How to obtain MAC address of WiFi network interface?

59,371

Solution 1

There has to be a way to get this address since it's shown in the "Settings > About Phone > Status" of the phone.

Which means, if nothing else, you can go putter around the Android open source code, perhaps using Google Code Search, to figure out where it pulls that from.

Doing a bit of puttering myself, it would appear it is using getMacAddress() from WifiInfo.

Solution 2

Late answer, but it can help others with the same "problem".

The answer is really straight forward:

WifiManager wifiMan = (WifiManager) this.getSystemService(
                Context.WIFI_SERVICE);
WifiInfo wifiInf = wifiMan.getConnectionInfo();
String macAddr = wifiInf.getMacAddress();

The above code will get you the MAC address of your device, remember to have wifi enabled when grabbing the address. This code snippet should be used in your Activity.

Solution 3

UPDATE:

Beginning Android 6.0, above API will give you constant MAC address for all the devices, which is 02:00:00:00:00:00. Refer below for details
http://developer.android.com/about/versions/marshmallow/android-6.0-changes.html
Found another post that claims to find MAC address in 6.0, not tested it though
How to get Wi-Fi Mac address in Android Marshmallow

Solution 4

On Android Q, there is no way to access mac address anymore.

WifiInfo.getMacAddress() will always return 02:00:00:00:00:00.

And WifiConfiguration.getRandomizedMacAddress() will not available anymore.

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Gubatron

I code for the masses, in the open. https://github.com/gubatron FrostWire.com Co-Founder, Maintainer DiarioBitcoin.com Founder, CTO

Updated on July 15, 2022

Comments

  • Gubatron
    Gubatron almost 2 years

    It seems the java.net.NetworkInterface implementation of android does not have a
    byte[] getHardwareAddress() method http://developer.android.com/reference/java/net/NetworkInterface.html

    I've found several forums of people trying to do this with no definitive answer, I need to get a somewhat cross-device UUID, so I can't rely on phone numbers or in ANDROID_ID (which can be overwritten and which I think depends on the user having a google account) http://developer.android.com/reference/android/provider/Settings.Secure.html#ANDROID_ID

    In linux you can use ifconfig or read from /proc/net/arp and you can easily get the Hardware address.

    Is there a file in android that I can read?

    There has to be a way to get this address since it's shown in the "Settings > About Phone > Status" of the phone.

  • rony l
    rony l about 13 years
    just to add some detail, you will have to add an appropriate permission to androidManifest.xml to get it to work: <uses-permission android:name="android.permission.ACCESS_WIFI_STATE"/>
  • jzafrilla
    jzafrilla over 10 years
    Not necesary to have wifi enabled to get MAC address. I get it with wifi off.
  • fernandohur
    fernandohur over 10 years
  • User
    User about 5 years
    This returns the same address as the adapter's (02:00:00:00:00:00)
  • cesargastonec
    cesargastonec over 3 years
    I used solution to get my own mac address from stackoverflow.com/questions/33103798/… on physical mobiles with Android 6, 7 and 8 and it works
  • cesargastonec
    cesargastonec over 3 years
    Solution from stackoverflow.com/questions/33103798/… to get my own mac address works for me on an Android 10 emulator
  • cesargastonec
    cesargastonec over 3 years
    It's a restriction introduced in Android 6.0
  • Amit Vaghela
    Amit Vaghela about 3 years