How to uninstall News Republic without root
This works for any pre-installed bloatware and doesn’t require root.
You’ll need a computer, a working ADB setup, and a phone with News Republic preinstalled. You can do this for other apps, but after my kid got a hold of my phone and the pictures in the news feed were inappropriate, not safe for work, and generally not something I want on my phone. I’ve decided it’s time for a PSA on getting rid of it.
While you can generally uninstall updates, you’ll notice pieces of the app like hanging around on the lock screen and one accidental tap and you’re back in business delivering them your info. You’ll also be prompted to download updates in the future. I believe they’re set on by default.
While unrelated, I feel I should mention that XDA did a piece five days ago about removing bloatware, and there are other guides going around that will give you how to uninstall other apps.
I should also mention that since News Republic scraped our RSS and published 4-year-old “news” which resulted in thousands of mockings about the upcoming devices from two years back, I’ve had a bit of a dislike of them.
The package name for News Republic is com.mobilesrepublic.appy
You’ll execute an ADB shell, however you do it on your system, and type in:
pm uninstall -k –user 0 com.mobilesrepublic.appy
News Republic will be no more.
I tried this in a terminal emulator but the process kept timing out. You might be able to do it in one, but for me the adb shell was required.
Once you factory reset the phone the app will return as it’s part of the factory image and you’re just uninstalling it for the current user. Either News Republic or HTC will also encourage you to reinstall NR on the first reboot, but I’m not seeing it in subsequent reboots.
There always exists the possibility that this will bork your phone, so beware.
This was done on an HTC 10.
