Disclosed are systems, methods, and non-transitory computer-readable storage media for notifying context clients of changes to the current context of a computing device. In some implementations, a context client can register to be called back when the context daemon detects specified context. For example, the context client can specify a context in which the context client is interested. When the context daemon detects that the current context of the computing device corresponds to the registered context, the context daemon can notify the context client that the current context matches the context in which the context client is interested. Thus, context clients do not require the programming necessary to independently obtain context updates and detect changes in context that are relevant or of interest to the context client.