If you have manually flashed an Android phone before or have unlocked your bootloader, then you are familiar with the ADB and Fastboot commands that you use to make those changes to your Android devices. The challenge, till now, is that you either had to download the entire Android Developer Studio, all 1.6GB of it, just to get the official ADB or you had to go off piste and get it from a 3rd party. That, of course, opens you up to all kinds of fun like malware. Now you have a third option: Download these platform tools directly from Google.
Google has finally made it where you can download just these tools along with a few others without having to bother with the developer tools. Frankly, unless you are a developer, those tools eat up a huge amount of storage on your PC or Mac and are somewhat dead to you.
The new downloads are available in Linux, Windows and Mac which will allow you to quickly and easily access them so you can unlock your bootloader, install a custom ROM or do a backup.
Android Bootloader
Now, to be sure, unless you are comfortable with doing a flashing of your device, you don’t need these tools. They are only for advanced users who are comfortable tinkering with their phones at a deep level. If that’s not you, no worries. Thanks for reading this far!
Here are the links to the downloads directly from Google.
Enjoy!
