A modern, lightweight notification daemon for Wayland compositors.

• Full FreeDesktop Notifications Specification support
• Native Wayland support via GTK4 + layer-shell
• Works with all Wayland compositors: Sway, Hyprland, River, and more
• Notification Center with history grouped by app
• MPRIS Media Player widget with album art and playback controls
• Click-to-focus - click notifications to focus the source app
• Action buttons support for interactive notifications
• Progress bars for download/transfer notifications
• Sound notifications with per-urgency sound files
• TOML configuration with CSS theming
• Per-application rules with regex matching
• Do Not Disturb mode with scheduling
• Multi-monitor support
• IPC control via swaynotictl

Download the latest release from the Releases page.

Debian/Ubuntu:

sudo dpkg -i swaynoti_*_amd64.deb
sudo apt-get install -f  # Install dependencies if needed

Fedora/RHEL/CentOS:

sudo dnf install swaynoti-*.x86_64.rpm

Manual Installation:

curl -fsSL https://raw.githubusercontent.com/swaynoti/swaynoti/main/install.sh | bash

Debian/Ubuntu:

sudo apt install libgtk-4-dev libgraphene-1.0-dev libgtk4-layer-shell-dev pkg-config

Fedora:

sudo dnf install gtk4-devel graphene-devel gtk4-layer-shell-devel pkg-config

Arch Linux:

sudo pacman -S gtk4 graphene gtk4-layer-shell

git clone https://github.com/swaynoti/swaynoti.git
cd swaynoti
cargo build --release

# Install
sudo cp target/release/swaynoti target/release/swaynotictl /usr/local/bin/

First, stop any existing notification daemon:

pkill mako
pkill dunst
pkill swaync

Then start swaynoti:

# Using systemd (recommended)
systemctl --user enable --now swaynoti.service

# Or manually
swaynoti &

Configuration file location: ~/.config/swaynoti/config.toml

[general]
max_visible = 5
sort_order = "newest-first"
markup = true

[appearance]
width = 350
border_radius = 12
gap = 8
opacity = 0.95
icon_size = 48
show_app_name = true

[appearance.animations]
enabled = true
duration_ms = 200
slide_direction = "right"

[positioning]
anchor = "top-right"  # top-left, top-center, top-right, bottom-left, bottom-center, bottom-right
layer = "overlay"
stacking = "vertical"

[positioning.margin]
top = 10
right = 10
bottom = 10
left = 10

[timeouts]
default = 5000
low = 3000
normal = 5000
critical = 0  # 0 = never expires

[history]
enabled = true
max_entries = 100

[sound]
enabled = true
sound_low = "~/.config/swaynoti/sounds/low.wav"
sound_normal = "~/.config/swaynoti/sounds/normal.wav"
sound_critical = "~/.config/swaynoti/sounds/critical.wav"

# Per-app rules
[[rules]]
[rules.criteria]
app_name = "Spotify"
[rules.actions]
timeout = 3000
css_class = "spotify"
skip_history = true

Custom themes can be applied via CSS. Create ~/.config/swaynoti/theme.css:

.notification {
    background-color: rgba(30, 30, 46, 0.95);
    border-radius: 12px;
    padding: 12px;
    border: 1px solid rgba(69, 71, 90, 0.5);
}

.notification.critical {
    border-left: 4px solid #f38ba8;
}

.notification .summary {
    font-size: 14px;
    font-weight: 600;
    color: #cdd6f4;
}

.notification .body {
    font-size: 13px;
    color: rgba(205, 214, 244, 0.85);
}

Then reference it in your config:

[appearance]
theme = "~/.config/swaynoti/theme.css"

The notification center provides a panel showing your notification history grouped by application. It includes:

• History list - All notifications grouped by app with timestamps
• MPRIS Media Widget - Shows currently playing media from Firefox, Spotify, VLC, etc.
• Playback controls - Previous, Play/Pause, Next buttons
• Album art display
• Clear All button to remove all history

Toggle with: swaynotictl toggle-center

# List active notifications
swaynotictl list

# Get notification count
swaynotictl count

# Dismiss a notification
swaynotictl dismiss <id>

# Dismiss all notifications
swaynotictl dismiss-all

# Toggle Do Not Disturb
swaynotictl toggle-dnd

# Check DND status
swaynotictl dnd-status

# Toggle Notification Center
swaynotictl toggle-center

# Show Notification Center
swaynotictl show-center

# Hide Notification Center
swaynotictl hide-center

Add to your waybar config:

"custom/notifications": {
    "exec": "swaynotictl count",
    "interval": 1,
    "format": " {}",
    "on-click": "swaynotictl toggle-center",
    "on-click-right": "swaynotictl toggle-dnd"
}

Add to ~/.config/sway/config:

exec swaynoti

Or use systemd:

exec systemctl --user start swaynoti.service

Add to ~/.config/hypr/hyprland.conf:

exec-once = swaynoti

1. Check if another notification daemon is running:

   busctl --user list | grep Notifications

2. Kill the conflicting daemon:

   pkill mako
   systemctl --user stop mako.service

3. Disable D-Bus activation for other daemons:

   sudo mv /usr/share/dbus-1/services/fr.emersion.mako.service{,.disabled}

Run with debug logging:

swaynoti -d

Contributions are welcome! Please feel free to submit a Pull Request.

MIT License - see LICENSE for details.

• mako - Inspiration and reference implementation
• dunst - FreeDesktop notification spec reference
• gtk4-layer-shell - Wayland layer-shell support