Brave-browser: Desktop push notifications do not always function (twitter, reddit, etc)

[Brave-Matt]

Latest status: see https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/issues/2362#issuecomment-571775236

Description

I've seen DT notifications for various sites (gmail, community, twitter, reddit, etc) work without any issues or conflicts with settings. DT notifications for Youtube however do not work. Alert never actually get displayed in b-c (nor does it play the sound).

This was tested using Dev, Beta and Release builds. Windows 7/Windows 10.
Shields up/down and changing global shields have no effect.

Steps to Reproduce

1. Visit YouTube, sign into YT account

2. Verify that:

   • Notifications from YT are set to "Allowed", either by prompt on visit or manual entry (see #1775 ) in browser
   • Desktop notifications set to "on" in YT (Click the notification icon (bell) --> Gear icon --> Notification Settings --> Desktop Notifications). Note that it will display the Chrome icon instead of the Brave icon.
   • Notifications are enabled in Windows system settings
   1. Try and provoke a notification from you YT account. I tested this by sending both messages, and commenting on a video I put on my channel from a separate account.
3. Adjust Shields settings (global and/or panel), and repeat

Actual result:

No notification is displayed on desktop. Notifications _do_ appear on YT.

Expected result:

Desktop notification appears as intended, notifications appear on YT as well.

Reproduces how often:

Easily/always

Brave version (brave://version info)

Release: 0.56.15
Beta: 0.57.8
Dev: 0.58.10

Reproducible on current release:

Yes

• Does it reproduce on brave-browser dev/beta builds?
  Yes

Website problems only:

• Does the issue resolve itself when disabling Brave Shields?
  No
• Is the issue reproducible on the latest version of Chrome?
  No - notifications are displayed as intended. I was tricked by this more than once.

Additional Information

User(s) also reporting this on Community:
https://community.brave.com/t/version-0-56-7-chromium-70-0-3538-77-official-build-beta-64-bit-youtube-notifications-or-lack-of/36771/26

[Brave-Matt]

May be related to this:
https://www.reddit.com/r/brave_browser/comments/a5xy25/cant_enable_facebook_notifications_in_brave/

[Brave-Matt]

This seems to be true for Twitter as well -- Navigating to "Web notifiactions" in Twitter's settings displays the following message:

Note that I _have seen_ the offer to enable web notifications on Twitter in previous releases.

[Brave-Matt]

Several +1's from Community:
https://community.brave.com/t/notification-enabled-but-not-working/49594/8

[Brave-Matt]

+1 from reddit: https://www.reddit.com/r/brave_browser/comments/b90b4o/release_channel_version_06250_is_live/ek30sbv?utm_source=share&utm_medium=web2x

[Brave-Matt]

+1 Community:
https://community.brave.com/t/google-drive-desktop-notifications-are-broken-in-brave-for-windows/52498/7

[felschr]

I'm pretty sure the reason why it's not working is #2143
On Android it's still working atm because FCM wasn't disabled there.

I'm not entirely familiar with Chrome's history with FCM but I think they initially offered a custom FCM/GCM API (https://developers.chrome.com/extensions/gcm) and later added support for the Push API once it was standardised.
Maybe they've reused parts of the FCM implementation for the Push API. So #2143 probably removed too much.
I'm not even sure if there is still such a thing as an FCM API in Chrome or if they maybe just used that as an internal name for their Push API implementation. At least chrome.gcm is not available anymore.

Hopefully this contains some new insight.

[mrdavey]

I'm having the same issue and suspect that @FelschR is correct that it is FCM related.
I'm testing web push notifications using Firebase FCM and it works perfectly on Chrome, Opera, and Firefox, but not Brave. (No Safari as it doesn't support Push API)

According to FCM documentation:

The FCM JavaScript API lets you receive notification messages in web apps running in browsers that support the Push API. This includes the browser versions listed in this support matrix.

It seems Brave's Push API is broken.

[Brave-Matt]

More +1s:
https://community.brave.com/t/notification-enabled-but-not-working/49594/41

[bbondy]

@simonhong could you take a look?

[simonhong]

On my local, I debugged with gmail and youtube service on MacOS.
With youtube, renderer process requests notification displaying via NotificationManager::DisplayPersistentNotification().
With gmail, NotificationManager::DisplayNonPersistentNotification() was used.
On Brave, I only can get gmail notification.
On Chromium, both notifications are displayed.
And according to notification spec and comments, persistent notification is a notification with an associated service worker registration.

I think persistent notification seem not working properly on Brave.
But not sure it is youtube specific problem or not. Needs more debugging.

Push notification doesn't work with Brave. - https://serviceworke.rs/push-simple_demo.html

[simonhong]

After re-enabling GCM client (we disabled by https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/issues/1716), I got notification from youtube and demo of https://serviceworke.rs/push-simple_demo.html works well.

However, still web notification of twitter can't be enabled. (Same as chromium)

[Brave-Matt]

+1 https://community.brave.com/t/notification-enabled-but-not-working/49594/53?u=mattches

Note that 9 new users have joined the above thread confirming that they're unable to receive notifications.

[WorldLanguages]

After re-enabling GCM client (we disabled by #1716), I got notification from youtube and demo of https://serviceworke.rs/push-simple_demo.html works well.

However, still web notification of twitter can't be enabled. (~Same as chromium~)

@simonhong This isn't working in latest Brave Stable, even with shields off: https://serviceworke.rs/push-simple_demo.html

[snowbound]

I went back to using Firefox rather than continue to use Chrome and put up with Google antics. On the Chromium side both Brave and MS Edge Chromium beta and dev have the notification issues

[simonhong]

@WorldLanguages This issue is blocked by https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/issues/4431

[jamesray1]

Looking forward to this being fixed after or with #4431. In the mean time I'll go back to using Firefox. Gmail notifications don't work for me despite allowing notifications:

[snowbound]

Sad to say that over this past weekend I uninstalled Brave Beta as well as both of MS Chromium-based browsers which all suffer from this issue.

[felschr]

I, too, have reverted to Chrome/Chromium on my devices due to this issue.

Additionally I was also missing the Android app's lack of creating WebAPKs (https://github.com/brave/browser-android-tabs/issues/645) quite a bit.

[bsclifton]

We are looking at a fix for this 😄 Stay tuned...

[sakralbar]

No push notifications with last version of Brave both Linux and Android platform.

[bsclifton]

@jumde is assigned to https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/issues/2301 which (when fixed) should also fix this

We've got to look at a few things:

• does using the service use a Google API key? some services (translations, speech api) require the caller provide an API key which has rate limits. Some limits are low and increasing them means we would need to evaluate the cost
  
  
  
  • if the service does use a Google API key, we may need to look at the Mozilla implementation for this
  
  
  • if the service does not use a Google API key, we should be able to put this option behind a config flag in settings and then setup a proxy for calling
  
  

We should see progress on this in the next few weeks. There may be more updates in https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/issues/2301 for folks wanting to subscribe to the issue

[Brave-Matt]

+1
https://community.brave.com/t/brave-have-a-notification-bug/76687

[Adrymate9]

Contribution in the community. On a phone with Android 7 where notifications work correctly. However on my phone with Android 8 unfortunately not.

https://community.brave.com/t/notification-enabled-but-not-working/49594/95?u=adrymate9

[bsclifton]

Removing blocked label as @jumde has done some pathfinding and we should be able to enable this without issues 😄

Our current status (as far as I know):

• We'll need to proxy the requests. This work has already been started
• We may need to add a whitelist exception for this in brave-browser
• A setting will need to be created (similar to Chromecast), defaulted to off

[jumde]

Thanks for highlighting the current progress @bsclifton. Proxies are set-up and the work for an off-by-default setting is in place. The PR will be ready for review by the end of this week.

This work will be followed by: https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/issues/4431 as a complete solution for push notifications cc: @rebron

[Adrymate9]

Will this solution also be implemented in the Brave version for Android?

[aboydpoi]

Is there any fix?

[Adrymate9]

@aboydpoi For me, it still doesn't work. Right now I use Brave version 1.4.0 rc3 on my phone.

[jumde]

Fix for issue https://github.com/brave/brave-browser/issues/2301 enables Push notifications in Brave, but push notifications on some sites including Youtube, Twitter might not work because of an upstream issue: https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=1011244 - we are working with the chromium team to fix this. We are using this issue to track the upstream fix. Stay tuned.

[szaimen]

Will this solution also be implemented in the Brave version for Android

I am also wondering🤔

[dijonkitchen]

Note that this doesn't work for Outlook's (https://outlook.office365.com:443 or https://outlook.office.com:443) desktop notifications either.

Works on Chrome when desktop notifications are enabled in the Outlook settings.

[BabyJesus666]

Not sure how valuable this feedback is but they aren't working with Dlive.tv either

[Brave-Matt]

+1 from Community:
https://community.brave.com/t/gmail-notifications-dont-show-up-in-windows-10-action-center/90703/15
@jumde -- what is the status of this particular issue? It looks like it hasn't seen a much movement for some time now.

[PixelHir]

Any updates, please?

[Brave-Matt]

+1 from Reddit:
https://www.reddit.com/r/brave_browser/comments/eki8pk/cant_get_any_notification_other_than_ads/

[bsclifton]

I believe the blocker for this is https://bugs.chromium.org/p/chromium/issues/detail?id=1011244 which is assigned to an owner that is OOO until Jan 13

Will mark issue as waiting-upstream

For folks that aren't aware, there is a Use Google Services for Push Messaging option under brave://settings/privacy (set to OFF by default) which, when enabled, may resolve items which are trying to use GCM

[david2278]

It has been over a year since this was opened. Are we getting a fix or not?

[snowbound]

It has been over a year since this was opened. Are we getting a fix or not?

I assume you saw this option when enabled allowed me to see YouTube notifications fine in Brave.

"For folks that aren't aware, there is a Use Google Services for Push Messaging option under brave://settings/privacy (set to OFF by default) which, when enabled, may resolve items which are trying to use GCM"

[david2278]

My concern is for my users. All of them have to jump through hoops just to get push working. The least brave could do is push an update which toggles it on by default if they aren't going to fix it.

[PixelHir]

My concern is for my users. All of them have to jump through hoops just to get push working. The least brave could do is push an update which toggles it on by default if they aren't going to fix it.

As far as I know, it's disabled due to a security concern, since enabling it probably requires you to communicate with Google's servers

[snowbound]

This was working for a couple of months for me once I enabled it. However with Version 1.3.115 Chromium: 80.0.3987.87 (Official Build) (64-bit) the YouTube notifications are dead in the water here. Verified that YouTube notifications are enabled and Use Google Services for Push Messaging is enabled. Firefox has no issues with receiving notifications. I also notice that Brave can no longer delete specific cookies such as "google.com" on browser shutdown.

[jshan17]

Hello I have Google push notifications enabled AND I have Notifications settings set to allow sites to ask. Only popular sites like Facebook and Trading View are successfully asking for notifications when I visit them, then their push notifications actually send. But news sites like Bitcoinist.com and Youtube are not asking. Does anyone know how to troubleshoot this to enable website push notifications? I’ve already gone to settings and selected, Allow Sites to ask for permission, but my listed sites won’t ask for permission to send notifications. I'm using Windows 10 -Brave is up to date: Version 1.5.113 Chromium: 80.0.3987.149 (Official Build) (64-bit) - just updated today. But I cannot receive notifications from sites like Youtube, Twitter, or Crypto news sites. I've seen many different threads on this topic but none have solved my issue. I've also been able to receive notifications from testing sites listed, but still no improvement. Help??

[megaroeny]

Same issue here with latest Brave version (production build)

[Brave-Matt]

This is still an issue in v1.7.92 -- +1 from Community today:
https://community.brave.com/t/twitter-cannot-activate-push-notifications/119002/2

[bsclifton]

@jshan17 do any of the sites you DO want to get notifications show up here?
brave://settings/content/notifications

You can always manually add them there under Allow - but it should be asking you too (default is to ask). You can also make sure the top level setting is enabled

[seanwu1105]

Though I add Google Drive site to the allow list of notification, Brave still does not function correctly to show the notification.

Brave Version

Brave | 1.8.96 Chromium: 81.0.4044.138 (Official Build) (64-bit)
-- | --
Revision | 8c6c7ba89cc9453625af54f11fd83179e23450fa-refs/branch-heads/4044@{#999}
OS | Linux
JavaScript | V8 8.1.307.32
Flash | (Disabled)
User Agent | Mozilla/5.0 (X11; Linux x86_64) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/81.0.4044.138 Safari/537.36

Additional Information

• Does the issue resolve itself when disabling Brave Shields? No.
• Is the issue reproducible on the latest version of Chrome? No.

[jsappme]

any update on this very important issue? Google Calendar notifications are not showing up because of this issue.

[michaelcusick]

I love the browser, but push notifications would be nice. 📌

[shadow1349]

I'm not sure why, but blocking FCM has also broken Firebase Callable Functions in Angular. Here's a comment I made for it:

https://github.com/angular/angularfire/issues/2475#issuecomment-711099922

I don't think there is much the Angular team can do to fix it since it seems the issue is on Brave itself. Now my whole app is broken in Brave since I rely on callable functions.