How to install an older version of an Android app without losing your data (with root)

In technology in general and Android in particular, everything is designed to move forward: updating applications is simple, but downgrade or return to previous versions it’s troublesome. What’s more, on Android you can’t even: instead you have to uninstall the app and reinstall it.

There are technical reasons for this, but if you still you need to go back to a previous version of an app without losing your data, there is a possibility to do it through an Xposed module that, as such, will require you to have Magisk or similar on your mobile.

How to downgrade an Android app

Let’s say you’re using an app that’s great in version 1.0, but turns into a little monster in version 2.0. You update, the application migrates your data to the new version and since then it will be impossible for you to return to the previous version.

Android directly gives you an error if you try to install an older version of an app than already installed, so the only way to do that is to uninstall the app first, losing your data if it’s not saved to the cloud or you have some way to export it first . There is a way to solve it that can help you in some cases, although it has a big but: needs you to have Xposed Framework running on mobile.

There are several ways to have the Xposed Framework on mobile, although the most common is to have Magisk and install a Magisk module that emulates the usual Xposed Framework. There are many: LSPosed, EdXPosed, Riru, Taichi. The traditional way to install Magisk on mobile is by root or from a Custom Recovery (which also usually requires root). Us we recommend LSPosedwhich works very well, although any other alternative would probably work for you.

With LSPosed ready, you’re going to need the XDowngrader module, from the same author of WaTweaker. You can download it from this Xposed Framework module repository. It is very light and installs like any other application. After installing it, LSPosed itself (or similar) will notify you that the module is not active and by tapping on the notification you will be able to activate it. If it doesn’t appear, you can always open LSPosed and activate it: it will appear in the modules.

The best thing about XDowngrader is that You do not need to do anything else: This module allows you to install older versions on top of older versions. When trying to install the older version, you will see the usual message of Do you want to install an update of this application?, but the big difference is that now it will not give you an error when installing it.

XDowngrader removes Android’s checks against installing older versions, so you can install an older version on top of a newer one, although this does not guarantee that the application will work. After all, the restriction to make downgrade it’s there for a reason: the older version might not recognize your data if it has made changes to how it saves it.

With XDowngrader we have installed WhatsApp 2.20 on top of WhatsApp 2.22 without problems

Unfortunately there is nothing you can do about it, since Android applications are prepared to migrate their data to newer versions, but not to migrate to older versions. Therefore, the trick will serve you only in apps that don’t change your data from one version to another. If not, be prepared for the app to crash, crash, or complain that its data is corrupted.