Vanillify: Debloat & Privacy

Make your Android phone vanilla again, without root and without a computer.

Vanillify removes the apps your phone came with that you never asked for, stops background data sharing and always-on listening, and keeps it that way. It works on any Android phone through Shizuku, which gives it the same rights as adb shell.

• Remove preinstalled apps. Every system app with its name, icon and a safety rating from the Universal Android Debloater community list (about 5,400 packages from all major manufacturers and carriers), plus Vanillify's own findings verified on real phones. Apps are removed for your user only, so nothing on the system partition changes and everything can come back.
• See what depends on what. Before you remove an app: which apps depend on it, what it depends on, and whether the system uses it as your home screen, keyboard, phone, SMS or browser app. Vanillify warns you before you remove something other apps need.
• Privacy settings. Background Wi-Fi and Bluetooth scanning, uploads of your apps and Wi-Fi scans to Google, crash reports, and encrypted Private DNS that blocks ads and trackers.
• Microphone blocks for the apps that run all the time and so aren't covered by Android's "only while using the app".
• Per-app firewall (Android 14+) using Android's own firewall: no VPN slot taken.
• Kept that way. Android forgets microphone and network blocks at every restart; Vanillify puts them back as soon as Shizuku runs again, and reminds you if it isn't.
• Every change can be undone from History, one at a time or several together.
• One tap. "Vanillify" lists every recommended change with a checkbox; nothing happens until you confirm.

Vanillify has no internet permission. It can't send anything anywhere.

Install

• GitHub: download the latest release.
• F-Droid: submitted, coming soon.

Then install Shizuku, start it (wireless debugging, no computer needed), open Vanillify and tap Allow when Shizuku asks. Without Shizuku you can still browse every app and its rating; changes need it.

Releases are signed with certificate SHA-256 5e991d051c9ad7047b0aaec601bf08a93a887ea9486cf08fdd27e57dfea0502a.

Support Vanillify

Vanillify is free, open source and has no ads, and it stays that way. If it made your phone better, you can help:

• ☕ Buy me a coffee on Ko-fi. No account needed: pay with Google Pay, Apple Pay, a card or PayPal.
• ⭐ Star this repository and tell others about it.
• Report apps that Vanillify rates wrongly, or ones it doesn't know yet, in Issues. Findings from real phones are what make the app lists better.

Building

export JAVA_HOME=/path/to/jdk-17-or-21
./gradlew :app:assembleDebug :app:lintDebug :app:testDebugUnitTest

• tools/update_uad_list.py refreshes the bundled community list.
• tools/build_icons.py regenerates every icon and store image from the two Inkscape drawings in design/ (needs skia-pathops and svgelements from pip, Inkscape and the Noto Sans font).

Releasing a version

1. Bump versionCode (+1) and versionName in app/build.gradle.kts.
2. Add metadata/en-US/changelogs/<versionCode>.txt: one plain paragraph.
3. Run ./gradlew :app:assembleDebug :app:lintDebug :app:testDebugUnitTest.
4. Commit and push to main (CI publishes the rolling latest build).
5. Put the full hash of that commit (git rev-parse HEAD, never a tag) in .fdroid.yml's commit:, update versionName/versionCode/CurrentVersion/CurrentVersionCode, commit, push.
6. Tag the release commit from step 4 and push the tag: git tag vX.Y.Z <hash> && git push origin vX.Y.Z. release-tag.yml publishes the permanent release F-Droid compares its own build against.
7. Download https://github.com/AndSni/vanillify/releases/download/vX.Y.Z/Vanillify.apk and check apksigner verify --print-certs shows the certificate above.

License

GPL-3.0-only. The bundled package list (app/src/main/assets/uad_lists.json) is from Universal Android Debloater Next Generation, also GPL-3.0.