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I had flashed Android 6.0 Marshmallow in My Nexus 5. As a part of a rooting process, I had to flash the kernel to allow SU binary to work.

All is fine and root works well.

Kernel is a intangible software component. How can I know the name and version of the kernel that I am using on my phone after installing it? I mean if I do not remember from where I downloaded the kernel or do not have the its ZIP file, are there any means with which I can find the kernel's name and its version?

Narayanan
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2 Answers2

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Unless Marshmallow has some unnecessary native changes, you should be able to see the kernel version in many Android releases from Settings → About phone.

(Click image to enlarge)

IMG:

A command line way other than uname -a can be:

cat /proc/version

Output in my case is:

Linux version 3.4.107~AK.236.OPO.CM12.1 (ak@kernel) (gcc version 4.9.3 20150424 (prerelease) (UBERTC-4.9.3) ) #1 SMP PREEMPT Thu Apr 30 08:37:49 CEST 2015

where,

  • Linux -- Kernel name
  • 3.4.107~AK.236.OPO.CM12.1 -- Kernel release
  • #1 SMP PREEMPT Thu Apr 30 08:37:49 CEST 2015 -- Kernel version (I know it's odd)
  • the rest is homework :)

Provided that you've root access or command executed using dumpstate can also show you what you want, but the rest of the output would be overwhelming.

Another alternative can be an app which can show system details, such as Elixir 2 or Droid Hardware Info.

IMG:

Firelord
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  • My goodness - I feel kind of dump to miss the About phone page. In Marshmallow, it does show the kernel as it did in terminal emulator. +1 – Narayanan Oct 07 '15 at 12:03
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Do one thing, download an app called “terminal emulator” and open that terminal and invoke this command:

      $ uname  -a

It will show you your kernel version, and its name and other details.

RokeJulianLockhart
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BrotskyTv
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    Cool. In terminal emulator running in Marshmallow, the command option -all did not work. It seems it is uname -a and that worked. Thanks. +1. – Narayanan Oct 07 '15 at 05:11
  • uname -all doesn't even work in my Slackware let alone in my Android. On which device did you test your command? – Firelord Oct 07 '15 at 11:19