[iOS] Foreground push notifications not displaying in v23.8.6 (works in v23.8.4)

[hoyoung0]

I'm experiencing an issue where foreground push notifications stopped working on iOS after upgrading from @react-native-firebase/messaging v23.8.4 to v23.8.6.

Environment

• @react-native-firebase/messaging: 23.8.6
• expo: 54.0.32
• expo-notifications: 0.32.12
• react-native: 0.81.5
• Platform: iOS (both simulator and real device)

What I've tried

1. Set up notification handler

import * as Notifications from 'expo-notifications';

export const setForegroundPushNotification = () => {
  Notifications.setNotificationHandler({
    handleNotification: async (notification) => {
      console.log('🔵 handleNotification called for:', notification.request.content.title);
      return {
        shouldPlaySound: true,
        shouldSetBadge: false,
        shouldShowBanner: true,
        shouldShowList: true,
        shouldShowAlert: true,
      };
    },
  });
};

// Called at app startup (in app/_layout.tsx)
setForegroundPushNotification();

2. Handle FCM messages

import { getMessaging, onMessage } from '@react-native-firebase/messaging';

onMessage(getMessaging(), async (remoteMessage) => {
  console.log('Foreground message received:', remoteMessage);

  try {
    const notificationId = await Notifications.scheduleNotificationAsync({
      content: {
        title: remoteMessage.notification?.title ?? 'Notification',
        body: remoteMessage.notification?.body ?? '',
        sound: 'default',
        data: remoteMessage.data,
      },
      trigger: null,
    });
    console.log('✅ Notification scheduled with ID:', notificationId);
  } catch (error) {
    console.error('❌ Failed to schedule notification:', error);
  }
});

3. Added firebase.json

{
  "react-native": {
    "messaging_ios_foreground_presentation_options": []
  }
}

Current behavior (v23.8.6)

• ✅ FCM messages are received (confirmed in logs)
• ✅ handleNotification is called successfully
• ✅ scheduleNotificationAsync completes without errors
• ❌ Notification banner does NOT appear on screen

Working behavior (v23.8.4)

• Everything above works identically
• ✅ Notification banner DOES appear on screen

Question

Is there a breaking change or configuration change between v23.8.4 and v23.8.6 that I'm missing? The exact same code works perfectly in v23.8.4 but fails to display notifications in v23.8.6.

I suspect this might be related to PR #8786 (delegate call order changes in willPresentNotification), but I'm not sure how to properly configure it for the new version.

Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Logs

LOG  🎯 Setting foreground push notification handler
LOG  🎯 Handler set: [object Object]
LOG  📨 Foreground FCM message received: {...}
LOG  🔵 handleNotification called for: Test Notification
LOG  ✅ Notification scheduled with ID: def60a70-...

Everything appears to work in logs, but no visual notification appears.

[RodSarhan]

I've been stuck on an old version because of this issue too, when using expo-notifications with the latest version of react-native-firebase/messaging i am no longer able to present local notifications

[mikehardy]

Hmm - this is logged as a discussion but that won't prompt focused attention in our workflows on this repository.

Is this logged as an issue anywhere? If so, we should discuss there with a reproduction and full version information, if not, I'd be grateful if an issue was created with that information and linked here 🙏

[nidhi-canopas]

It's working for me with version 23.8.8
The only thing we need to care is to add <project_root>/firebase.json with below config.

{
    "react-native": {
      "messaging_ios_foreground_presentation_options": [
        "badge",
        "sound",
        "list",
        "banner"
      ]
    }
  }

For more info refer React native firebase foreground notifications

With this approach there's no need to perform step 2 (Handle FCM messages). Just step 1 is sufficient.