Moto E 2015 comes with Android Lollipop out of the box and has a locked bootloader. The good thing, however, is that the bootloader can easily be unlocked via the method provided on the official Motorola portal. Unlocked bootloader means that you can easily root the phone and flash a custom recovery using Fastboot as soon as it’s is available.
If you have the new Moto E and want to get ready to root and install CWM/TWRP recovery, you must be looking for a tutorial that guides you through the procedure safely. And, if that’s the case, we have come up with the steps that you need to take to get the job done.
Unlock Bootloader on Moto E 2015
- Please note that unlocking the bootloader will wipe all data present on your device. We, therefore, strongly recommend you to take a backup of your entire device data, such as 3rd party apps, contacts, text messages, images, videos, etc.
- Download the Android SDK or the Minimal ADB and Fastboot tool on your computer.
- Also install Motorola USB Driver on your computer.
- Enable USB Debugging on your Mote E 2015.
- Go to phone Settings> Developer options and enable OEM Unlock option.
- Boot your Moto E into Fastboot mode. There are 2 ways to do so:
- Turn off the phone and then press and hold Volume down + Power buttons together.
- Connect phone to computer, launch a command window, type the command given below and press the Enter key:
adb reboot bootloader
- Now connect your Moto E to computer using the USB cable provided by the OEM.
- Launch command prompt window:
- If you have installed the Android SDK, go to android/sdk/platform-tools/ folder and launch a command prompt by pressing the Shift + Right mouse click and selecting Open command window here option.
- In case you have downloaded Minimal ADB and Fastboot tool, unzip the file and open the extracted folder and launch the command window by by pressing the Shift + Right mouse click and selecting Open command window here option.
- Type or copy/paste the following command in the cmd window:
fastboot oem get_unlock_data
- You will get a return string in the command window. Copy it (Right click the mouse, select Mark option and then highlight the string by Shift+dragging the mouse, and then press Ctrl+C to copy).
- Paste the copied string in a notepad and remove the empty spaces.
- Now open the Motorola website. Sign in with your Google account or Motorola ID.
- Now paste the copied string into the text field and then click “Can my device be unlocked?” button.
- You’ll see a “REQUEST UNLOCK KEY” button at the bottom of the page.
- Check the “I Agree” option.
- Your Unlock Key will be generated and emailed to you.
- Copy the 20-character unlock key and launch the command window again. Make sure your phone is still in Fastboot mode and connected to the computer. To ensure that the device is still connected, type
fastboot devices
- Now issue the following command in the cmd (replace “UNIQUE_KEY” text with the 20-character unlock key:
fastboot oem unlock UNIQUE_KEY
- Press Enter key to initiate the bootloader unlock process.
- When the procedure finishes, you device will reboot and you would see Bootloader Unlocked warning while your device boots up.
21. In case you change your mind anytime later and want to re-lock the bootloader, you can use the following command:
fastboot oem lock