Live data in Rust+ (map, team, switches) travels directly between your phone and the server. Notifications do not. A smart alarm trigger goes from the server to Facepunch, from Facepunch to Google's push service, and from there to your phone. Any one of those legs can drop it while the app itself looks perfectly connected. That is why "the app works but I get no alerts" is so common.

1. Did the alert type ever get turned on?

Notifications are opt-in and are configured in the game, not in the app. On the server you are paired to, open ESC → Rust+ and look at the notification toggles: server events, team member logins, offline deaths, and so on. They are per server and default to a limited set. Smart alarms have their own setting on the alarm itself.

2. Is the smart alarm actually powered and paired?

A smart alarm that shows inactive in the app, or never fires, is usually one of:

• No power. Smart alarms need 1 rW. A dead battery at night takes the alarm with it.
• Not paired to your account. Pairing a smart device is per player: look at the device with a wire tool and press the pair option; accept the notification on your phone. A teammate's alarm does not notify you unless you paired it yourself.
• The three-minute cooldown. After an alarm sends a notification it will not send another for about three minutes, regardless of how many times it is triggered. Repeated test triggers make it look broken when it is not.
• Wired to a sensor that never trips. An HBHF sensor set to ignore authorised players will not fire for you or your team by design.

3. Can the phone receive pushes at all?

The same conditions that break pairing break every other notification, because they use the same push path:

• Notifications disabled for Rust+ in the phone's app settings, or the notification category for alarms muted.
• Battery optimisation, sleep or "adaptive" modes suspending the app. Samsung, Xiaomi, OnePlus and Huawei are known for this; exclude Rust+ from battery management.
• Do Not Disturb / Focus mode.
• No internet on the phone at that moment. A phone that was offline when a raid started may only get the alert much later, or not at all.

Test: press Pair with server in game on any server you are already paired with. The pairing notification uses the same delivery path. If it arrives, pushes work and the problem is steps 1, 2 or 5. If it does not, fix push delivery first.

4. Are you paired with a fresh token?

Every pairing stores a token that the server uses to address notifications to you. Wipes, restarts and some plugin updates invalidate it. The app keeps showing the server, live data may even work after reconnecting, but notifications go to a token the server no longer recognises. Remove the server from the app and pair again from in game. This is the number one "it worked yesterday" fix.

5. The server cannot reach Facepunch

Notifications originate on the server and go out to companion-rust.facepunch.com. If the server's host blocks outbound traffic, or Facepunch's service is degraded, alerts stop for everyone on the server while the direct connection keeps working. Ask a teammate whether they get alerts. If nobody does, it is the server or Facepunch: Facepunch's wiki says exactly that "if push notifications aren't working then make sure your server can access companion-rust.facepunch.com." A broken or shared companion.id file on the server has the same effect and, per Facepunch, "disables notification permission for all your players."

6. Too many devices, too many alerts

If you have paired the same account on several phones and tablets, each receives a copy; that is expected. What is not expected is one device receiving and another not, which almost always points back to step 3 on the silent device.

What "failed to set up notifications" means

Seeing Failed to set up notifications or Failed to get information from server in the app points at the handshake right after pairing, when the app registers for that server's notifications and pulls its details. In practice the reliable fix is: remove the server from the app, sign out and back in, and pair again from in game. If it repeats on one server only and other servers are fine, that server's side (outbound access to Facepunch, or its companion.id) is the likely cause, and only the admin can check it.

For rustplusplus users

The bot receives exactly these pushes through the FCM credentials you generated here. If the bot connects to the server but never posts alarm, death or pairing messages, its credentials have expired or were replaced: they last 14 days, and after that the bot silently stops receiving anything. Regenerate with Log In, run the new /credentials add … command, and re-pair devices that were paired under the old credentials. The bot's activity channel is a quick way to see whether any pushes are arriving at all.