Get bluetooth signal strength

To get the signal you can check Bluetooth RSSI, you can read RSSI for connected devices, or perform a Bluetooth discovery to check the RSSI for any nearby devices.

Basically a Bluetooth discovery is a broadcast to all stations within range to respond back. As each devices responds back, Android fires off an ACTION_FOUND intent. Within this intent you can getExtra EXTRA_RSSI to obtain the RSSI.

Note that not all bluetooth hardware supports RSSI.

Also Related: Android IRC Office Hours Question About Android Bluetooth RSSI here is a Bluetooth Classic broadcast receiver example

private final BroadcastReceiver receiver = new BroadcastReceiver(){
    @Override
    public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) {

        String action = intent.getAction();
        if(BluetoothDevice.ACTION_FOUND.equals(action)) {
            int  rssi = intent.getShortExtra(BluetoothDevice.EXTRA_RSSI,Short.MIN_VALUE);
            Toast.makeText(getApplicationContext(),"  RSSI: " + rssi + "dBm", Toast.LENGTH_SHORT).show();
        }
    }
};

I think your code is ok, but you need to implement startDiscovery() in order to see results.

The true is that BluetoothDevice.EXTRA_RSSI only works for discovering devices, when you connect to one of them you are not able any more to get its RSSI.

Here I developed a very simple sample of an Activity that permit you see the RSSI of the devices near to you. You first need to add a TextView and a Button to your layout, then enable the Bluetooth Adapter and then just click the button.

package com.in2apps.rssi;

import android.os.Bundle;
import android.app.Activity;
import android.bluetooth.BluetoothAdapter;
import android.bluetooth.BluetoothDevice;
import android.content.BroadcastReceiver;
import android.content.Context;
import android.content.Intent;
import android.content.IntentFilter;
import android.view.Menu;
import android.view.View;
import android.view.View.OnClickListener;
import android.widget.Button;
import android.widget.TextView;

public class RSSIActivity extends Activity {

    private BluetoothAdapter BTAdapter = BluetoothAdapter.getDefaultAdapter();

    @Override
    public void onCreate(Bundle savedInstanceState) {
        super.onCreate(savedInstanceState);
        setContentView(R.layout.activity_rssi);
        registerReceiver(receiver, new IntentFilter(BluetoothDevice.ACTION_FOUND));

        Button boton = (Button) findViewById(R.id.button1);
        boton.setOnClickListener(new OnClickListener(){
            public void onClick(View v) {
                BTAdapter.startDiscovery();
            }
        });
    }

    @Override
    public boolean onCreateOptionsMenu(Menu menu) {
        getMenuInflater().inflate(R.menu.activity_rssi, menu);
        return true;
    }

    private final BroadcastReceiver receiver = new BroadcastReceiver(){
        @Override
        public void onReceive(Context context, Intent intent) {

            String action = intent.getAction();
            if(BluetoothDevice.ACTION_FOUND.equals(action)) {
                int rssi = intent.getShortExtra(BluetoothDevice.EXTRA_RSSI,Short.MIN_VALUE);
                String name = intent.getStringExtra(BluetoothDevice.EXTRA_NAME);
                TextView rssi_msg = (TextView) findViewById(R.id.textView1);
                rssi_msg.setText(rssi_msg.getText() + name + " => " + rssi + "dBm\n");
            }
        }
    };
}

It looks this way:

The necessary API was introduced in API 18 (Android 4.3). You need to call BluetoothGatt#readRemoteRssi() to initiate the request. The response shows up on the BluetoothCallback#onReadRemoteRssi() callback. (That's the callback object that handles connect, discovery, characteristic reads, etc.)

The broadcast receiver stuff is no longer required.