Be On Time with the Alarms & Clock App

Staying on time is an important necessity in today's busy world. Everywhere we turn there seems to be a method of keeping time. Why should your computer be any different? Sure, Windows has included a small clock in the task bar for years, but sometimes we need an alarm to help remind us of what we need to be doing, or even stop doing at a certain time.

To help stay on top of what, and when, you need to be doing things, Windows offers the alarm portion of the Alarms & Clock app. To get started with Alarms & Clock app, click the Start button and scroll to and click on Alarms & Clock to launch the app. Windows displays the Alarms & Clock app. (See Figure 1.)

Figure 1. The Alarm tab of the Alarms & Clock app.

By default, when you launch the Alarm & Clock app you are presented with the Alarm portion of the app. (If, for some reason, you don't see the Alarm portion, click the Alarm option at the top of the app's dialog box.) The app includes a default 7:00 AM alarm. You can create your own alarms, up to 32 total alarms, quickly and easily. To create your own alarm:

1. Click the Add New Alarm button (the plus icon) in the bottom bar of the app. You will then see the New Alarm section of the Alarms & Clock app. (See Figure 2.)



Figure 2. The New Alarm Section of Alarms & Clock app.

2. Set the time you want the alarm to be set for. For example, if I want to set an alarm for 6:30 AM, I would scroll the first column of numbers to 6, then the second column to 30, followed by AM in the third column.
3. Enter the name for your alarm under Alarm Name.
4. Under Repeat, you can choose the desired repeat schedule you prefer for your alarm. By default, the alarm will only be used once, until you turn it on again. Or, you can choose on which days of the week the alarm will repeat.
5. Under Sound, you can choose from 10 different sounds. By default, the sound Chimes is selected.
6. Under Snooze, you can choose from 5 different preset time durations, or you can disable the snooze. This will determine the amount of time that will pass if you press snooze when the alarm goes off. By default the Snooze time is set at 10 minutes.
7. Once you're done click on Save. Your alarm will now show up as "On" in your list of alarms, with the time, name, and repeat schedule you chose.

An important note: Alarms will only work properly when your computer is actually on. The alarm clock tab will display a Notifications Will Only Show If The PC Is Awake disclaimer. Some Windows 10 systems have InstantGo installed which allows the networking and clock functions to keep going while your PC is asleep.

Setting up alarms is easy, and using alarms is an easy way to stay on top of your day and all the many tasks you might have.

 This tip (13074) applies to Windows 10.