Android Receive SMS Tutorial

This Android tutorial will walk you through to create an Android application to receive SMS messages in your Android mobile. SMS is popular utility now loosing sheen to Internet based instant messenger services like Whatsapp.

We will be using a BroadcastReceiver to receive the messages and parse the SMS message out of it and update our UI. We will also show a toast message. In a previous Android tutorial to send SMS we created an app to send SMS messages. These two tutorials combined together will create one complete SMS Android application.

Receive SMS Application

AndroidReceiveSMS

Application uses the basis Android constructs. We should know about using BroadcastReceiver and using Android ListView. Knowing these two is enough to build this Android SMS application.

AndroidManifest.xml

Couple of things to note in the Android manifest file. Add permission to receive, read and write SMS to the application. Then add the broadcast receiver with an intent-filter to receiving SMS.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<manifest xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    package="com.javapapers.androidreceivesms" >
    <uses-permission android:name="android.permission.WRITE_SMS" />
    <uses-permission android:name="android.permission.READ_SMS" />
    <uses-permission android:name="android.permission.RECEIVE_SMS" />
    <application
        android:allowBackup="true"
        android:icon="@drawable/ic_launcher"
        android:label="@string/app_name"
        android:theme="@style/AppTheme" >
        <activity
            android:name=".SmsActivity"
            android:label="@string/app_name" >
            <intent-filter>
                <action android:name="android.intent.action.MAIN" />

                <category android:name="android.intent.category.LAUNCHER" />
            </intent-filter>
        </activity>

        <receiver android:name=".SmsBroadcastReceiver" android:exported="true" >
            <intent-filter android:priority="999" >
                <action android:name="android.provider.Telephony.SMS_RECEIVED" />
            </intent-filter>
        </receiver>

    </application>

</manifest>

SmsBroadcastReceiver.java

This is a BroadcastReceiver which receives the intent-filtered SMS messages. onReceive, we extract the SMS message bundle and show a toast message and also update the UI by adding the SMS message to the SMS inbox list. When a SMS message arrives, the inbox is automatically refreshed.

package com.javapapers.androidreceivesms;

import android.content.BroadcastReceiver;
import android.content.Context;
import android.content.Intent;
import android.os.Bundle;
import android.telephony.SmsMessage;
import android.widget.Toast;

public class SmsBroadcastReceiver extends BroadcastReceiver {

    public static final String SMS_BUNDLE = "pdus";

    public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) {
        Bundle intentExtras = intent.getExtras();
        if (intentExtras != null) {
            Object[] sms = (Object[]) intentExtras.get(SMS_BUNDLE);
            String smsMessageStr = "";
            for (int i = 0; i < sms.length; ++i) {
                SmsMessage smsMessage = SmsMessage.createFromPdu((byte[]) sms[i]);

                String smsBody = smsMessage.getMessageBody().toString();
                String address = smsMessage.getOriginatingAddress();

                smsMessageStr += "SMS From: " + address + "\n";
                smsMessageStr += smsBody + "\n";
            }
            Toast.makeText(context, smsMessageStr, Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();

            //this will update the UI with message
            SmsActivity inst = SmsActivity.instance();
            inst.updateList(smsMessageStr);
        }
    }
}

SmsActivity.java

This is the main Android activity of the SMS application. It acts as the SMS inbox. It has a ListView to show the SMS messages. onCreate we read all the messages present in the internal SMS inbox from its Uri and show them using the ListView.

package com.javapapers.androidreceivesms;

import android.app.Activity;
import android.content.ContentResolver;
import android.database.Cursor;
import android.net.Uri;
import android.os.Bundle;
import android.view.View;
import android.widget.AdapterView;
import android.widget.AdapterView.OnItemClickListener;
import android.widget.ArrayAdapter;
import android.widget.ListView;
import android.widget.Toast;

import java.util.ArrayList;

public class SmsActivity extends Activity implements OnItemClickListener {

    private static SmsActivity inst;
    ArrayList<String> smsMessagesList = new ArrayList<String>();
    ListView smsListView;
    ArrayAdapter arrayAdapter;

    public static SmsActivity instance() {
        return inst;
    }

    @Override
    public void onStart() {
        super.onStart();
        inst = this;
    }

    @Override
    protected void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.activity_sms);
        smsListView = (ListView) findViewById(R.id.SMSList);
        arrayAdapter = new ArrayAdapter<String>(this, android.R.layout.simple_list_item_1, smsMessagesList);
        smsListView.setAdapter(arrayAdapter);
        smsListView.setOnItemClickListener(this);

        refreshSmsInbox();
    }

    public void refreshSmsInbox() {
        ContentResolver contentResolver = getContentResolver();
        Cursor smsInboxCursor = contentResolver.query(Uri.parse("content://sms/inbox"), null, null, null, null);
        int indexBody = smsInboxCursor.getColumnIndex("body");
        int indexAddress = smsInboxCursor.getColumnIndex("address");
        if (indexBody < 0 || !smsInboxCursor.moveToFirst()) return;
        arrayAdapter.clear();
        do {
            String str = "SMS From: " + smsInboxCursor.getString(indexAddress) +
                    "\n" + smsInboxCursor.getString(indexBody) + "\n";
            arrayAdapter.add(str);
        } while (smsInboxCursor.moveToNext());
    }

    public void updateList(final String smsMessage) {
        arrayAdapter.insert(smsMessage, 0);
        arrayAdapter.notifyDataSetChanged();
    }

    public void onItemClick(AdapterView<?> parent, View view, int pos, long id) {
        try {
            String[] smsMessages = smsMessagesList.get(pos).split("\n");
            String address = smsMessages[0];
            String smsMessage = "";
            for (int i = 1; i < smsMessages.length; ++i) {
                smsMessage += smsMessages[i];
            }

            String smsMessageStr = address + "\n";
            smsMessageStr += smsMessage;
            Toast.makeText(this, smsMessageStr, Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
        } catch (Exception e) {
            e.printStackTrace();
        }
    }
}

activity_sms.xml

Following is the layout file.

<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?>
<LinearLayout xmlns:android="http://schemas.android.com/apk/res/android"
    android:orientation="vertical" android:layout_width="fill_parent"
    android:layout_height="fill_parent" android:id="@+id/MainLayout"
    >

    <TextView
        android:layout_width="wrap_content"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:textAppearance="?android:attr/textAppearanceMedium"
        android:text="SMS Inbox"
        android:id="@+id/textView"
        android:layout_gravity="center_horizontal" />

    <ListView android:id="@+id/SMSList"
        android:layout_height="wrap_content"
        android:layout_width="match_parent"
        android:layout_margin="5dp" />

</LinearLayout>

AndroidReceiveSMS

How to test SMS Application in Android Emulator

We need not have a real Android mobile to test this Android application. The Android emulator provides the facility to send test SMS messages to the deployed app via the DDMS Emulator Control as shown below.