Google Pixel 3, Pixel 3 XL Fingerprint Reader Doesn’t Reliably Show Notifications, Users Report

Google Pixel 3's list of bugs continues to grow as a new problem has come to the fore. On some Android phones with a rear fingerprint scanner, you can swipe on the scanner to quickly view notifications. This gesture appears to be buggy for quite a few people who use Google Pixel 3 and Pixel 3 XL. Once you swipe down on the fingerprint scanner, the notifications should appear on screen. But many people using the Pixel 3 and the Pixel 3 XL have been claiming that it doesn't work reliably. Some have reported that the gesture works perfectly on a Pixel 2, but on the Pixel 3 it takes a few tries to make it work.

This issue was first reported in a Reddit thread all the way back in October, and posted to Google's Issue Tracker in November. It's come to the fore now as the bug has not been fixed yet, and an increasing number of people have been reporting this issue on Reddit and the Issue Tracker thread.

According to those who have reported the fingerprint scanner swipe notifications bug on the Google Pixel 3, there are a few ways to make the gesture work properly. One of the possible fixes is to swipe slowly to make the gesture reliably, and another one mentions using only the tip of the finger to swipe down, to make this gesture work reliably. All of these fixes sound flaky and point towards the fact that Google's flagship smartphone continues to be plagued by bugs that take months to fix.

This is far from the first set of bugs reported on the Google Pixel 3 and the Pixel 3 XL in the two months since launch. Many have recently reported poor sound quality on phone calls and microphone failures. Before that there were serious memory management issues that would force quit apps aggressively, which was claimed to be fixed in the December update.

Pixel 3 was also erasing some people's text messages without warning, showing a 'fatal error' when some tried to open the camera app, overheating and shutting down without warning while charging, on some units Pixel 3 display was seen to be flickering, featured speaker distortions and buzzing, and not to forget, failing to save photos reliably.

Can Google Pixel 3 succeed without massive discounts? We discussed this on Orbital, our weekly technology podcast, which you can subscribe to via Apple Podcasts or RSS, download the episode, or just hit the play button below.