debloating-the-lg-q6-phone.md (5142B)
1 --- 2 title: "Debloating the LG Q6 Phone" 3 date: 2020-08-25T13:17:00 4 tags: ["Android", "Guides", "Linux", "Minimalism", "Software", "Snippets"] 5 --- 6 7 I've had the LG Q6 for many moons now, I picked it up used for about 120GBP and it fits right in with my cheap and cheerful mantra. One thing that's always annoyed me about it however was the inability to root the device and install a custom ROM with less bloat! The bootloader is locked, and any guides you'll find online are copy/paste jobs for other models that don't work. You can hide apps and even disable them, but that doesn't uninstall them. 8 9 Anyway, Chris Titus recently published [a video](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=k9ErL9L6KIw) and [matching article](https://christitus.com/debloat-android/) that ticked all my boxes. My guide is basically a rehash of his, so I recommend you go read his before seeing the list of things I removed. 10 11 Without further ado, you'll want to install ADB tools: 12 ``` 13 sudo pacman -S adb 14 ``` 15 16 Then enable developer mode on your phone (Tap Build Number 7 times in About > Software). Connect up a USB cable to your phone and start the make sure your phone isn't `unauthorized`. I had to set my phone to Charging Mode only for it to appear authorized. 17 ``` 18 adb devices 19 ``` 20 21 With this, you can now list out your installed packages: 22 ``` 23 adb shell pm list packages 24 ``` 25 26 As we don't have root, you can't globally uninstall applications using `adb uninstall packagename`, we instead need to delete it for our user with `adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 packagename`. 27 28 I don't use many Google products, so I uninstalled swathes of Android without any serious side effects. The full list of what I removed is... 29 30 ``` 31 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.android.calendar 32 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.android.cellbroadcastreceiver 33 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.android.chrome 34 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.android.gallery3d 35 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.android.LGSetupWizard 36 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.android.wallpapercropper 37 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.facebook.appmanager 38 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.facebook.system 39 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.google.android.apps.docs 40 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.google.android.apps.docs.editors.docs 41 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.google.android.apps.docs.editors.sheets 42 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.google.android.apps.docs.editors.slides 43 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.google.android.apps.photos 44 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.google.android.apps.tachyon 45 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.google.android.gm 46 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.google.android.googlequicksearchbox 47 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.google.android.music 48 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.google.android.videos 49 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.google.android.youtube 50 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.bnr 51 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.bnr.launcher 52 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.email 53 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.equalizer 54 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.eula 55 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.eulaprovider 56 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.exchange 57 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.faceglance.enrollment 58 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.faceglance.trustagent 59 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.fmradio 60 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.gallery.collagewallpaper 61 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.gametuner 62 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.hifirecorder 63 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.ia.task.incalagent 64 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.ia.task.informant 65 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.ia.task.smartcare 66 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.ime 67 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.ime.solution.handwriting 68 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.lgworld 69 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.music 70 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.phonemanagement 71 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.qmemoplus 72 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.signboard 73 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.sizechangable.musicwidget.widget 74 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.sizechangable.weather 75 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.sizechangable.weather.platform 76 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.sizechangable.weather.theme.optimus 77 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.smartdoctor.webview 78 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.theme.black 79 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.theme.highcontrast 80 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.theme.titan 81 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.theme.white 82 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.videoplayer 83 adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.lge.videostudio 84 ``` 85 86 You'll **very, very** likely want to look up what most of these applications are/do before just blindly running the above commands. 87 88 Lastly, in the event you ever uninstall something you wanted to keep, you can re-install the application by issuing: 89 ``` 90 adb shell cmd package install-existing application_name 91 ``` 92 93 * **Edit 2020-10-26:** Add reinstall instructions, remove calendar and email applications.