Silence is bliss ... except when your phone has stopped ringing and you miss important calls you wanted or needed to receive. If you’re the owner of an Android phone, having to whittle down all the reasons why you can't hear your device ring can be off-putting; however, before you blame it on a faulty phone, see if any of the following reasons fix the problem.

Silent Modes

The first setting you’ll want to check is to see if you’re in Silent or Do Not Disturb mode — you may have accidentally enabled one of these modes or simply forgotten you turned it on. Not all Android devices have a Sound button, so press the volume button up to move out of Silent.

Airplane Mode

All Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, and cellular functions are turned off in Airplane mode, so you won't be able to make or receive calls or access the internet until the setting is disabled. Either swipe down to access your phone’s notification menu or head to Settings to turn off the mode.

Call Forwarding

When call forwarding is on, your calls are sent to a second cell phone or landline. To disable the feature and resume getting calls, open the Phone app > the Dial or Keypad option > the three-dot icon in top right corner > Call Settings > Additional Settings > Call Forwarding.

Ringtone

If your phone has stopped ringing and you're using a third-party ringtone, it's best to set your phone back to its default ringtone to see if it goes back to ringing as expected. Open the Settings app, tap Sound, scroll down and select the ringtone you want, and tap OK to enable it.

Damaged Speaker

If none of these troubleshooting methods have fixed the problem, there's a chance your smartphone's speaker may be physically damaged. If you try to listen to a song or watch a video through the phone’s built-in speaker and nothing plays, take the phone to a servicing center.