How to Flash Stock Android on Google Pixel

Transcript

Please excuse any grammatical errors. I used a tool to generate the transcript and haven’t had a chance to read through it yet.

So today I’ll be covering how to install stock Android OS on a Google Pixel currently running GrapheneOS. This process should still work if you’re running a different operating system than GrapheneOS looking to install the stock OS on your device, but for the purpose of this demo, it’ll be a Google Pixel 7 running GrapheneOS. So to get started, we’re going to head on over to grapheneos.org. Select install GrapheneOS. Select web USB-based installer. Scroll down in the table of contents to replacing GrapheneOS with the stock OS. This is the one part that’s specific to GrapheneOS, and that is GrapheneOS factory images. Flash a non-stock Android verified boot key, which needs to be erased to fully revert back to the stock device state. Before flashing the stock factory images, you should boot the device into fast boot mode and make sure the boot loader is unlocked. Then erase the custom Android verified boot key to untrust it. And then regardless of which OS you’re using, we’ll be using the Google web flashing tool. So we’ll get to that shortly. But the first step in this process is to enable OEM unlocking and USB debugging. So to do that, swipe up on your device, go to settings, scroll down to about phone, tap on that, scroll down to the bottom, tap on build number, I think four or five times. You’ll be prompted for your PIN code. Enter that.

We can now swipe back. Go to system right above about phone. You should now see developer options. Tap on that. We’re going to scroll down. The first one is OEM unlocking. Toggle that on. Enter your device PIN again. Allow OEM unlocking. Enable. Scroll down some more till you get to USB debugging. Enable that. Allow USB debugging. Okay. So now the next step is to boot into fast boot mode and make sure the boot loader is unlocked. So for that, we need to connect a USB cable to our device. This USB cable should be plugged into whatever device you’re using to perform the installation. I’m using my laptop with Brave Browser. Now that we have that plugged in, we need to boot into fast boot mode. And to do that, we’re going to press the power button. And as soon as we press restart, hold the volume down button down. So, press restart, hold volume down while it’s rebooting.

If that worked correctly, you should be presented with the fast boot mode. And if we look here, we see device state locked, but it is unlockable since OEM unlocking is enabled. And on the GrapheneOS page, we’re going to scroll up to unlock bootloader. It should be the first step at the top. Press unlock bootloader. Your screen should change to this if everything’s working successfully. But before we unlock the bootloader, I do want to say this process will erase all data on your device. So if there’s something you want to save, stop now. Transfer that data off. Otherwise, it’ll be gone, and you cannot recover it. So now on this screen, we have do not unlock the bootloader. To change that, press the volume up or down. And when it says unlock the bootloader, press the power button to execute it.

And if that was successful, you should see device state unlocked. Now at this point, we can proceed with the GrapheneOS-specific step, which again, scroll back down to the bottom, press the remove non-stock key. Key erased. We are good to proceed. Once that’s completed, you can then right-click on the Google web flashing tool, open link in new tab. Let’s go to the new tab. You can click get started. You’ll see a popup like this. Grant access to ADB keys. Allow ADB access. Press the button. Now at this point, if everything was successful, you should see one available device that you can select. So click on that now because we used the GrapheneOS page to remove the stock key. You might see an error like this: connection error. Just try reconnecting your device cable and plug it back in again.

So once I did that, I now see that my device is available to connect to. It says connected slow because I’m using a crappy cable, but that doesn’t make a difference. It just makes the process take longer. So once you see this, you can then go ahead and select your device. We’re going back to default. Once you do that, press the install build button again. Here’s another warning. Factory reset will result in all data on the Android device being erased. It’s already erased because we unlocked the bootloader. Do not unplug your device. Do not interact with your device unless instructed. Once you give that a quick read, select continue or confirm. You must agree to the license. I accept. Preparing your device in progress. Now, this step will take different amounts of time depending on your internet connection. So, I’m going to give this a minute to download, and I’ll be back in a moment.

So this is about done. So we should see our device flash in a moment once this finishes.

Now that that has finished, the next step is to lock the device. Your bootloader must be locked to complete the process. So select start. And now on our phone, we see do not lock the bootloader. We want to lock the bootloader. So, press volume up or volume down. Lock the bootloader. Press the power button to execute that.

Once that finishes, we saw device state locked. Your device will now reboot. You can press done on the page. We are finished here.

Give our device a minute to start up.

So, at this point, we are back on stock Android OS. The device is ready to be sold, traded in, use it, whatever. The web user interface makes the process pretty straightforward, but if you have any questions or comments, feel free to leave those down below, and I’ll see you next time.