Realme X Kernel Source Released, Opening Door for Custom ROM Development

Realme has taken the market by storm by aggressively pricing its smartphones in the market. While doing so, it is also taking on Xiaomi’s budget brand, Redmi, in multiple price segments. The Realme X is one such popular smartphone which was the first to offer a pop-up selfie camera as well as an in-display fingerprint scanner under Rs. 20,000. The smartphone also offered a powerful Qualcomm Snapdragon 710 SoC. Now, Realme has released the kernel sources for the Realme X online which should help developers make custom ROMs for the device.

Realme has not only released the Realme X kernel source online but it has also put a step-by-step tutorial to unlock the bootloader on the Realme X. The company has updated its Bootloader Unlock Tool to unlock the bootloader on the Realme X. While the process is fairly easy, unlocking the bootloader does have its own consequences. Realme mentions that unlocking the bootloader will erase all the data on the smartphone, so we would recommend that you take a complete backup before you proceed. Unlocking the bootloader will also downgrade the Widevine certification level from L1 to L3 which means that if you unlock the bootloader, you won’t be able to enjoy HD content on some video streaming apps. Realme also mentions that unlocking the bootloader could break the OTA software functionality, so users won’t be able to update their Realme X devices to the latest version of ColorOS.

Since the kernel source is also released, developers will be able to make custom ROMs and custom kernels for the Realme X. This could also lead to the device having an active developer community which users can benefit from. Thankfully, unlocking the bootloader on the Realme X and flashing a custom ROM on it will not void the device warranty.

Bootloader unlocking should soon be possible on the Realme 5 and the Realme 5 Pro soon, as Realme CEO Madhav Sheth had announced it along with offline availability for the two devices.