UK Emergency Alert Test: Will your phone siren on September 7

The UK will hold a second test of its emergency alert system on 7 September 2025 – find out all you need to know in this video explainer.

Transcript

00:00Mobile phones across the nation are expected to light up around 3pm on Sunday the 7th of

00:05September as part of the UK government's plan to test their emergency alert system.

00:10Emergency alerts, which appears with notifications on your smartphone,

00:14are used to warn citizens of danger, including extreme weather.

00:18The test will be the second of its kind, the first was in April 2023.

00:24The UK government says they are committed to testing the system regularly to make sure it

00:28works optimally and that the public are familiar with the alerts.

00:32Expect your mobile phone to vibrate and make a loud siren sound for 10 seconds,

00:37even if you typically keep it on silent.

00:39If you receive this notification on 7th of September and you've forgotten about the test,

00:44hopefully you won't panic for too long, a message will appear on your screen

00:48confirming that the alert is only a test.

00:51According to gov.uk, there are approximately 87 million mobile phones in the UK.