[Samsung Galaxy S9  Guides, News, & Discussion] EagerestWolf:
Ok, for all the Verizon peeps who want to get in on the hot beta action, don't waste your time flashing to U1, beta registration is closed. Trust me, I found out the hard way. Here is your step-by-step guide to getting the Android Pie/One UI Beta on your VZW SM-G960U.

BEFORE PROCEEDING, BY CLICKING THAT SHOW SPOILER BUTTON. YOU UNDERSTAND THAT YOU ARE FLASHING SOFTWARE ONTO YOUR $1000 SMARTPHONE AT YOUR OWN RISK. ANYTHING COULD HAPPEN, AND I AM NOT RESPONSIBLE IF IT HITS THE FAN. YOU SHOULD ONLY PROCEED IF YOU UNDERSTAND EXACTLY WHAT IS BEING TOLD TO YOU, AND UNDERSTAND WHAT THE RISKS ASSOCIATED WITH THIS ARE.

Step 1: Check your firmware version

Open the settings app on your phone, scroll all the way to the bottom, select "About phone", then select "Software information". If your baseband number ends with BRJ6, bad news bears, you gotta downflash, don't worry I'll get there slowly but surely. If you do not have BRJ6, good news, you can probably just flash the beta or a chain of OTA packages to get to the beta. Check https://firmware.science for what chain of OTA packages to flash. You ultimately want to get to a build number in the C-series, then simply proceed to Step 4: Profit.

Step 2: You gotta downflash

Poor you and your first world problems of having too new of software. Anyhow to proceed further, you need a few things:

A computer, with Samsung USB Drivers and Android SDK installed

This modified version of Odin

The BRJ5 firmware to downflash

The BRJ6 firmware just in case it hits the fan

Before proceeding it may be wise to turn off auto update, so your phone doesn't try to download and apply BRJ6 before you can get into recovery to flash the beta.

Hook your phone up to your PC with USB Debugging enabled, open a command prompt and enter

adb reboot bootloader

Alternatively, you can simply power off your phone and hold down the Volume Down, Bixby, and Power Keys for a couple seconds, then press Volume Up to confirm you want to enter download mode. Next, open the modified Odin you downloaded, and you should see a blue bar at the top saying 0: [COM3], where 3 can be any number, just depends on how many serial devices your computer has. If you see no blue bar, your USB Drivers aren't installed. Now, extract the BRJ5 zip, and in Odin, select the AP, BL, CP, and HOME_CSC files from your BRJ5 firmware. Then hit Start and wait. DO NOT FOR ANY REASON UNPLUG YOUR PHONE UNTIL ODIN DISPLAYS A GREEN SQUARE SAYING PASS, ELSE YOU WILL HAVE AN EXPENSIVE PAPER WEIGHT!!! Once you reboot your phone, make sure you let all the update stuff finish, else your phone is gonna be in a bad state, and possibly broken. That's it, you now have BRJ5 installed, proceed onwards.

Step 3: Install the Beta

You will need the update.zip from either https://firmware.science or from the OP. Make sure you get the correct package, else the update will fail. You need the BRJ5 to C### for your device (SM-G960U is the S9/SM-G965U is the S9+)

Once your phone has rebooted which will happen automagically unless you changed any settings in Odin (in which case, why are you reading this?), place the update.zip somewhere on your PC where you can find it, then in command prompt, enter

adb reboot recovery

This will take you to your phone's recovery and then just hit, apply update from ADB. Back on the computer, in command prompt, enter

adb sideload /path/to/update.zip

Obviously replacing /path/to/update.zip with the actual location of your update.zip. Alternatively, if you have an SD Card in your phone, and it is not encrypted, you can just put the update.zip in the root of your SD Card, and select apply update from SD Card. This will be significantly faster. Now, if all goes well and the stars are aligned, you should be running the Android P beta when your phone reboots; however, be prepared to wait a while, sideloading an update is VERY slow.

Step 4: Profit

Do I really need to explain this step?

FAQ

Q: Will this trip Knox?

A: No, you are flashing official Samsung Software with an official Samsung Tool, why would it trip Knox?

Q: Will this work for the Exynos models?

A: First of all, don't you guys have your own beta going on right now? Secondly, why do you have an Exynos model on Verizon? Finally, no Qualcomm only.

Q: Will this work for Model SM-#### (insert number here)

A: This method is only guaranteed to work with the SM-G960U, you know since that's the firmware files I linked and all. Try it at your own risk.

Q: Can I go back to Oreo if I don't like the beta?

A: That's why I linked the BRJ6 firmware. Just flash it with Odin. Additionally, you must do a factory reset, or your device will NOT boot.

Q: Will I get OTA updates for the beta?

A: No, unless your device is registered for it, and if it is, why try to circumvent things?

Q: Will I get the official OTA when it comes out?

A: Umm...maybe? I'm not 100% sure on that one.

Q: How is your battery life?

A: Boy you have a lot of questions, don't you? Anyway, it's alright. Then again, I have an S9 (non-plus model) and my battery life was kinda meh before the update anyway. I usually only get a few hours of screen on time.

---------- Post added at 09:43 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:42 PM ----------

Might I add, I am a huge fan of the new gesture navigation.

---------- Post added at 10:14 PM ---------- Previous post was at 09:43 PM ----------

I did find one thing I don't like in the beta so far, why the heck did they move the clock to the left side of the status bar? It feels so wrong.