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Notifications

Polkadot Live offers a flexible notification system powered by subscriptions, allowing you to monitor on-chain activity across accounts, governance, and staking. Notifications are delivered both as native OS notifications and as event items within the app's main window. These event items often include helpful links to external tools like Subscan or the Staking Dashboard, depending on the notification type.

Subscription types

There are currently two main types of subscriptions in Polkadot Live, with support for on-demand previews as well:

  • Automatic subscriptionsThese trigger notifications immediately when a tracked on-chain value changes. For example, if a balance subscription is active for an account, you'll be notified as soon as that account sends or receives funds.
  • Interval subscriptionsThese are ideal for tracking slower-moving metrics, such as OpenGov referenda. You can configure a custom interval (e.g. every 60 minutes) to receive updates, such as the latest Aye/Nay vote percentages on a referendum.
  • One-shot previewsSome subscriptions can be previewed by clicking a "one-shot" button. This gives you a real-time look at the event data without enabling continuous tracking.

Available subscriptions

Polkadot Live supports subscriptions for a variety of data types across Substrate-based chains, including:

  • Account metricsTrack free, frozen, reserved, and spendable balances for any imported account.
  • Staking activityGet updates on staking rewards, validator exposure, commission changes, and more—whether you're staking directly or via a pool.
  • OpenGov activityFollow key metrics from referenda, including vote counts and and referenda listings.

Subscriptions are available for both fully controlled and read-only accounts, allowing you to monitor on-chain activity even if you don't control the private key.

Notification delivery

Whenever a subscription is triggered, an event item is always created and displayed in the main window. These items often include contextual links for deeper inspection—such as to Subscan, the Staking Dashboard, or OpenGov portals, depending on the type of event.

In addition to in-app event items, Polkadot Live can also display native OS notifications in your desktop environment. These alerts are optional and fully configurable:

  • GloballyToggle native OS notifications on or off for the entire app. They are enabled by default.
  • Per subscriptionEach subscription has its own setting to control whether a native notification is shown when triggered.

This gives you fine-grained control over how you stay informed—whether through quiet in-app updates, desktop alerts, or both.

Looking ahead

The number and variety of available subscriptions is expected to grow as Polkadot Live continues to evolve. This will offer even more fine-grained ways to stay informed about activity across your accounts and networks.