Yes, an app using NotificationListenerService in Android can determine the notification channel (and thus its category or name) for notifications it receives, but with some important caveats:

How It Works

1. NotificationListenerService allows an app to receive notifications posted by other apps, but only if the user explicitly grants permission (via Notification Access in settings).

2. When a notification is received in the listener's onNotificationPosted callback, the app gets a StatusBarNotification object. From this, you can extract:

   • The Notification object (via getNotification()).
   • The package name of the app that posted the notification (via getPackageName()).

3. To get the channel name (NotificationChannel.getName):

   • You need the NotificationChannel associated with the notification.
   • Starting from Android 8.0 (Oreo), notifications are assigned to channels, and you can retrieve the channel ID from the Notification object using:
     java

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     String channelId = notification.getChannelId();

   • To get the channel name, you need to query the NotificationManager of the app that posted the notification:
     java

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     NotificationManager notificationManager = (NotificationManager) context.getSystemService(Context.NOTIFICATION_SERVICE);
     NotificationChannel channel = notificationManager.getNotificationChannel(channelId);
     String channelName = channel.getName();

   • However, your app cannot directly access the NotificationManager of other apps due to Android's sandboxing. You can only access your own app's NotificationManager.

Workarounds

1. For Your Own App's Notifications: If the notification is from your own app, you can directly query your NotificationManager to get the channel name.

2. For Other Apps' Notifications:

   • No direct API: There is no official API to fetch the NotificationChannel details (like name or description) of another app.
   • Reflection (Hacky and Unreliable): Some developers have tried using reflection to access the NotificationManager of other apps, but this is:
     • Unreliable (breaks with Android updates).
     • Requires system-level permissions (not available to regular apps).
     • Violates Android's security model (your app could be rejected from the Play Store).
   • Alternative: If the notification's Notification object includes the channel name in its content (e.g., in the title or text), you could parse it, but this is not guaranteed.

3. Android 13+ (API 33+):

   • Starting from Android 13, the NotificationListenerService can request additional permissions to access more details about notifications, but channel names are still not directly exposed for other apps.

What You Can Access

From StatusBarNotification and Notification, you can reliably get:

• The app package name (e.g., com.whatsapp).
• The notification channel ID (e.g., messages).
• The notification title, text, and other metadata (if not restricted by the app).

But not the channel name unless the app explicitly includes it in the notification content.

Example Code (Limited to Your App's Notifications)

@Override
public void onNotificationPosted(StatusBarNotification sbn) {
    Notification notification = sbn.getNotification();
    if (notification != null) {
        String channelId = notification.getChannelId();
        NotificationManager nm = (NotificationManager) getSystemService(NOTIFICATION_SERVICE);
        NotificationChannel channel = nm.getNotificationChannel(channelId);
        if (channel != null) {
            String channelName = channel.getName(); // Works only for your app's notifications
            Log.d("NotificationListener", "Channel Name: " + channelName);
        }
    }
}

Conclusion

• For your own app: Yes, you can get the channel name.
• For other apps: No, unless the app explicitly includes the channel name in the notification content or you use unreliable hacks (not recommended).
• Android 13+: Still no direct access to other apps' channel names.

Would you like help exploring alternative approaches for your use case?