It’s the perfect time to make sure that this feature on your Pixel’s iconic widget is toggled on

Many Pixel users enjoy having the “At a Glance” widget on their phone. With a quick look, they can see the day and date and some weather information including the temperature and a cartoon image depicting rain, sun, clouds and rain. And the widget also looks at their Google Calendar app so that it can show any upcoming appointments. Such prime real estate on the phone, which is viewed by many, would be the perfect place to add some type of alert that requires the user’s immediate attention.

So now, the At a Glance widget is delivering important weather alerts. Using the same format employed for upcoming calendar events, the widget will use two lines to grab your attention. The first line, in large print, will say something like “Winter Storm Warning” while the second line kicks off with a triangle showing an exclamation point in the middle which denotes a warning. That is followed by the name of the agency that issued the warning; in this case, it would say the “National Weather Service” in the U.S.

If you want to make sure that you receive certain alerts through the At a Glance widget, long press on your Pixel’s home screen just under the widget. Tap on “preferences” and you’ll see three options to toggle including Calendar (Next upcoming meeting alerts), Weather alerts (Forecasts for severe weather), and Work profile (Next upcoming alerts from work profile).

Some in the southern U.S. are expected to experience unusually cold weather tonight and tomorrow (the forecasts calls for a bone chilling low of 44 degrees in South Florida on Saturday). It would be a propitious time for Pixel users to make sure that the settings for their At a Glance widget show that severe weather alerts are enabled.