Gear S3 (or any Gear devices) Incompatibility issue with Android P solved!

[Jackz314]

I've noticed the incompatibility issue as soon as Android P came out, but never got the time to dig into the problem, now I finally took some time, and recompiled several APKs so that the gear app can work on Android P now. For details about what this problem is about, please take a look at my thread here, and the rest of the discussions, basically Samsung is "sneaky" and used some private kind of API that was deprecated when Android P came out, so the app would naturally crash every time you try to set up a device, and because of Samsung's laziness, this problem never got solved. (I tried to contact Samsung several times and nobody seems to care)
Anyways, I've attached the APKs here, and you have to install all of them (with the same signature, from me) to make the app work because of APK signature issues, otherwise after installing the main Gear app, the other needed plugins, and service apps will fail to install (I still don't know how Samsung managed to do that).

I've included the plugin APKs for Gear S series, Gear Fit2, Gear IconX, and Gear IconX 2018, please download the corresponding ones for your devices.

If you failed to install any of these APKs, make sure you uninstall all the other Samsung related apps first, as some of them seem to be able to block these installs somehow.
Enjoy!

PS: Samsung Pay is not working with the recompiled APKs at the moment, probably because of the different signatures on the APKs, any ideas on how to fix this?

PPS: I've also included my keystore file (my.keystore). In case you have other Gear devices, just go to APK Mirror or whatever you prefer and download the corresponding plugin APK, resign them with this keystore file and install it with the Gear App, then it should work (resign APK simple tutorial, detailed tutorial, remember to replace the keystore's name and password with the corresponding ones. Password for the keystore file when resigning: 314151)

 

[bonesnj0]

Thank you for trying!

 

[thgood]

Your APK files worked on my Pixel XL w/ Android P. Thanks for taking the time to share your work!

 

[dsmitty166]

I've noticed the incompatibility issue as soon as Android P came out, but never got the time to dig into the problem, now I finally took some time, and recompiled several APKs so that the gear app can work on Android P now. For details about what this problem is about, please take a look at my thread here, and the rest of the discussions, basically Samsung is "sneaky" and used some private kind of API that was deprecated when Android P came out, so the app would naturally crash every time you try to set up a device, and because of Samsung's laziness, this problem never got solved. (I tried to contact Samsung several times and nobody seems to care)
Anyways, I've attached the APKs here, and you have to install all of them (with the same signature, from me) to make the app work because of APK signature issues, otherwise after installing the main Gear app, the other needed plugins, and service apps will fail to install (I still don't know how Samsung managed to do that).
Enjoy!
PS: I've also included my keystore file (my.keystore) in case someone wants to resign other gear apps, they should work as well (tutorial)
PPS: I noticed that Samsung Pay is not working with the recompiled APKs, probably because of the different signatures, any ideas on how to fix this?

Thanks for the upload, however, I cannot use your keystore file without the password

 

[Jackz314]

Thanks for the upload, however, I cannot use your keystore file without the password

Thanks for the reminder, I completely forgot about it, anyway, I've added the password in the original post, it's 314151

 

[Magnum80]

Thanks for the help, managed to get the app to work however I've noticed that Samsung health won't sync steps with my gear S3, even though everything seems to be connected

 

[SubliminalME]

I get app not installed on all of these...any ideas?

 

[dsmitty166]

I get app not installed on all of these...any ideas?

Make sure you have no Samsung apps or plugins installed.

 

[SubliminalME]

So i got it running, but it doesn't appear to be pushing anything to the watch...its not tracking my steps, and it's not giving me notifications.

Any additional thoughts? hehe...thank you in advance!

damon

 

[DeskPixel]

I just found this thread, it's exactly what I was looking for! But I'm pretty noob when it comes to these things, to make it work do I simply uninstall all the Samsung apps from my phone and install these ones? That's all and it should work?

 

[BladeRunner]

I just found this thread, it's exactly what I was looking for! But I'm pretty noob when it comes to these things, to make it work do I simply uninstall all the Samsung apps from my phone and install these ones? That's all and it should work?

yes, it's that simple.

 

[comiskeybum]

I uninstalled all Samsung apps and it won't install the apks for me on Pixel XL

 

[TOWWTC]

Thank you so much for this!

Not that I am skilled at this or anything but I've been tinkering around with Samsung Pay to see if I could get it to work. I downloaded an older version of it (1.2) and resigned it using your keystore file. I am greeted with the "Insert Simcard" and "Access Denied...Samsung Pay has been locked due to an unauthorized modification" notices. Hitting "OK" closes the application, of course.

 

[BladeRunner]

I uninstalled all Samsung apps and it won't install the apks for me on Pixel XL

Make sure you have everything uninstalled, including the Gear Plug-in

 

[comiskeybum]

Make sure you have everything uninstalled, including the Gear Plug-in

I do. Still can't get it to install.

 

[BladeRunner]

I do. Still can't get it to install.

I'm not sure what the problem is. It SHOULD work. I deleted everything that said Samsung and the Gear Plugin and it worked for me.

 

[SubliminalME]

Ok, so i've ironed out everything, with the exception of the step counter...it just doesn't seem to want to work for me.

Anyone have any luck with that?

 

[TOWWTC]

I do. Still can't get it to install.

Did you try clearing the storage/cache for the apps prior to installing the recompiled APKs? And is the install screen at least appearing?

 

[comiskeybum]

Make sure you have everything uninstalled, including the Gear Plug-in

Did you try clearing the storage/cache for the apps prior to installing the recompiled APKs? And is the install screen at least appearing?

The installation screen does show up and then it hangs at around the 80 percent mark. It then says not installed.

 

[TOWWTC]

The installation screen does show up and then it hangs at around the 80 percent mark. It then says not installed.

Could you reinstall the Samsung Gear app from the app store -> Force Close -> Clear Cache/Clear Storage -> Uninstall app -> Restart device -> Install APKs from drive folder.

Sorry if you have done the above already but it's strange that the installation hangs for your device.