Is Rooting Really Worth?

[Cruel]

I used to be very interested in rooting back in 2014-2016, but during those years I slowly grew out of it. I never really found many pros of rooting your phone. I had an old Samsung Galaxy S2 when I started rooting then eventually found my way to the LG Stylo (I have Galaxy S7 rn)

Besides being able to back up all of your phone data including save game data, I never really found much use other than that. Like in-app purchase exploit apps like Lucky Patcher aren't all that great because it's just for singleplayer games and I mean, shit, you can literally download hacked apks without having to root lol. I remember rooting my Stylo specifically to put all my games onto the SD card and play them all through there and could never do it! Was such a waste of time and fucked up the experience. The games could only play if they were on my phone storage. I couldn't even use snapchat. It would block me, and I would try using I think the app is called xploit or something like that, but it still wouldn't let me use Snapchat.

As for custom ROMs, I think they are easily subpar at best. They're not that great like CyanogenMod for example, a lot of features don't work depending on your phone and in my personal experience I've had many little problems that annoyed the shit out of me.

But on the other hand you can also get any type of emoji you want so you're not stuck with shitty Android emojis and I can see people rooting specifically for IOS emojis.

Why do you root your phone for? Do you guys think its worth rooting your phone? I haven't rooted in a long time and maybe I'm missing out on some shit so that's why I wanna see what other people think

[DragonyCat]

I have rooted my Galaxy S7 Edge and I did it for the Emojis, iApp with Lucky Patcher and Titanium Backup.

[DragonyCat]

I have rooted my Galaxy S7 Edge and I did it for the Emojis, iApp with Lucky Patcher and Titanium Backup.

Oh and Pokémon GO for that time

[Omnibenevolent]

Might be a bit of an un-needed bump but it's weird cause we're in the exact same scenario it seems.

I've always had Google phones (after the Blackberry era, recently tried Samsung) and I've had fun tinkering around with different exploits that have been available specifically for rooted phones only; it was more fun when I was younger and I've learnt and done some fairly interesting things.

As you grow older (currently in University) responsibilities grow and priorities are addressed more seriously and for that reason alone I've decided to leave my S7 unrooted and it has been for the entire time I've owned it, whenever I used to get a new Nexus the first thing I'd focus on is rooting along with tinkering with different ROMs/Kernels to maximise the efficiency of the phone (E.G the Nexus 4 had 4G capability that just needed to be manually activated, which could only be done by rooting).

So of course we have the pros, but what are the cons? Well, when you get a new phone, you'll be glad you're secured with warranty if any accidents do arise (E.g broken screen) and believe me, with my Nexus 4 I had broken the screen a good 3 times and replaced the screen myself each time, the costs basically racked up to what could've been put towards a newer phone or a contract phone. So rooting of course, voids your warranty, meaning you're basically forced to do any phone repairs yourself or take it to a phone repair shop which will only cost you twice the $$$, of course you could unroot the phone but if it's damaged fairly seriously you can't always do that, meaning if they find out your warranty is void upon fixing the device, you could be in some serious trouble when it comes to them forcing you to pay any costs involved with fixing your phone.

Also applications such as bank applications and so forth are designed to reject rooted phones, I understand you can bypass this but the reason why they reject them is because they can't guarantee a fluid experience for an application on a rooted phone which could result in weird glitches in banking applications and I don't really like the risk of that just so I can play around with MiTM attacks and so forth on a rooted device. I enjoy the simple convenience that I once ignored so heavily. I'm not sure but I just wouldn't root my phone these days unless I absolutely had to or if it was a secondary phone (I have an Xperia Z that's rooted).

You're better off just leaving your main phone clean and possibly getting a cheaper/second hand android phone that can be rooted just so it doesn't interfere with your day to day convenience, I had a Moto G for that ages ago before I sold it cheap cause it was basically just sitting in a corner.

[rockwings00]

Rooting isn't needed as much anymore unless you like tinkering around with the OS. Stock Android is so much better than it used to be.

[decomarius]

I also have an s7 edge. I have original android. No modded OS. I suppose nowdays rooting isn't really necesary anymore only if u like badly or need for sth.

[gamingraptor]

There a couple of things I enjoy having and rooting isn’t to difficult. However in the future I doubt rooting is super necessary especially with many popular root features being added into the os

[NAROBST]

For me its always worth it. Having full control over my phone feels better.

[sautzer]

I think it all depend on what use you want to do with your smartphone, for example I have a S6 and I use root for kernel app, change the ui of my system and add some features like dolby atmos, finger print unlock when screen is off and so on. But in your case is totaly unuseful, so it just depend

[SKIMASKTHESLUMPGAWD]

REALLY depends, in most cases no.

Unless you wish to achieve a goal that requires rooting I would strongly advise against it.

[Joshuapkz]

My brother rooted my phone and installed adblock and some other things. For me it felt like it was worth it. I understand why some people don't though.

[Jaladhjin]

I used to be a loyal root user for a long time.. since my first Android an HTC Evo.

I rooted primarily for ad blocking & SetCPU at the start..

Then I noticed the IAPs & started looking at custom roms..

Finally of course I decided to go down the rabbit hole that is Xposed..

Currently I've got a Nexus 6P with TWRP & Magisk..

Have some adblocking going on.. iOS emojis my nav bar gone & pie controls..

This will be my last Android device though I'm leaving for that very reason.. root.. I couldn't be an Android user without it & the fact it has become weaponized to the point it's all a vulnerability much more so than a power user level for customization.. I'm over it.. I do too many valuable things on my devices.

[invisman]

Like you said, it used to be essential 2-3 years back but now whatever features that I used to root for are now available in the system itself. System-wide adblocking is still missing but "fake VPN" apps like Blokada take care of it.

[Greythorne]

Rooting allows you to install custom roms/operating systems, while I bet nowadays people can get by without rooting their phone and have found ways around rooting.

[NeverWing2]

Rooting allows you to install custom roms/operating systems, while I bet nowadays people can get by without rooting their phone and have found ways around rooting.

I am learning a lot from you guys, keep the discussion going. I never rooted a phone before and am planning to have one but am still hesitant to do so.