Where is the Hosts File in Android?

saluk · May 13, 2009

In my country some sites have been banned but most of us keep using them in pc's by changing hosts file in \Windows\System32\drivers\etc

adding ip strings like

207.200.100.5 shoutcast.com
207.200.100.5 www.shoutcast.com

I just wonder if there is someway to do this in android? If the answer is yes then my new question is "how"...

Thx for the answers...

rub1k · May 13, 2009

/etc/hosts

saluk · May 13, 2009

rub1k said:
/etc/hosts

Thx. I reached the file by a file manager app. but i cant open it with notepad apps. Do I need the root privilage?

persiansown · May 13, 2009

yes. Just ADB pull it.

grokdesigns · May 13, 2009

Technically it's in /system/etc/hosts, /etc is a symlink.

If you want to edit it, create a hosts file on your SD card and then cp from terminal with root privileges. Or you could adb push it from your computer.

saluk · May 13, 2009

thx a lot for the answers. ill try it.

mindrot · Apr 18, 2010

question

hello there,

i'm a newbie and i don't know anything about programming. and i need a step by step guide to edit the host file. i have reached the file with file manager but i can't edit or replace it.

thanks.

gophergun · Apr 18, 2010

Should just be a matter of

adb pull /etc/hosts

Which will copy the file to the current directory, then make the necessary changes, then

adb remount
adb push hosts /etc/hosts

Anyone correct me if I'm wrong. If you don't have ADB set up, now would be a good time to do so; searching for "ADB for dummies" should help you with that.

cloverdale · Apr 18, 2010

I suggest nano if you have a ROM with this included (such as cyanogenmod). Then all you need to do is open the terminal and enter

Code:

 su
nano /system/etc/hosts

In this manner, one can do the edits straight from the phone terminal.

domenukk · Apr 18, 2010

Or download estrongs file manager, go to settings and set file system to "read write"(its in something like root settings or so). after that you can edit the file

jcarrz1 · Apr 18, 2010

cloverdale said:
I suggest nano if you have a ROM with this included (such as cyanogenmod). Then all you need to do is open the terminal and enter

Code:

su nano /system/etc/hosts

In this manner, one can do the edits straight from the phone terminal.

This guy knows his hosts. I have his file on my desktop and I push it into every rom I use.

MrBlueEyez · Apr 20, 2010

If i put in hosts like one from google for example, and some regular news sites i use, would this speed up my internet?

DiskCrasher · Oct 17, 2010

I've rooted my Droid and copied over a pre-populated hosts file to /system/etc that re-maps bad/ad sites to 127.0.0.1. However, when I open a terminal and ping one of the sites listed in the hosts file, it still comes back with the real IP and not 127.0.0.1.

RedWave31 · Oct 18, 2010

I do believe in Linux systems, the real hosts file is in root/data/data/
>The system/etc/ hosts file is empty, aka a decoy of some sorts....?

To view it, u may need "rootexplorer.apk" (as opposed to droidexplorer.exe, a windows vista program), as I couldn't get Astro to require SU

(Need to check this out, my own system may be different?)

Skrip037 · Oct 18, 2010

RedWave31 said:
I do believe in Linux systems, the real hosts file is in root/data/data/
>The system/etc/ hosts file is empty, aka a decoy of some sorts....?

To view it, u may need "rootexplorer.apk" (as opposed to droidexplorer.exe, a windows vista program), as I couldn't get Astro to require SU

(Need to check this out, my own system may be different?)

If it is empty, it just means there aren't any hosts in it. /etc/hosts is the correct file.

DiskCrasher said:
I've rooted my Droid and copied over a pre-populated hosts file to /system/etc that re-maps bad/ad sites to 127.0.0.1. However, when I open a terminal and ping one of the sites listed in the hosts file, it still comes back with the real IP and not 127.0.0.1.

What exactly is the process you are using? Does it look like this?

And when you pushed the hosts to your phone, what command did you use?

farmatito · Oct 18, 2010

DiskCrasher said:
I've rooted my Droid and copied over a pre-populated hosts file to /system/etc that re-maps bad/ad sites to 127.0.0.1. However, when I open a terminal and ping one of the sites listed in the hosts file, it still comes back with the real IP and not 127.0.0.1.

Where did you get the file from, a windows pc?
In this case you need to convert the end-of-line characters
from Dos to Unix ones. This could be done with nano editor
or with busybox's dos2unix command.

alutastisch · Oct 19, 2010

you should try to open it with the "text editor" in "ASTRO"..

DiskCrasher · Oct 20, 2010

farmatito said:
Where did you get the file from, a windows pc?
In this case you need to convert the end-of-line characters
from Dos to Unix ones. This could be done with nano editor
or with busybox's dos2unix command.

That was it! I opened the hosts file in Notepad++ and converted it to UNIX format, then saved it back to my phone. Now blocked addresses are resolving to 127.0.0.1 as expected. No more ads or malware, yay!

kenanyan · Nov 3, 2010

Converting hosts file to unix format is worked for me also ,i converted hosts file with notepad++ to unix format(edit>eol conversation>unix format) then copy it in etc ,overwrite(backup ojinal host file to sdcard first with copy command) ,no need to reboot phone

nuflood · Mar 13, 2011

can't pull

Hi

I'm trying to pull the hosts file with adb or with android commander. the adb sais there isn't a file like that and the AC give me this when I try to copy:

Items count: 1
Items source: /system/etc/
Items destination: C:\android-sdk-windows\

Starting operation...

Coping file: hosts@
remote object '/system/etc/hosts@' does not exist

*** Operation complete! ***

What can I do?
thanks

Where is the Hosts File in Android?

Member

Senior Member

Member

Retired Recognized Developer

Senior Member

Member

New member

Senior Member

Senior Member

Senior Member

Retired Recognized Developer

Senior Member

New member

Senior Member

Member

Senior Member

Senior Member

New member

New member

Member

Similar threads

Top Liked Posts