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I've been attempting to root my phone (Samsung Intercept M910, but that probably doesn't matter).

How can I tell that I have actually, successfully gained root? I've run a few apps which require root, and some work and some don't, so I'm unclear if I've gained root or not.

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4 Answers

up vote 12 down vote accepted

Use terminal emulator (a popular free/open-source terminal emulator is Android Terminal Emulator, available from F-droid or Play Market), open the emulator and type su .. you will know with the message that appears after if phone is rooted or not.

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A popular free/open-source terminal emulator is Android Terminal Emulator, available from F-droid or Play Market. – imz -- Ivan Zakharyaschev Apr 20 at 15:20
What if "su: not found"? It simply implies that the su utility has not been installed (or is not in the PATH), rather than whether we have root... – imz -- Ivan Zakharyaschev Apr 20 at 15:52
up vote 7 down vote

Connect your phone in developer mode via USB and start an ADB shell

adb shell

If you see a # at the beginning of the line your phone is rooted, if it's a $ try to execute the su command, and if you get a # now, your phone is rooted, but if you get an error that su can't be found it's probably not or the su binary is simply missing.

There are also Apps on the market that test if your phone is rooted.

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1  
That's not enough. If you see a "$"-Prompt you still can elevate to root via the su binary (typing the "su" command), if you have successfully rooted your phone. – Flow♦ Sep 11 '11 at 10:44
Yeah, forgot that some ROMs doesn't have root as default. Hm, anything else you want me to change now? – Demizey Sep 11 '11 at 11:01
up vote 5 down vote

There is an application available in the market called Root Checker, that can verify if your phone is rooted, and if you have BusyBox installed.

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up vote 4 down vote

You should see the "Superuser" application in the app tray.

Most rooting methods add this app to manage the superuser rights: it appeared for me when I rooted my Desire.

Not all do: so just try to install and run Superuser from the market. If it fails, you aren't rooted :-)

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That's incorrect, the Superuser application has to be installed manually after rooting, but it might be installed automatically if you use a one-click rooting application. – Demizey Sep 11 '11 at 9:40
@Demizide: I was updating as you downvoted. It depends how you root it of course: some methods add it automatically like happened for me. – gbn Sep 11 '11 at 9:45
Okay, think you could update it again, so that I can undo the downvote? – Demizey Sep 11 '11 at 9:49
@Demizide: thank you, done – gbn Sep 11 '11 at 10:03
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You can install Superuser on a non-rooted device just fine, though. It just won't do anything without the su binary (and will complain that it needs to "update" it every time you run it). The presence of Superuser doesn't really mean you're rooted; running it kind of does, but the update failure message doesn't say "failed to update because you're not root" or anything of that nature (and you can hit "Cancel" and it goes away). – eldarerathis♦ Sep 11 '11 at 20:48

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