eBay alerts on iPhone and Android: real-time push notifications

The listings worth an alert are the ones that sell fast: an underpriced Buy It Now for a known item goes to whoever sees it first, often within a minute or two. An email you read at lunch is a report on something already sold. A push notification that arrives on your phone within about 15 to 45 seconds of the listing going live, with the title and price on the lock screen and the listing one tap away, is what makes it possible to be that first person without sitting at a computer.

eBay's own app can notify you about saved searches, but on its own schedule, which is not published and is not real time. A dedicated alert app checks the public search results for each monitor as often as every minute and pushes the moment a new listing matches your keywords, price range, condition, listing type and negative keywords. It does not bid or buy anything; it gets you to the listing, and the purchase is yours to make in the eBay app or a browser.

The eSnipe app is on the App Store for iPhone at https://apps.apple.com/app/esnipe/id6758319934 and on Google Play for Android at https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.automate.esnipe.app. Search the store for the name if you prefer, and check the developer matches before installing. The app is free, like the web dashboard, and there is no subscription to unlock alerts.

Sign in with the same account you use at esnipe.app on the web: either the email and password you registered with, or the Discord login if that is how you signed up. This matters because the monitors are attached to the account, not the device. Sign in with the same credentials and every monitor you built on the web is already there on the phone; sign in with a different email and you get an empty account and no alerts, which is the single most common reason a new install shows nothing.

If you have never used the web dashboard, create the account in the app instead; it will then work on the web too, where the larger screen makes building and tuning monitors easier.

On first launch, or when you first turn on phone delivery for a monitor, the app asks for permission to send notifications. On iOS this is a one-time system prompt, and tapping Don't Allow is remembered; the app cannot ask again, and you have to go to Settings, Notifications, find the app and turn Allow Notifications on by hand. On Android 13 and later the prompt is similar, and a denied permission can be restored from Settings, Apps, the app, Notifications.

Allowing notifications is necessary but not always sufficient. On iOS, check that the alert style is Banners or Alerts rather than none, that Sounds is on if you want to hear it, and that the app is allowed to show on the Lock Screen, since a listing that arrives while the phone is in your pocket is the one you most need to see. On Android, the app registers a notification channel for alerts; open it in the app's notification settings and confirm its importance is high enough to make a sound and pop on screen, not just sit silently in the shade.

A quick test is worth the minute. Create or open a monitor with keywords broad enough to match something within a few minutes, turn on phone delivery, and wait for the first notification with the phone locked. If it appears on the lock screen with a sound, the permissions are right; if it only shows when you unlock, one of the settings above is still off.

Two iOS features are designed to reduce interruptions, and both will hold an alert until it is useless if you let them. The first is Focus. Do Not Disturb, Sleep, Work, Driving and any custom Focus silence every app that is not on the allowed list, and they turn on automatically by schedule, by location or when CarPlay connects. Open Settings, Focus, choose each Focus you use, and under Allowed Notifications add the app to the list of apps that can break through. Do it for every Focus, not just the one you are in now.

The second is Notification Summary, which collects notifications from chosen apps and delivers them in a batch at set times. It is a good feature for newsletters and a bad one for listings that sell in a minute. Open Settings, Notifications, Scheduled Summary, and make sure the app is not in the summary list; if it is, remove it so alerts are delivered immediately. Also check Screen Time if you use downtime limits, since those can hide notifications from apps outside the always-allowed set.

Android saves battery by putting idle apps into a restricted state called Doze, and some manufacturers add their own more aggressive layers on top. In that state, a push can be held for minutes before the system wakes the app to show it. For a weather app that is fine; for a listing alert it is the difference between buying and reading about it. The fix is to exempt the app from battery optimisation: open Settings, Apps, the app, Battery, and choose Unrestricted or Don't optimise, depending on the phone's wording.

Some manufacturers need a second step. Phones from Samsung, Xiaomi, Huawei, OnePlus and others have their own battery managers that close background apps or block auto-start, usually in the same Battery screen or a separate device-care app. Look for settings named auto-start, background activity or sleeping apps, and make sure the alert app is allowed to run in the background and is not on a sleeping list.

Then check the notification channel. Android lets you set importance per channel, and if the alert channel is set to silent or low, the notification arrives on time but does not make a sound or appear over other apps. Set it to high or urgent, give it a distinct sound, and, if your phone supports it, allow it to bypass Do Not Disturb so a night-time listing still wakes you if that is what you want.

Phone push is the fastest path from alert to purchase, and that is exactly why it should be rationed. A notification that interrupts you is worth it for the handful of monitors where you would buy on sight at the price you set: the one part you need for a restoration, the reference you have been hunting for a year, the current-generation GPU under your resale ceiling. It is not worth it for a wide research monitor that produces twenty alerts a day, and if you route that to your phone, you will start swiping them away without reading, including the one that mattered.

Discord is the right home for everything you want to read rather than pounce on. Each monitor can post to its own channel through a webhook, so the history is scrollable, the embed shows price, condition and a photo at a glance, several people can watch the same feed, and a noisy monitor can be muted without losing the record. Delivery is chosen per monitor, so the arrangement most people settle on is both: a few urgent monitors to phone push and Discord, everything else to Discord only.

Bring it together. First, install the app from the App Store or Google Play using the links above. Second, sign in with the same email and password, or the same Discord login, that you use at esnipe.app; if you are new, create the account in the app and it will work on the web too. Third, when the app asks, allow notifications, and then check the platform settings: on iPhone, add the app to every Focus mode's allowed list and keep it out of Notification Summary; on Android, set the app's battery usage to Unrestricted and the alert channel to high importance.

Fourth, create or edit a monitor. On the web or in the app, give it a name, put the exact phrase you would type into eBay in Search keywords, add comma-separated Negative keywords, set a Min and Max price, pick a Condition and a Listing type, and set the check frequency to every minute for anything time-sensitive. Choose phone push for that monitor, and add a Discord webhook as well if you want a record. Fifth, test it: pick a monitor broad enough to match something soon, lock the phone, and confirm the notification appears on the lock screen with a sound. If it does, every monitor with phone delivery will now reach you the same way.

eSnipe does all of this for free, with unlimited monitors and no eBay account required, because it watches public search results rather than your eBay login. When a notification arrives, tap it, check the listing and the seller, and buy if it is right. The app tells you the listing exists; it never bids, snipes or purchases on your behalf, and it is not affiliated with eBay.

If a monitor shows matches in the app or on the web but the phone never buzzes, the problem is delivery, and it is almost always one of the settings above. Work through them in order: notifications allowed, alert style and lock screen on, not in a Focus that blocks it, not in Notification Summary, battery unrestricted, notification channel importance high. Sign out and back in on the phone if you have changed accounts, since the device registers for push under the account that is signed in.

If alerts arrive late, check the monitor's check frequency first, since a monitor set to every 15 minutes cannot alert within a minute, then the battery settings on Android. If they arrive on time but you still miss listings, the listing sold between the notification and your tap; be quicker, or tighten the ceiling so fewer, better alerts get your full attention. If nothing arrives at all, confirm the keywords produce results on eBay right now and the price range is not so tight that nothing qualifies.