In this article, we will Install LineageOS on Raspberry Pi, which is an open source Android-based operating system. It is important to point out that this is just an experimental setup.
No version of Android is officially compatible with raspberry pi, so the version we installed is not optimized for our dear motherboard. Therefore, even if the installation we are about to present is relatively good, it is difficult to use Android on its raspberry pi today.
If you’ve ever wanted to run the free open source LineageOS operating system for smartphones and tablets on your small Raspberry Pi 3 single board computer (SBC), you can now use the unofficial version for public testing.
The Finnish developer KonstaT released the first LineageOS 15.1 port of the Raspberry Pi 3 SBC based on Google’s Android 8.1 Oreo mobile operating system. It is powered by the Linux kernel 4.4.119 LTS and compiled with GCC 4.9, including the Android security patch level of February 2018.
Designed for advanced users, the Raspberry Pi 3’s LineageOS port uses Google’s SwiftShader software renderer by default, which means display performance may be interrupted. In addition, developers do not recommend this initial build for any production use, nor does it recommend any media-oriented devices.
“This is the LineageOS 15.1 I built for the Raspberry Pi 3. It’s unofficial and not supported by the LineageOS team. It’s only for advanced users. This version currently uses Google’s SwiftShader software renderer, so display performance may not be what you expect , “developer.
Needless to say, if you want to install and run LineageOS on the Rasberry Pi 3, you can download the Konsta version from his website. The archive size is approximately 300 MB and contains approximately 4.3 GB of images, which you need to write on the SD card to launch it on the Rasberry Pi 3 computer.
The developer has not provided any installation instructions, but it provides early adopters with quick FAQs on how to enable root access, find developer options and performance settings, and restart features. He also promised to release the LineageOS port source code for the Rasberry Pi 3 on GitHub.
Requirements for installing Lineage OS
After a brief introduction, let’s summarize everything you need to complete this installation.
- Raspberry Pi View on Amazon
- Power supply
- The SD card is at least 16GB, and it is important that it has good read/write speed.
- You also need a screen and an HDMI cable to display the beautiful Android interface. You can also use the official touchscreen that does not require the use of an HDMI cable.
- Then you need to download the Android image and sh script that will install the Play Store.
Software Requirements
Note that for the final part of this tutorial, you must use a computer with a UNIX OS (Linux or Mac OS) to execute the sh script. If not, you can use a virtual machine. Here we point to Debian commands such as distributions (eg Ubuntu, Linux Mint, Elementary Os and many others).
LineageOS Downloading link
- pedigree 14.1-20180118-UNOFFICIAL-KonstaKANG-rpi3.zip
- Https://www.androidfilehost.com/?fid=746010030569947763
- pedigree 15.1-20180307-UNOFFICIAL-KonstaKANG-rpi3.zip
- Https://www.androidfilehost.com/?fid=890129502657588904
- 2) Win32DiskImager here
- https://sourceforge.net/projects/win32diskimager/
Steps to install Android OS to Raspberry Pi 3
The first step is to download LineageOS 15.1 Android 8.0.1 Build from konstakang.com, which has a download link.
Go to the page and scroll down and download the latest version here.
https://konstakang.com/devices/rpi3/LineageOS15.1/
After it Formats the Card with SD formatter and extract the iso files with Win32 disk imager
Install ISO file with Win32 diskimager
When the OS image is written in the SD card then remove it and insert into the raspberry pi.
Plug everything in and a boot logo will display on the screen for a bit. Let it run until the main screen comes up.
Again, these options are all experimental, so take caution and be patient. Things might not always go as planned. In any case, you do have a working LineageOS installation to try out and configure on your Raspberry Pi.
