When it comes to Android smartphones, there are several OEMs that often sell their smartphones with a lot of different apps pre-installed. This happens due to certain tie-ups or in some cases, carrier-locked phones have a partnership with certain apps and app developers. For instance, few of the Samsung smartphones come with Microsoft apps pre-installed. Definitely, it’s all bloatware and just increases the overall system storage usage and other resources too. So if you want to get rid of the unnecessary apps from your smartphones that are system-wide installed usually need a rooted device if not then the alternative to rooting is using the ADB commands. Here is how you can uninstall system apps on Android without root.

In this tutorial, we are covering how to freeze background apps and delete system apps on Android device without root. We will also cover how to re-install the uninstalled bloatware apps, and everything would be done using the ADB commands, so make sure you have properly installed ADB and drivers on your PC.

Also read: Remove and Block Ads in All Android Apps Without Root

Get Android Bloatware List via ADB

Every app has different package names through which the Android system recognises it. We all recognise it using the name of the app which is shown on our home screen or menu. But you might have heard of the term “com.google.android.gm” this type of name is the name of the package of a certain app. So to uninstall the system apps from your Android phone you need to know the package name of the app. Below are a few of the common ways through which you can find the package name of the Android apps.

1. Visit the Google Play store website on desktop and then find the app in the store which you want to install. When located check the URL the package name is usually written right after the word ‘id=’. Some of the system apps might not be available on Google Play Store.
2. Alternatively try apps like Package Browser, App Inspector, Package Name Viewer, etc.
3. Or else you can also try to get the full list of packages that are installed on your Android phone with the help of adb shell list packages command.

If you are planning to go with the third step where you would have to use the ADB commands, make sure you have ADB and fastboot tools installed on your PC and it is the latest version. Also, install the appropriate Android USB driver.

1. Download the latest Android SDK Platform-tools and then extract the zip file.
2. Make sure you have enabled USB debugging on your mobile phone. To enable it to go to settings >> Developer’s options and then find and enable USB debugging.
3. Now, go to display under the phone settings and increase the screen timeout duration.
4. Connect your smartphone with the computer using the USB cable.
5. Go to the “platform-tools” folder and launch Command Prompt or Power Shell windows by pressing and holding the shift key and then right-clicking on an empty space inside the platform-tools folder. In the context menu, you will see an option that says open Command Prompt here/ Open Power Shell window here.
6. Now type adb devices to check if the smartphone connected is properly connected or not.
7. Also, after executing the above command keep an eye on your smartphone to accept a prompt that should appear which is to gain access to the device.
8. Depending on the type of app packages you want to be listed on your adb shell command. You will be required to execute different commands. We have written down the three different commands which you might use to debloat your Android device.
9. List of ADB Commands to list the packages
   • pm list packages (It will show you all of the apps which are installed on your phone).
   • pm list packages -s (It will list only the system apps )
   • pm list packages | grep ‘name of the brand’ ( It will list all of the apps which are installed from the vendor like Samsung, onePlus, Oppo, Xiaomi etc).
10. Below we have an example of how the list of packages would look like from a Samsung Galaxy S21.

The name of the actual app which you see on the app list and the name of the package might vary, and it could hard to track down the exact name of the package from the app. Not only that you cant simply decide which app is safe to

How To Uninstall System Apps Without Root

Once you get the hands-on list of packages you have to uninstall from your phone to uninstall the bloatware, all you need to do is use the ADB commands to remove each of the apps one by one. Below we have a tutorial on how to remove the system apps without rooting your device as we will be using ADB and the fastboot tool.

1. As mentioned above you have to first open Command Prompt or Power Shell inside the Platform-tools folder to run the ADB tool.
2. Now connect your Android device using a USB cable, also making sure that you have enabled the USB debugging option from settings.
3. Now type adb shell and execute it on command prompt it will show the phone’s code name along with a $ sign.
4. To uninstall any system app from your Android phone you need to write any one of the below-written commands on the ADB terminal.
   1. pm uninstall –user 0 <package name> (This will uninstall an app along with the app data).
   2. pm uninstall -k –user 0 <package name> (This will uninstall an app but will keep the app data.)
5. Now follow this step one by one to remove each app from your phone, it can remove one app at a time, so make sure you write the package name of only one app. After executing the command each time you will get a success message.

How To Reinstall any Uninstalled Android Apps via ADB

With the help of the above mentioned steps you will be able to remove any system apps from your Android smartphone. However, while using the command pm uninstall command we remove the system app only for the current user and it means that the app still remains available for other users, or in other words the app still remain inside the phone. So with the help of the existence of these system apps we can bring back those system apps on our Android devices.

To install any package on your Android device simply write and execute the following command on the ADB terminal.

• First write adb shell.
• cmd package install-existing <package name>

Removing Bloatware From Android Device Using Root Method

If your Android device is already rooted or if you are planning to root your device then here is a way through which you can debloat your Android device easily without the need for a PC. Although it will require root access, so make sure your phone is already rooted before you proceed with the below method.

1. To remove Android system apps from your phone you can use apps like  System App Remover and Bloatware Remover.
2. If not then you can use the Magisk module called Debloater to debloat your Android device.
3. Make sure you have installed the latest version of Magisk manager on your device if yes then open it.
4. Now open the hamburger menu and click on the Downloads option from it.
5. On the topmost part of the app, there will be a search option click on it and type “Busybox” and then click on the download button located at the right.
6. After installation is finished, go to the search again and type “debloater” and then install this module as well, the same way as you did with the busy box.
7. After both the modules are installed make sure to download any terminal app like Termux and then restart your device.
8. Open the termux app and inside the terminal screen type “su” command. Right after the execution of the command you will be asked to give root permission, make sure that you have granted the root access.
9. Now type debloat to launch the debloater module from magisk.
10. On the next screen, you will have to choose from 5 different options.
    • System Apps
    • System Priv-Apps
    • Vendor Apps
    • Enter Custom System Apps dir
    • Import Config (/cache/import-debloat.txt)
11. To remove bloatware from your Android device you can choose options among 1,2 or 3. To uninstall any system app type 1 and press enter.
12. The debloater module will scan your whole Android device and will provide you with a list of apps as per your request.
13. The list will be ordered serial number wise, and you can uninstall any app from the list by typing the serial number and then pressing enter.
14. You can even delete multiple apps at once by writing multiple serial numbers of the apps which you want to delete.

Freeze Background Apps on Android

One of the main reasons for Android’s battery drains or RAM usage is the background apps. There are a lot of apps that are almost all the time running and creates a lot of wake-locks for the device. In contrast, Apple’s IOS has achieved mastery in managing the background apps, it doesn’t have that big of a drain from the background apps as we get to see on Android devices. However, you can always try to freeze and stop those background apps which might improve the battery life of your device as well as performance. To freeze any background app on an Android device follow the method mentioned below.

1. As we will be using ADB and Fasstboot tool, make sure you have set up your ADB and your Android device is connected to your PC.
2. After you have connected and checked your Android device with ADB from your laptop, type the command adb shell.
3. Now execute the command – cmd appops set <package name> RUN_IN_BACKGROUND ignore. Make sure to edit the package name with the package name of the app that you want to remove.

cmd appops set <package_name> RUN_IN_BACKGROUND ignore

Similarly, you can even enable the apps which you have already tried to freeze using the ADB commands. To bring back an app from a frozen state simply write the below-written command.

cmd appops <package_name> RUN_IN_BACKGROUND allow

Disable System Apps on Android via ADB

Most of the things that we do with the help of root access can also be done by ADB commands. ADB is a very powerful tool that can be used with Android devices in performing a lot of tasks. As mentioned above with the help of ADB commands you can uninstall apps, see all of the apps installed on your phone and there’s a lot more than that. But, you can also disable system apps on Android with the help of ADB commands, this way apps won’t go anywhere from the phone and it won’t use much of the resource of the device like battery or RAM. So to disable any system app on your Android device follow the below-written command on your ADB command prompt screen.

adb shell 
pm disable-user --user 0 <package name>

To enable any system app which you have earlier disabled using ADB commands then type the command written below.

adb shell 
pm enable --user 0 <package name>

Delete Failed Internal Error in ADB

At times you might face some errors while executing ADB commands of disabling or uninstalling system apps. This is because OEMs restricts users from uninstalling system apps. The error which you will be seeing in such a case would be like this.

“Failure[Delete failed Internal Error]“

Unfortunately, you cannot uninstall such system apps with the help of ADB, in such cases you need to have root access to properly uninstall system apps. So, if you have root access and wants to uninstall any system apps then below are the line of commands which you need to execute one by one.

adb shell 
su
mount -o rw,remount /system
rm -rf /system/app/appname.apk
rm -rf /data/data/package name
mount -o ro,remount /system
exit
exit

To Conclude

So this was an extensive tutorial on how to uninstall any bloatware apps or system apps on any Android device. Along with that, there’s also a tutorial on how to freeze any system app which can be hogging into your resources. Most of the tutorials need ADB and only a few needs root access, so make sure that you are well aware of ADB and commands while you execute these tasks.

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