So you've bricked your telephone. You flashed a ROM, installed a modern, tweaked a organisation file, or did something else---and at present your phone won't boot.

Don't panic! It's about certainly fixable. Here'southward how to unbrick an Android phone.

What Do the Terms 'Bricking' or a 'Bricked Phone' Mean?

'Bricking' your phone substantially ways that your once useful device is now just as useful equally a brick. A 'bricked phone' is usually unresponsive, won't power on, and doesn't function normally.

How Is Your Phone Bricked?

bricked android phone

The steps for how to unbrick a telephone depend on how it'due south bricked in the start place. At that place are 2 categories of bricked phones:

  • The soft brick. The phone freezes on the Android boot screen, gets stuck in a kicking loop, or just goes direct to recovery. So long as something happens when you lot press the power button, it's soft bricked. The good news is these are pretty easy to fix.
  • The difficult brick. Yous push the power push, and nothing happens. Hard bricks can exist caused by problems like attempting to wink an incompatible ROM or kernel, and at that place'southward normally no software solution for them. Hard bricks are terrible news, but fortunately, they're quite rare.

Almost likely, yous're soft bricked, and you lot'll meet something similar the image above. While the differences in how various devices work make it hard to come up with a catch-all solution to unbrick Android, there are four common tricks you can endeavor to get yourself back on track:

  • Wipe the data, and then re-flash a custom ROM
  • Disable Xposed mods through recovery
  • Restore a Nandroid fill-in
  • Flash a factory paradigm

Before you become started, make certain your phone and computer are prepare upwardly and ready with the proper tools.

What You Need to Unbrick an Android Phone

Chances are, you already have most of the tools you need to unbrick your phone. They're the same tools you used to root your device and wink ROMs, so you lot should already exist familiar with how they work. Fifty-fifty so, double-bank check before you begin.

Virtually important is a custom recovery. You lot likely installed this when you rooted your telephone, only information technology can sometimes become overwritten by the stock recovery or wiped entirely. If you lot do demand to reinstall it, we recommend going with TWRP. Information technology'south a fully-featured custom recovery that'southward too easy to use and has builds for about popular devices.

Next, you might need Fastboot and ADB. These are normally used for rooting and flashing system mods, and you can go both from the Android Developers website. Check our primer on how to use Fastboot and ADB if y'all aren't familiar with them.

android devs website

And finally, some manufacturers utilise special software to wink factory images. Hopefully, yous can avoid doing this, merely if you lot need to, you can use Odin for Samsung, the LG Flash Tool for LG devices, or the ZTE Unbrick Tool if you've got a ZTE device. Just brand sure that they support your specific model of device.

Most of these tools will allow y'all set up a bricked Android phone using a PC. However, you tin often do the task directly on the phone itself.

1. Wipe Data and Re-Wink a Custom ROM

Attempt this method if: Y'all flashed a ROM, and now Android won't boot.

I of the most likely causes of soft bricking your phone is when yous accept problems when flashing a new custom ROM. The culprit here is ofttimes that you lot didn't wipe your data first.

This is referred to as a "dirty wink," and occurs when you choose to forego the inconvenience of having to restore your apps and data by flashing a new ROM on top of your quondam ane. Equally a full general rule, y'all can go away with information technology if y'all're flashing a newer version of your existing ROM, only you lot must always wipe your information whenever yous flash a different ROM.

Fortunately, information technology's easy to ready---as long as you've backed upward your phone properly. If y'all haven't, well, y'all've learned an important lesson the hard manner. Follow these steps:

  1. Kicking into your custom recovery.
  2. Navigate to the Wipe option and cull Advanced Wipe.
  3. Check the box marked Information (you can wipe the arrangement, Fine art cache, and cache again, besides), and so hitting Ostend.
  4. Re-flash your custom ROM.

[gallery columns="2" size="total" ids="875484,875485"]

Wiping your data effectively performs a factory reset, merely it shouldn't clear your internal storage or SD card (although, once more, you should back it up only to exist condom). When you restart your phone, y'all'll see the Android setup screen. Afterwards inbound your Google account data, your apps should begin reinstalling automatically.

If you lot need to, you can restore your data from your Nandroid fill-in. See the Restore a Nandroid Backup section below.

2. Disable Xposed Modules in Recovery

Try this method if: You get kicking loops after installing a new Xposed module.

The Xposed Framework isn't as mutual as information technology once was, but it's yet a simple style to modernistic your phone, and besides one of the most dangerous.

The best Xposed modules are then like shooting fish in a barrel to install---many of them are available in the Play Store---that they lull you lot into a simulated sense of security. Information technology'due south unlikely anyone makes a Nandroid backup before installing a new Xposed module, even though they can brick your phone.

Use ADB Push to Install the Xposed Uninstaller

The best way to deal with these issues is with the Xposed Uninstaller, if it'south bachelor for your version of Android. This is a small flashable ZIP that yous can install through the recovery to remove Xposed from your device.

If you don't already have it on your phone, yous can put it on an SD card, or you might be able to copy it over using the ADB push button method:

xposed uninstaller
  1. Download the Xposed Uninstaller to your desktop.
  2. Connect your phone to your computer via USB and boot into recovery.
  3. Launch the command prompt (Windows) or Terminal (Mac) and employ the cd command to change the directory to where yous have adb installed.
  4. Type adb button [full path to xposed uninstaller.zippo] [full path to destination]. On Mac and Linux, precede the command with ./ (such as ./adb).
  5. When the file finishes copying, flash it through the recovery.

How to Disable Xposed Modules in Recovery

If yous can't utilise ADB push and the Xposed Uninstaller, try either of these solutions.

This method lets y'all disable Xposed through recovery:

  1. Kick into recovery, then navigate to Advanced > Terminal command.
  2. Create a file chosen /data/data/de.robv.android.xposed.installer/conf/disabled
  3. Reboot your telephone.

This method prevents Xposed modules from starting:

  1. Boot into recovery and select File Director.
  2. Navigate to the folder /data/data/de.robv.android.xposed.installer/conf/ then delete the file modules.listing
  3. Reboot your phone.

None of these solutions volition disengage whatsoever changes the modules have made to your system. If these changes caused your phone to brick, you will have to restore your Nandroid backup.

3. Restore a Nandroid Backup

Effort this method if: You lot need to remove other system mods, supervene upon a tweaked organization file, or if the methods higher up didn't work.

The Nandroid backup is the safe internet for Android mods and tweaks. It's a consummate snapshot of your phone---not just your data and apps, merely of the operating arrangement itself. So long every bit yous can access your custom recovery and have a Nandroid backup, you will exist able to get your soft bricked device up and running. To do so:

  1. Kick into recovery and navigate to Restore.
  2. Select your backup from the listing, confirm, and wait while it'southward restored.
  3. Reboot your telephone.
restore nandroid backup

Nandroid backups are a bit of a hurting to make. They take a while and cannot exist done in the groundwork. But they're worth information technology: they're the simplest way to unbrick your phone.

Recover Data From a Nandroid Backup

A Nandroid backup can besides save the day if you had to wipe your data and didn't back it up in an easily restorable form. It'due south possible to extract specific parts of a Nandroid, so you tin can restore your apps and data without needing to restore the operating arrangement as well.

Here are the instructions for this:

  1. Kick into Android and install Titanium Fill-in from the Play Shop. While this app hasn't been updated for a while, information technology'due south all the same one of the best options for this task.
  2. Tap the menu button and navigate to Special Backup/Restore > Extract from Nandroid Backup.
  3. Select your fill-in from the list.
  4. Choose whether to restore apps, data, or both, and select them (or hit Select All).
  5. Tap the green tick icon to offset the restore process.
extract from nandroid titanium backup

4. Flash a Factory Prototype

Effort this method if: None of the other options work.

If your attempts at unbricking Android have failed so far, the nuclear option is to re-wink a factory image. This restores the phone to its original country and will wipe your internal storage as well as everything else. Information technology'll also unroot your phone.

Because it wipes everything, you might be meliorate off trying to flash a stock ROM start. OnePlus really offers flashable ROMs for recovery rather than manufactory images, and you lot'll find similar for virtually every device at xda-developers.com. In many cases, y'all'll be able to flash a pre-rooted stock ROM for added convenience.

OnePlus Roms

Where flashing a factory prototype differs from flashing a ROM is that it happens over a connectedness to your desktop computer rather than through recovery. Some devices use the Fastboot tool from the Android SDK, but others utilise custom software. Samsung uses the Odin tool, for example.

Because of the different methods used, the instructions for flashing a factory paradigm differ for each device. And not all manufacturers make their firmware publicly available, so yous accept to detect them from unofficial sources.

Here's where to find manufacturing plant images for some popular Android brands:

  • Google Pixel
  • Samsung
  • Motorola
  • OnePlus
  • Sony

What Near Hard Bricks?

Hard bricked phones are notoriously more difficult to fix, merely thankfully they're also much rarer.

How to Unbrick a Difficult Bricked Android Phone

Starting time, make sure the phone actually is bricked---plug it in and go out it charging for a while. Attempt to reset information technology by belongings the power button downwardly for 10-15 seconds (or pulling your bombardment if you've got an older device). Yous may also want to try plugging it into your computer, y'all can exist pretty sure that your telephone is hard bricked if information technology is not detected by your PC.

If it is definitely hard bricked, then you may exist out of luck. A few phones can be revived with a USB Jig, a tiny device that plugs into the USB port and puts the phone into Download Mode to reinstall the stock firmware.

usb jig

You can find USB Jigs for difficult bricked phones for cheap on eBay, just just for a very small number of old devices. Even then, at that place's no guarantee that they'll piece of work.

Beyond that, you lot may need to send your telephone in for repair (though rooting it might accept voided your warranty) or seek out a local phone repair person. But you nigh likely will cease upward needing to buy a new device.

Tweak Android Safely

Hopefully, this guide has helped y'all to unbrick your Android telephone. And hopefully, your experience hasn't put you lot off rooting and hacking Android birthday.

But if yous'd rather play information technology rubber in future, you can still have a lot of fun with your phone. Accept a wait at our guide to the best Android tweaks you can make without rooting for some amazing ideas.

The Best Android Tweaks You Tin can Make Without Rooting

Read Next

About The Author