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Is there a unique Android device ID?

Do Android devices have a unique ID, and if so, what is a simple way to access it using Java?

Answer*

I think this is sure fire way of building a skeleton for a unique ID...  check it out.

Pseudo-Unique ID, that works on all Android devices
Some devices don't have a phone (eg. Tablets) or for some reason, you don't want to include the READ_PHONE_STATE permission. You can still read details like ROM Version, Manufacturer name, CPU type, and other hardware details, that will be well suited if you want to use the ID for a serial key check, or other general purposes. The ID computed in this way won't be unique: it is possible to find two devices with the same ID (based on the same hardware and ROM image) but the changes in real-world applications are negligible. For this purpose you can use the Build class:

    
    String m_szDevIDShort = "35" + //we make this look like a valid IMEI
            	Build.BOARD.length()%10+ Build.BRAND.length()%10 +
            	Build.CPU_ABI.length()%10 + Build.DEVICE.length()%10 +
            	Build.DISPLAY.length()%10 + Build.HOST.length()%10 +
            	Build.ID.length()%10 + Build.MANUFACTURER.length()%10 +
            	Build.MODEL.length()%10 + Build.PRODUCT.length()%10 +
            	Build.TAGS.length()%10 + Build.TYPE.length()%10 +
            	Build.USER.length()%10 ; //13 digits

Most of the Build members are strings, what we're doing here is to take their length and transform it via modulo in a digit. We have 13 such digits and we are adding two more in front (35) to have the same size ID as the IMEI (15 digits). There are other possibilities here are well, just have a look at these strings.
Returns something like `355715565309247`. No special permission is required, making this approach very convenient.

---
(Extra info: The technique given above was copied from an article on [Pocket Magic][1].)

  [1]: http://www.pocketmagic.net/?p=1662

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10

Interesting solution. It sounds like this is a situation where you really should be just hashing all that data concatenated instead of trying to come up with your own "hash" function. There are many instances where you'd get collisions even if there is substantial data that is different for each value. My recommendation: use a hash function and then transform the binary results into decimal and truncate it as needed. To do it right, though you should really use a UUID or full hash string.

Steve Pomeroy
– Steve Pomeroy

2011-04-12 16:28:04 +00:00
Commented Apr 12, 2011 at 16:28
25

You should give credit to your sources... This has been lifted straight out of the following article: pocketmagic.net/?p=1662

Steve Haley
– Steve Haley

2011-05-16 12:07:44 +00:00
Commented May 16, 2011 at 12:07
11

This ID is open to collisions like you don't know what. It's practically guaranteed to be the same on identical devices from the same carrier.

Seva Alekseyev
– Seva Alekseyev

2011-05-26 20:21:30 +00:00
Commented May 26, 2011 at 20:21
10

This may also change if the device gets upgraded.

David Given
– David Given

2012-01-25 12:25:54 +00:00
Commented Jan 25, 2012 at 12:25
13

Very, very bad solution. Tested on two Nexus 5... Return same numbers.

Sinan Dizdarević
– Sinan Dizdarević

2015-03-04 16:53:23 +00:00
Commented Mar 4, 2015 at 16:53

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Is there a unique Android device ID?

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