I have found a successful method to update major Android versions (i.e.: a15 → a16) without needing a PC or command line.
Disclaimer: I don’t think this method is officially supported. If something goes wrong with this process, you may need to reinstall /e/ OS from scratch. I take no responsibility for bricked devices.
Before continuing, please be sure to a have a full backup of anything important on your decide. This process shouldn’t delete anything, but I’ve only tested on one device.
- Ensure your device has the latest updates in the /e/ OS settings.
- In a browser, navigate to the command line install instructions for your device.
- Scroll to Downloads for [device_code].
- Click the link to download the /e/ OS build.
- Chose the desired version and download it. (I recommend picking the closest point version possible with a new android version and only upgrading one major Android version at a time when possible.)
- While it’s downloading, install an app to verify the checksum. Steps 7-11 will walk you through the one I used.
- Download and install Hashr.
- Once the new /e/ OS version has finished downloading, open the Hashr app and choose the file you downloaded.
- Press the Hash button.
- Copy/paste the MD5 checksum into Hashr. (Make sure you get the checksum that matches the exact file you downloaded and do not include the file name in your copy/paste.)
- Ensure it’s a match.
- In /e/ OS settings, navigate to the updates page.
- Click the 3 dots in the top-right corner and choose Local update.
- Choose the new /e/ OS version you downloaded.
- From here it’s just like a standard OTA update.
Note that the first boot in the new version took significantly longer than normal for me. My phone was also sluggish for the first few minutes. The slowness was not present on the second boot.
I’m curious to have other people give this a test and provide feedback on the process. I’ll be doing it again shortly as my phone was multiple Android versions behind.