How do notification settings differ between mobile and desktop?

Notification capabilities on Reddit differ substantially between mobile apps and the desktop/web interface, and understanding those differences helps users configure each environment to serve their needs without being overwhelmed or missing important activity. On mobile, Reddit supports push notifications — alerts that appear on the device's lock screen or notification center even when the app is not open. These can be configured granularly within the app's settings. The categories available include replies to your comments, comments on your posts, mentions of your username, private messages, chat messages, upvote milestones for your posts, new followers, and community recommendations. Reddit's notification management page in the mobile app also lets users subscribe to specific posts for updates, which is useful for following a thread you want to monitor without bookmarking it manually. Push notifications are the primary mechanism through which most casual Reddit users stay connected to conversations they care about. On the web interface, Reddit uses in-platform inbox notifications rather than push notifications. The notification bell icon in the navigation bar updates when there is new activity — replies, mentions, messages — and clicking it opens an inbox view. Browser-level push notifications can be enabled in some browsers if the user grants permission to reddit.com, but this is a browser-level feature rather than a Reddit-configured one, and it is less reliable and more limited than native mobile push notifications. The scope of configurable notifications is broader on mobile than on the web. Mobile settings expose finer-grained controls over notification types, including the ability to toggle specific notification categories independently. On the web, notification preferences are fewer and less granular. Moderators have access to additional notification types related to modmail, modqueue activity, and community-specific alerts, and these are most comprehensively managed through the desktop interface or through third-party moderator tools. If you are a moderator, configuring modmail notifications to ensure prompt responses — regardless of whether you are on mobile or desktop — is a priority, since delayed modmail responses are a common source of member frustration.