ADB Command Cheat Sheet

The Android Debug Bridge (adb) is a versatile command-line tool that lets you communicate with a device. The adb command facilitates a variety of device actions, such as installing and debugging apps, and it provides access to a Unix shell that you can use to run a variety of commands on a device.

Basic Services

Command	Description
`adb devices`	List connected devices
`adb devices -l`	List connected devices with attributes
—	—
`adb root`	Restart adbd with root permissions
`adb start-server`	Start the adb server
`adb kill-server`	Kill the adb server
`adb remount`	Remount file systems with read/write access
`adb reboot`	Reboot the device
`adb reboot bootloader`	Reboot the device into bootloader mode
`adb disable-verity`	Disable dm-verity checking

You can specify wait-for-device after adb to ensure that the command will run after the device is connected.

-s can be used to send commands to a specific device when multiple devices are connected.

Examples

$ adb wait-for-device devices
 List of devices attached
 somedevice-1234 device
 someotherdevice-1234 device

$ adb -s somedevice-1234 root

Log Output

Command	Description
`adb logcat`	Start printing log messages to stdout
`adb logcat -g`	Show current log buffer size
`adb logcat -G <size>`	Set the buffer size (K or M)
`adb logcat -c`	Clear the log buffer
`adb logcat *:V`	Enable all log messages (verbose)
`adb logcat -f <filename>`	Dump logs to a specified file

Examples

$ adb logcat -G 16M
$ adb logcat *:V > output.log

File Management

Command	Description
`adb push <local> <remote>`	Copy local files to the remote device
`adb pull <remote> <local>`	Copy remote device files to local

Examples

$ echo "This is a test" > test.txt
$ adb push test.txt /sdcard/test.txt
$ adb pull /sdcard/test.txt pulledTest.txt

Remote Scripting

Command	Description
`adb shell <command>`	Run specified command on the device (most Unix commands work here)
`adb shell wm size`	Display the current screen resolution
`adb shell wm size WxH`	Set the resolution to WxH
`adb shell pm list packages`	List all installed packages
`adb shell pm list packages -3`	List all installed third-party packages
`adb shell monkey -p app.package.name`	Start a specified package (Monkey test)