Notifications

In mobile app testing, verifying notifications is an important part as well as a challenging job some times. Notifications can include messages, alerts, or reminders sent by an app to grab the user's attention, even if the app is running in the background. Appium allows you to automate and validate these notifications, ensuring they appear as they should and contain the correct information.

Notifications are a key part of user engagement. For example:

  • Push Notifications: Alerts sent from a server to notify users about updates, offers, or reminders.
  • In-App Notifications: Notifications that appear while the user is using the app.
  • System Notifications: Notifications related to the app but managed by the device's system, like battery alerts or permission reminders.

On Android, we can access the notification drawer (where notifications are shown) and validate their content.

  1. Open the Notification Drawer: Use Appium’s driver.openNotifications() method to pull down the notification drawer, where all the notifications are displayed.
  2. Locate the Notification: Identify the notification by its text, title, or any unique property.
  3. Validate the Notification Content: Check if the notification displays the correct message or title.
  4. Interact with the Notification (Optional): You can also click on the notification to see if it opens the correct screen in your app.
Java
C#
Python
Javascript
Kotlin
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//Start by launching the main app
UiAutomator2Options options = new UiAutomator2Options();
options.setPlatformName("Android");
options.setPlatformVersion("12");
options.setAppPackage("com.example.demoapp");
options.setDeviceName("Pixel_4_Emulator");
options.setAutomationName("UiAutomator2");
options.setApp("/path/to/your/app.apk");

URL appiumServerUrl = new URL("http://localhost:4723");
AndroidDriver driver = new AndroidDriver<>(appiumServerUrl, options);

// Step 1: Open the Notification Drawer
driver.openNotifications();
Thread.sleep(2000); // Wait a moment for notifications to appear

// Step 2: Locate the Notification by text or ID (if possible)
WebElement notificationTitle = driver.findElement(By.xpath("//android.widget.TextView[@text='Your Notification Title']"));
WebElement notificationText = driver.findElement(By.xpath("//android.widget.TextView[contains(@text, 'Your notification message')]"));

// Step 3: Validate Notification Content
if (notificationTitle != null && notificationText != null) {
    System.out.println("Notification found with correct title and message!");
} else {
    System.out.println("Notification not found or text did not match!");
}

// (Optional) Step 4: Click on the Notification
notificationTitle.click();

driver.quit();
C# code coming soon
Python code coming soon
Javascript code coming soon
Kotlin code coming soon