[New][July-16-2020]Unlocking bootloader on VZW Pixel 1 and XL

[djared704]

AS OF JUL 19 THIS HAS STOPPED WORKING

I apologize if you did not get your bootloader unlocking!

At the moment, there is no information if the classic exploit will return, if it has worked for you, please make a post about it on this thread!

We will go back to work to ensure pixels will get unlocked. I do not know how long it may take, it could be a few days, a few months or a few years. For this reason I'd respectfully ask you for no ETAs on the development on the exploit.

I may keep this thread open if people are willing to crack on something or need help.

Thanks for understanding.

----

I wanted to make a new thread to clean things up as the correct answer is buried so far into the VZW thread and I don't believe people have time to dig down that far to do something so simple.

Please give @RaspberryPiBen a thanks by going to his quote for finalizing my rant and making it into doable steps.

The work by the community is absolutely incredible.

Here is what worked for me:

Prerequisites:
No SIM card in the phone
ADB and Platform Tools installed on a computer (https://www.xda-developers.com/install-adb-windows-macos-linux/)
The latest OTA image downloaded to the computer (https://developers.google.com/android/ota#sailfish for the Pixel or https://developers.google.com/android/ota#marlin for the Pixel XL)
The phone connected to the computer with USB
Learn how to use ADB and Fastboot on your computer as it can differ.

Steps:

1. On the phone, open Settings>System>Reset Options and factory reset the phone. It should say "Restarting" or something similar.
2. When the screen goes black, press and hold the Volume Down key until you get into the Bootloader mode. Use the volume keys to navigate to "Recovery Mode" and select it with the power button.
3. Hold the Volume Down key for about a minute (while it resets) until you see an android lying down.
4. Hold the Power button then press the Volume Up button once. It should give you a menu.
5. Use the volume and power buttons to select "Wipe Data/Factory Reset" and confirm the reset.
6. Once it finishes, select an option that is something like "Sideload OTA"
7. Go to your computer and type in 'adb sideload sailfish-ota-qp1a.191005.007.a3-394b5899.zip' (without quotes) for the Pixel or 'adb sideload marlin-ota-qp1a.191005.007.a3-23002a57.zip' for the Pixel XL OR you may drag the zip file into the command prompt after typing "adb sideload", either way it should look similar.
8. Factory reset again from recovery mode
9. Reboot to system
10. While it just shows the G, press the power button until the phone restarts
11. Once it boots up, skip all of the steps but disable the options for sending information to Google.
12. Enable Developer Options by tapping "Build Number" seven times
13. In Developer Options, enable USB Debugging
14. On your computer, run 'adb shell pm uninstall --user 0 com.android.phone'
15. Reboot twice
16. Connect to WiFi
17. Open google.com in Chrome
18. Check Developer Options to see if you can enable OEM unlocking
19. If you can't, swipe away Settings from the Recents menu and go back to Chrome
20. In Chrome, open a bunch of websites. After opening each one, check the OEM Unlocking option again and close Settings afterward.
21. Once you can enable it, do so! Now you can unlock the bootloader.

Unlocking the bootloader:

-Reboot and press the Volume Down key when the screen goes black
-On the computer, type 'fastboot flashing unlock'

You just unlocked the bootloader!

Credit goes to djared704 for finding this method.

Let me know if I need to change anything about this guide.

for other reasons, you may see my rant

Hey guys. After 5 months of my purchase I finally achieved bootloader unlocking. Basically I am a user that has never updated to latest, I don't know if it makes it a variable if you're already on latest and try this. (I was coming from Sept 2019). So what I did was factory reset from the system menus. Then as soon as the screen went black, I did bootloader combos and straight to recovery. I factory resetted as prep, flashed DECEMBER patch, then after that finished, factory resetted again. Essentially, I followed the classic ADB exploit that has "never worked since Sept-Oct 2019" And yes I do have the VZW_001 CID and "_VZ" in GL website. Know when yours is bootlooping as soon as you reboot it, just hard reboot so it boots up quicker, I don't know what it does for it to take so long. Anyways when you get in, just setup like we'd always do, NO google account, turn off all setting requests (Data location, wallpapers, etc). Then as soon as I got in, I turned on debugging, ran the classic adb pm command, rebooted TWO times. This means as soon as I booted, i swiped to go to home, then rebooted a second time. As soon as I did that, I loaded up my wifi connection, I don't know if it matters but Im using the 5G wifi, then I load up google.com. Immediately, I already notice something strange. Google.com doesn't have a "valid SSL certificate" I thought it was weird, so I went to google.com on my PC and look certified SSL. As I knew that was weird, I was clicking around and I thought that was enough. so I went to the dev menu. OEM lock still grayed out. I went back to chrome and simply typed in "youtube" Let it load up. Then I clicked on the site. I went back to the dev menu. Still grayed out. I exited settings app and relaunched it to the dev menu. OEM unlock lit up in flying colors. I could not believe it. I instantly ticked it with 0 hesitation and rebooted immediately to the bootloader. The unlock command worked! I am now unlocked sailfish! I thank the community so much for all the hard work. I, only motivated the community to their potential. Thank you again!

Generally there are some kinds of factors.
Users have stated before if you OTA'd from menus to Latest patch, it would say "October", even though it's really december. This may make the unlocking procedure impossible. I have also not seen any marlin users report back to me yet about this method. You can still try flashing from googles site if you're already on "October = Dec".

Enjoy guys. We proved WE own these phones, and not VZW.

I hope you enjoy this guys. Regarding it, I do not know how long it will stay for so I suggest to do it now. At the moment, I do not know if this will work for pixel 2 and so on. You may try it but if you have issues you must go to your device board. Thanks.

 

[squallvai]

I Can Confirm it works on Sailfish... unlock my phone on the day its discovered (July 15 ).
Big Thanks

 

[saibharath1319]

Can this method apply for pixel 2 XL Verizon with July patch 2020???

 

[djared704]

Can this method apply for pixel 2 XL Verizon with July patch 2020???

Please read the end of the post. Thanks.

 

[icarus1391]

Is there a way to donate to you?
I've been waiting for so long. You literally made my day.

 

[Tech180]

omg... Thank you sooooooooo much! This just more life into my device! I bow to you sir

 

[djared704]

Is there a way to donate to you?
I've been waiting for so long. You literally made my day.

I've updated my profile for my donate to my paypal - However only if you really feel! I'd be the same as happy if you just gave me and @RaspberryPiBen a thanks!

 

[MangoBento]

How long does it usually take for people to get the option active? I followed the steps 3 times and tried loading a bunch of websites but no luck unfortunately Maybe just need to keep trying?

 

[djared704]

How long does it usually take for people to get the option active? I followed the steps 3 times and tried loading a bunch of websites but no luck unfortunately Maybe just need to keep trying?

How much websites did you try to load? Did you go online only after uninstalling android.phone? Cheers.

 

[MangoBento]

Not sure, but I was at it for around 5 minutes with no luck.

And yes I only did wifi after uninstalling the android.phone like in the steps

 

[djared704]

Not sure, but I was at it for around 5 minutes with no luck.

And yes I only did wifi after uninstalling the android.phone like in the steps

Try a reboot and clear data of the settings app and visit various sites. Let me know how that goes. Cheers.

 

[MangoBento]

Tried that and still no luck.

Oh well, I'll probably keep trying tomorrow or something, not a huge fuss as I've since bought a new phone, but would've been nice to play around with custom ROMs on this pixel.

I went to check the IMEI number for my phone but it says "Unknown" in the settings now? Not sure if that contributes to it

 

[androidbad]

Try a reboot and clear data of the settings app and visit various sites. Let me know how that goes. Cheers.

So I tried following the bootloader unlock instructions 3 times but still couldn't get my oem unlock button to activate om the night of July 18. @djared704 What do you mean by clear data of the settings app, just like clear the app from recents?

 

[CLPose]

Hi! Please, remember that the button may be greyed out, but it may be toggable anyway. So try to toggle it even though it's greyed out. Good luck!

 

[Luminoux]

Tried that and still no luck.

Oh well, I'll probably keep trying tomorrow or something, not a huge fuss as I've since bought a new phone, but would've been nice to play around with custom ROMs on this pixel.

I went to check the IMEI number for my phone but it says "Unknown" in the settings now? Not sure if that contributes to it

Same. Tried 3 times just now still no luck. XL here. My IMEI is unknown as well.

 

[djared704]

Same. Tried 3 times just now still no luck. XL here. My IMEI is unknown as well.

Your IMEI is either unknown due to uninstalling android.phone, or actual corrupted/blacklisted EFS. If true, nothing can be done about that.

When you reset the device, did you flash December Android 10, and in the setup process, disable all the requests (data location, wallpapers, etc).

Is there a sim card in the phone?

Cheers.

 

[androidbad]

Hi! Please, remember that the button may be greyed out, but it may be toggable anyway. So try to toggle it even though it's greyed out. Good luck!

I just retried the instructions and tried the toggle even though it was greyed out and it doesn't look like it worked. It wouldn't flip to "on" no matter how many websites I tried.

 

[RaspberryPiBen]

I just retried the instructions and tried the toggle even though it was greyed out and it doesn't look like it worked. It wouldn't flip to on no matter how many websites I tried.

That's strange. Have you tried repeating the process a second time?

 

[androidbad]

That's strange. Have you tried repeating the process a second time?

This was literally my 4th time trying. I bought my phone off eBay so I'm honestly not sure if it's a verizon variant. I tried a checking my IMEI on the Verizon and Google website, neither of them actually indicate that it's a Verizon phone. But if it's a Google phone I expected to be able to unlock my bootloader already... idk Maybe it came from Canada or somewhere else like the UK.

 

[djared704]

This was literally my 4th time trying. I bought my phone off eBay so I'm honestly not sure if it's a verizon variant. I tried a checking my IMEI on the Verizon and Google website, neither of them actually indicate that it's a Verizon phone. But if it's a Google phone I expected to be able to unlock my bootloader already... idk Maybe it came from Canada or somewhere else like the UK.

If you can gather enough evidence that your device is a Google store device, you can go here.

To get a 50% chance of displaying actual correct device, you can download Simple CID Getter on the Play store.

Cheers. Let me know how it goes.