In Firebase when using push() How do I pull the unique ID

To get the "name" of any snapshot (in this case, the ID created by push()) just call name() like this:

var name = snapshot.name();

If you want to get the name that has been auto-generated by push(), you can just call name() on the returned reference, like so:

var newRef = myDataRef.push(...);
var newID = newRef.name();

NOTE: snapshot.name() has been deprecated. See other answers.


To anybody finding this question & using Firebase 3+, the way you get auto generated object unique ids after push is by using the key property (not method) on the promise snapshot:

firebase
  .ref('item')
  .push({...})
  .then((snap) => {
     const key = snap.key 
  })

Read more about it in the Firebase docs.

As a side note, those that consider generating their own unique ID should think twice about it. It may have security and performance implications. If you're not sure about it, use Firebase's ID. It contains a timestamp and has some neat security features out of the box.

More about it here:

The unique key generated by push() are ordered by the current time, so the resulting list of items will be chronologically sorted. The keys are also designed to be unguessable (they contain 72 random bits of entropy).