Rooting an Android device can be as easy as installing a custom recovery through Fastboot mode, booting into the custom recovery, then selecting to install a Superuser client to the /system partition. And, courtesy of squid2 on XDA Developers’ forums, that’s just how easy it is for anyone that bought the recently launched Motorola Moto G third generation.
The device has officially received its first bit of support from the modding community, which is the creation of a version of Team Win’s Recovery Project, commonly just called TWRP (pronounced like ‘twerp’). so, now all you have to do is unlock the device’s bootloader, install TWRP and boot into it, then choose to flash a Superuser package, to gain root access. Similarly, if you just want to make a stock backup of your brand new device in case something goes horribly wrong customizing it, you’re in the clear.
Though any custom versions of Android have yet to be developed for the most recent offerings from Chicago’s own, the development of a custom recovery for the new Moto G will likely have the same implications as with many devices. Once you unlock the bootloader and install a custom recovery, you’ve got the ability to handle your device more in-depth, like if you need to do a factory reset, or if you are looking to get rid of hundreds of megabytes of downloaded files, you can now just wipe the internal storage, leaving your installed apps pristine.
But the best news is that, for many, a custom version of Android isn’t necessary, and, with root access, you can more fully control your device. You can tweak all kinds of settings, though some should be left un-tweaked, and you can even, if you so choose, turn off the navigation bar, install a PIE launcher to enable pseudo-off-screen keys, as well as nearly limitless customizations to the ever-modded build.prop. The Moto G 2015’s custom recovery looks to work on both the 8 and 16 gigabyte versions, and, along with Chainfire’s SuperSU 2.46 zip package, allow any user to root. The watch begins for which custom versions of Android will adopt the newest Moto G as their own.