How To Setup ADB On Android, Windows, Mac And Linux (2023)

Android Debugging Bridge (ADB), as the name suggests, is a command-line utility that allows developers to debug various parts of their applications. However, it is not restricted to just developers. If you want to access certain features of the Android platform that are not otherwise accessible, you too can use the ADB commands by installing ADB on your computer, be it Windows, macOS, Linux, or Chrome OS.

Once you install it, there are numerous cool things that you can do with ADB on your Android device. Plus, there are various apps that require ADB permissions to work. So, if you have been confused about how to install and use ADB on Android, Windows, Mac And Linux, we have you covered.

What is ADB?

The Android Debug Bridge is a powerful command-line tool that gives you access to hidden features on your Android phone. It consists of three main parts:

• The client. The device you’re sending commands from is usually your computer.
• The daemon. Runs on your phone as a background service and receives commands from the client.
• The server. A service running in the background on your client that establishes the connection between the two devices.

ADB is a debugging tool for app developers, helping them create apps and troubleshoot issues in their code on a live phone environment. The tool is more than that, though. It also lets you access hidden settings on your phone and install system updates or a custom ROM.

Enable ADB debugging on Android device

First, we have to make our Android device ready for ADB debugging. So to setup ADB on Android, we have to enable USB debugging mode in system settings under Developer options – which is hidden by default. Follow these steps to enable Developer options and activate USB debugging:

• Open Settings > About phone
• Now tap on the Build number seven times and you can see a quick message showing Developer options is enabled.
• After that head back to Settings main page to find Developer options at the bottom and tap on it.
• Next in the Developer option toggle the button next to USB debugging to enable it. Don’t forget to Tap and choose “Ok” in the confirmation pop-up to enable USB debugging mode.

Now we partially setup ADB, next choose your operating system and continue installing ADB.

Install ADB on Windows

1. First download the ADB zip file for Windows.
2. Create a new folder in C: drive, named “adb” and extract files to that folder.
3. Next Shift + Right-click on adb folder and choose the option “open command prompt here” or “open command window here“. For Windows 10 users either PowerShell or Command Prompt will open.
4. Now connect your Android device to the computer via a USB cable. Make sure the USB mode you choose is “File transfer(MTP)“.
5. Now in the Command Prompt windows enter “adb devices” to launch the ADB daemon.
6. At the same time, a prompt will pop up on your Android device to allow or deny USB debugging access. Just tap the “Always allow from this computer” and select “OK” to continue.
7. Now you can see, the device is listed on the ADB daemon with the serial number. If it’s not, then re-enter the adb command in step 5.

How to Install ADB on Mac

1. First, download the ADB zip file for Mac.
2. Extract the zip file to the Desktop or any other easily-accessible location.
3. Now open Terminal windows.
4. Enter the command to navigate to the ADB directory, like “cd /extracted/path“.
5. Now connect your Android device to the Mac PC via a USB cable. Make sure the USB mode you choose is “File transfer(MTP)“.
6. Once your Terminal is pointed to the same folder of your ADB tools, enter the “adb devices” command to launch the ADB daemon.
7. At the same time, a prompt will pop up on your Android device to allow or deny USB debugging access. Just tap the “Always allow from this computer” and select “OK” to continue.
8. Now you can see, the device is listed on the ADB daemon with the serial number. If it’s not, then re-enter the ADB command in step 6.

Install ADB on Linux

1. First, download the ADB zip file for Linux.
2. Extract the zip file to Home or any other easily-accessible location.
3. Now open Terminal windows.
4. Enter the command to navigate to the ADB directory, like “cd /extracted/path“.
5. Now connect your Android device to the Mac PC via a USB cable. Make sure the USB mode you choose is “File transfer(MTP)“.
6. Once your Terminal is pointed to the same folder of your ADB tools, enter the “adb devices” command to launch the ADB daemon.
7. At the same time, a prompt will pop up on your Android device to allow or deny USB debugging access. Just tap the “Always allow from this computer” and select “OK” to continue.
8. Now you can see, the device is listed on the ADB daemon with the serial number. If it’s not, then re-enter the ADB command in step 6.

How to use webADB

If you don’t have Android 11 or higher or prefer to work with a bigger screen, webADB might be for you. It’s an open source web app that you can use to run the ADB shell, but it also comes with a file manager and supports SCRCPY for screenshots and screencasts in apps that don’t allow you to take them the regular way (on Android 11 and lower, that is). The biggest caveat: Being a web tool, you have to trust that the developers don’t do anything fishy with your phone. You’re granting an unknown party low-level access, so you might want to opt for a local install instead.

Using ADB

These are the simplest ways to get up and running with ADB, but there are other ways. If you use Homebrew on Mac or Linux, a formula automatically installs ADB in the right spot, similar to Nexus Tools. You can also manually install ADB on Linux and macOS, as detailed in the Windows tutorial.

Depending on which install method you opted for, you may have to add a period (.) in front of ADB commands to make them work. If you haven’t added your SDK tools installation to your path on Windows, you must run a terminal from the SDK tools folder (this isn’t the case if you installed it using Nexus Tools). You can enable or disable many advanced features and tweaks via ADB and the ADB shell.