How to download apk archives of installed applications from a Android phone.
Preparations
Make sure development debuging is enabled, phone plugged in and that adb can communicate with it.
List installed packages
Run the following adb command to list installed third party applications packages
$ adb shell pm list packages -3 -f
It will display a list that looks something like this:
package:/data/app/com.yle.audio.x3m-1/base.apk=com.yle.audio.x3m package:/data/app/com.kyorkka.stoppi-2/base.apk=com.kyorkka.stoppi package:/data/app/cgeo.geocaching-1/base.apk=cgeo.geocaching package:/data/app/com.instagram.android-1/base.apk=com.instagram.android package:/data/app/com.instagram.layout-1/base.apk=com.instagram.layout package:/data/app/com.schibsted.iberica.tori-1/base.apk=com.schibsted.iberica.tori package:/data/app/com.yle.webtv-1/base.apk=com.yle.webtv package:/data/app/com.twitter.android-1/base.apk=com.twitter.android package:/data/app/net.sourceforge.opencamera-1/base.apk=net.sourceforge.opencamera package:/data/app/com.spotify.music-1/base.apk=com.spotify.music package:/data/app/com.facebook.katana-1/base.apk=com.facebook.katana package:/data/app/com.bbm-1/base.apk=com.bbm package:/data/app/app.zxtune-2/base.apk=app.zxtune
Now note the path of the package you would like to download, say BBM (com.bbm). The path is /data/app/com.bbm-1/base.apk
To download the package from the phone, run the following adb command (destination file in italic, you can use whatever you like):
adb pull /data/app/com.bbm-1/base.apk com.bbm.apk
Now you can copy the downloaded apk to some other device, say for example a Sailfish OS running Jolla, and install it there.
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