Many streamers use Fire TV Stick for converting their existing non-smart TV to Smart TVs. While many of them are enjoying it, some aren’t satisfied with the same. If you guys are using a Fire Stick launched in 2018 with 4K, you can change the UI and make it an Android TV. With this, you will get a full-fledged Android TV experience without buying any Android TV box or stick. In fact, the UI which Fire Stick uses is a forked version of Android, which is Fire OS. Amazon operates the Fire OS both on Fire TV and tablets. Although it’s based on Android, it lacks Google apps out of the box, and the UI is far different from standard Android TVs. You will get the Amazon-owned App Store and services instead of Google Play Store and Play services.
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You could sideload Google apps, but now you can have an Android TV experience in it. Thanks to the XDA-Developer member ”burcbuluku” for helping Fire Stick users to get Android TV UI. He had installed Android TV in his Amazon Fire Stick 4K 2018 by some workarounds. If you want to do the same, then follow the steps mentioned below.
Steps to get Android TV experience in Fire Stick 4K 2018?
Before getting into the steps of installing Android TV in your Fire Stick, make sure that you have got all the products mentioned in the requirements list. Also, unlocking the bootloader will void the warranty of your Fire Stick. So, we don’t think you should blame us for this later. Now, follow the steps.
Requirements
- A TV aKa a monitor to plugin the Fire Stick.
- Fire Stick 4K (2018).
- A Pendrive formatted as Fat 32.
- Keyboard, Mouse, and OTG adapter.
Procedures
- Before getting into the steps, please back up your files.
- Now, unlock the bootloader of your stick and then install TWRP on the same. If you don’t know how to do the same, you can follow the guide by XDA developers.
- Once you have done that, download and extract the Firestick 4K Android TV TWRP Backup.rar to the TWRP backups path on your Pendrive, you can move it to the following address. Create a folder named TWRP, and inside it, create another named BACKUPS. Finally, make the G070VM0984752N1Q folder inside BACKUPS.
- After this, perform a factory reset via TWRP. For this, you can use the OTG adapter and either your Keyboard or mouse for navigating inside it.
- Then, restore the same from the TWRP backup which you have created before.
- Now, reboot the system.
- As a final step, connect to your Wi-Fi and sign in to your Amazon account. Obviously, you can’t do this without your Keyboard or Mouse.
- Finally, navigate to the Settings menu and then to Fire OS. From here, tap on Controllers and Bluetooth Devices and pair your Fire TV remote. Once you have done that, there is no use for the Keyboard and mouse.
There you go, you have successfully installed the Android TV experience in your Fire Stick 4K 2018. But the thing is, you will be on the old Android 7 Nougat. And as of now, the process is limited to the 2018 Fire Stick. We hope someone will find a way for the latter. According to a report, most things are working except Google Assistant and search after installing the same.
Working items include Widevine DRM, Kodi, Google Play Store, Play Services, Android Screen Cast, Alexa, Fire TV Remote app, and Magisk. We hope that the guide will help you guys and share the article with your friends and family using Fire Stick TV 4K 2018.
Terry Ts