Android Smali Tools

Bryan Ashby

2015-08-04

android, dissasemble, programming, smali

Wut.

I often find myself dissasembling Android APKs for one reason or another. This is a small list of helpful tools and resources:

Getting an APK

There is an online APK Downloader tool. Note that the site trys to redirect you to various malware and what. Just close the windows and use the downloader.

To be safe, I’d not ever actually use said APK for anything other than peeking at (e.g. Don’t install it!)

Dissasembling

APKTool has been my goto for quite some time for this. The steps are easy:

Ensure you have a recent Java version installed (1.7+ as of this writing)
Download the latest APKtool script + .jar. chmod +x both of them
Dissasemble an .apk to resources, .smali, etc. with the following command:

apktool d com.mydomain.myproduct.apk

Viola!

There also now exists APK Studio though I have not tried it yet. It looks very promising.

Smali & Sublime

I ♡ Sublime Text! Install Shane Wilton’s sublime-smali through your Sublime Package Manager and .smali files are now easy on the eyes.