This short article explains how you can disable the iPhone Cellular Calls feature so that your Mac will not ring and you will not be getting calls on your Mac when you receive calls.
See also: FaceTime Green Screen on iPad, iPhone or Mac
This feature is enabled by default. If you find this feature annoying (because your Mac will ring every time when your iPhone rings), then this article is for you.
This is part of the Continuity feature. And one feature of it is called “iPhone Cellular Calls”. This will let you make and receive phone calls from your Mac, as long as your iPhone and your Mar are on the same Wi-Fi network and are signed into the same iCloud account and FaceTime. This calls will use your iPhone’s cellular account and service. This will use your cellular minutes.
Turn off Calls from iPhone
You can turn this off on your Mac and on your iPhone. Your iPhone is where you change settings to stop the ringing on all your other Apple devices (Mac and iPad).
See also: FaceTime not working?
Here is how:
iPhone
- Tap Settings
- Tap Cellular
- Tap Calls on Other Devices
- Here you may want to turn this off completely, or you can turn off specific devices (if you have more than one).
Now your other device, e.g., your Mac, will not ring.
Mac
- Open FaceTime on your Mac, you will need to change preferences in FaceTime on your Mac
- From the top menu, FaceTime > Preferences.
- And then unselect the box for “Calls from iPhone“
- And you are done.
Now your iPhone calls will not be available on your iMac.
See also: FaceTime Call Won’t End
My facetime preferences does not include this option Catalina 10.15.2
Hi Scott, I’m on Catalina 10.15.6, current version. My Facetime had the field and unchecked it. It was similar to as pictured above in its own section around the middle of the options. My FaceTime version is 5.0 (3080). Hope this helps!
I have both of these options (on my phone and mac) unchecked, yet every time my phone rings it STILL comes through on my mac. Is there something else I’m maybe missing?
Yeah, me too. I’ve done all these things and my mac still keeps ringing. It is infuriating me.
Same! I even tried connecting to two different networks, changing the ringtone in FaceTime, and unchecking my phone number from FaceTime.
OK I have two phones I turned the FT off for the phone that I do not want to use on my iMac and that works. On that phone I have “Other Devises” not enabled yet the iMac still rings when I the phone rings.
OK this prevent from receiving calls on your Mac. But I would like to continue receiving calls, but just not having my computer ringing…
System Preferences, Notifications, FaceTime, uncheck “Play sound for notifications”.
Your iMac will continue receiving calls without the sound of a ringer.
This is just another example of how Apple’s software QA has hit an all-time low and is showing few signs of improving. This is what used to be called a killer app, for people that use a Mac for work. The concepts all sound great but Apple have delivered a subsystem that treads a narrow line between being a productivity boon and a threat to making or managing calls through your Mac and iPhone. There are times when it is just so unreliable I have to revert to my headset connecting directly to my iPhone, via BlueTooth. Also, the immovable object, that is the call status window will start to annoy the hell out of you, especially if you have to provide remote support to clients and have to start juggling/resizing windows to get to stuff that’s stuck behind it. This window used to be movable but some bright spark at Apple decided that it needed to be stuck in place. I challenge anybody to explain why this is a good idea! It’s no wonder so many people just want to turn it off!