[Xiaomi Redmi 4a Guides, News, & Discussion] Dtsxda:
Ok you cheap prick, you have bought the cheapest smartphone and considered not to root it??​

That was the question I asked myself and jumped right into rooting my Redmi 4A. I wasn't all that interested to do it but in a way MIUI forced me to do it. I will explain it in a bit. I used to love MIUI. It is not just a skin over Android but it was the first firmware that made android look beautiful and it was in par with the iOS. But now I do have some serious concerns over MIUI.

I still remember the days when I had Samsung Galaxy and its Touchwiz used to suck. I tried to flash MIUI so many times and even bricked my phone. When I finally made it to work, it was like a new world (in my phone of course). The music player with the lyrics displayed along with the song was a 'never seen before' experience. Those beautiful themes that you do not get in any android OS were available in MIUI. The lock-screen itself was beautiful enough to make the switch.

ME, YOU, I - Who's YOU here?

Now about the concerns I was talking about, MIUI might be sending personal data from users to a Chinese server. I'm already worried about Google collecting data using Android phones and if MIUI also does the same in between I don't think I can handle that.

How Xiaomi installs apps without telling you!

Report: Xiaomi Redmi Note sends photos and texts to Chinese server

Well, it may not be true but you should not take any chances. Stay away from people who claim they don't have anything to hide. It's not about what they hide, it is about what they give out.

What about warranty?

Your warranty will not get void if you are smart enough to flash the stock ROM and make sure the device is not unlocked, before going to the service center.

How many times have you seen this on xda threads.

/*
* Your warranty is now void.
*/

Not true if you know how to lock the phone back to normal!

When I was using Samsung Galaxy, I bricked my phone while trying too many ROMs. Luckily at that time some employee released Odin software to the public which is a Samsung official software for flashing stock ROMs. I used it to unbrick my phone. Xiaomi has XiaoMiFlash for the same purpose.

Why should you ROOT?

There are plenty of reasons to root an android device. But before that, let's see what rooting is. What I like the most is the part where you learn that your phone can be hacked and made to obey your rules! Things go wrong now and then(I mean almost all the time) but what's the fun in successfully flashing a custom ROM without any struggle??

Superpowers your phone gets after Rooting

Full control of the kernel.

Install whatever ROM you fancy.

Remove those annoying system apps and bloatwares.

Get the latest Android update.

Backup everything, get rid of ads, automate phone functions and more...

Full control of the kernel

I don't think you bought Redmi 4A for gaming because it sucks at it. But lets imagine you still want to play Assfart seamlessly then try overclocking the kernel. It will give you the best gaming performance but comes with the cost of battery backup and cpu life.

OVERCLOCKING AND COOLING DOWN YOUR MI PHONE

Install whatever ROM you fancy

Custom ROMs are awesome. There is a ROM for your taste. If there isn't one then build it! I was crazy about SlimRom. It offered some of the best (least) features needed in a phone.

Once my phone was old enough, I installed a ROM called barebones(I hardly remember the names) and it had a super slim launcher with one or two apps. No calling, data or anything. You can turn the whole phone into a music player and nothing else.

Check out:

Redmi 4A Update - Now with 4 Officially supported ROMs

Remove those annoying system apps and bloatwares

Have you seen the notification which says "Space running out" a hundred times??

Xiaomi has at least 10 apps that I never want to use. A few are security, cleaner, data monitoring and restrictions, permission manager, anti-virus etc. It is a heavy ROM and eats up a lot of space. If your phone has lesser apps then it will have a greater battery backup. Ok, can we uninstall those unwanted crapware? Nope. Again - Rooting is liberation.

System Apps that are SAFE* to remove!

Get the latest Android updates

I don't know when will Xiaomi release the next Android version for Redmi 4A but luckily I got it before the official release. Android improves its base in every version for new features, performance, stability and battery backup. I don't want to miss out on that.

I remember how much I longed for the Marshmallow update which has doze mode to save battery and I was still stuck at Lollipop.

Backup and more

Nandroid backup is a life saver. It is not necessary to backup but highly recommended. If something goes wrong then you always have a home to come back to. Your device can be backed up completely with all the apps in the current state. TWRP offers a great GUI to backup the whole system and can be restored in minutes.

Rooting a device offers few apps to work like a beast in what they do. For instance, Tasker and Greenify are not that great on an unrooted phone but when it comes to a rooted phone, they are nothing less than a Hulk.

Are ads annoying you?

There are apps that block ads by updating host file. There is an alternative for the YouTube app which blocks all the display and pre-roll ads on YouTube. A modified Facebook app that blocks all the BS that fb shows us in between the real feed. There are plentiful apps for different functionalities pertaining to a rooted phone. You should try it to know it.

How to root Redmi 4A?

Let's see how we can safely root our Redmi 4A. The same method can be used for any Mi phone I believe.

Get the drivers ready

Unlock Bootloader(I really wish there was another way)

Install TWRP recovery

Install SuperSu

Detailed Procedure

Follow this procedure only after your device is unlocked.

Make sure you are a developer already. If not, then go to Settings >> About phone >> Tap on Build Number multiple times. Now go to Settings >> Additional Settings >> Developer Options and select Android Debugging.

Connect the phone to your PC and make sure you accept any pop-up it might show on the phone.

Download & exctract these files. Also keep the TWRP image inside the same folder. Rename the twrp image file to twrp.img for simplicity. Now, use shift + Right click in the window and Run command prompt.

Now, use

adb devices

to check if the device is available for accepting adb commands. If the phone is communicating with the PC then it should show you a string of hexadecimal characters.

[IMG="fastboot devices redmi 4a"]https://i.imgur.com/qmV2KJO.png[/IMG]

Boot into Bootloader mode(fastboot mode) using this command.

adb reboot bootloader

Now use the below code to check if the phone is communicating in fastboot mode.

fastboot devices

The command should show a hexadecimal string similar to the last step.

[IMG="adb devices redmi 4a"]https://i.imgur.com/wKVDHeN.png[/IMG]

Flash TWRP recovery using the command below.

fastboot flash recovery twrp.img

After the flash process is complete(do not reboot), hold volume up + power buttons together for sometime till you get a haptic feedback and Mi logo. That should get you to TWRP recovery mode! Things get really easy after this process. Flashing ROMs, firmwares or apps are pretty straight forward. But make sure you wipe cache and data wherever necessary.

[IMG="TWRP recovery on Redmi 4A"]https://i.imgur.com/vv19eUJ.png[/IMG]

Do you think Rooting is fun? Let me know which ROM you are using.

Thank me if you've liked the post.

Disclaimer: Rooting can brick your device. There are ways to unbrick it.