Have you ever dreamed of getting a taste of iOS on your Android phone? Well, it's now possible thanks to a new movement called "Hackios," which has been booting native iOS on a range of Android phones.
Developers are porting iOS to Android phones
The iOS home screen looks surreal on an Android device. | Image by Android Authority
Over the past couple of days, reports of Android phones running iOS have been piling up. Apparently, these ports are the work of a new movement, inspired by the Hackintosh — a portmanteau of "hack" and "Macintosh" for running Apple's proprietary OS on a PC.
The origin of Hackios comes from a GitHub project called “ios-sweet,” which replaces Android’s stock Linux kernel with XNU, Apple’s own kernel for iPhones.
I won't go into the technical details of what a kernel is, but you can think of it as the base of the operating system that deals with both the hardware and the software.
How does this work?
Well, it's a bit complicated. When a smartphone boots up, the kernel receives something called a device tree — a list of all the phone's hardware.
The developer first copied the device tree from an iPhone X, as newer iPhone models have security features that prevent such spoofing.He then created a boot image of XNU for a Redmi Note 10 Pro device, and fooled the OS into thinking that it's booting an iPhone with the spoofed device tree.
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Long story short, the phone booted into an iOS lock screen, which is a bizarre thing to see on an Android phone.
What do you think about iOS running on an Android phone?
Not much. As you have probably guessed, it's a proof-of-concept and not a functional operating system. However, there are things that are working just like on an iPhone.
The home screen features all the built-in apps, and Safari kind of works too. You can open Settings and fiddle with things there, and all the touch and swipe gestures also work. Control Center is accessible, and the power and volume buttons also seem to work. The list of things that don't work, however, is huge.
Some things work, most - don't. | Images by GitHu
You can't use any kind of connectivity — Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and cellular all don't work. All the sensors on the phone also don't work; these include the fingerprint sensor and the ambient light sensor.
The cameras and speakers also don't work, and the developer points out that Apple's file encryption also doesn't work, so this Android/iOS phone is not secure.
All of the above is expected, as iPhones use different hardware and fooling the OS only does so much. The actual sensors and camera require different drivers and software, unknown to the iOS copy booted on the Redmi Note 10 Pro.
Supported phones
Surprisingly, this method has been used to port iOS to a rather large number of phones. Even though the original code was built to work on Snapdragon phones, enthusiasts have been trying to port iOS to a Pixel 6 phone using the Tensor chipset, as well as an ancient Galaxy S7 with an Exynos 8890 on board.
At the moment, though, the GitHub repository has been updated with forks for the Redmi Note 12 Pro and LG V60, with support for the OnePlus 7T, Redmi 5 Plus, and Galaxy S23 Ultra as well.The Redmi Note 12 fork allegedly enables sound, Wi-Fi, and wallpapers, but the phone is far from usable in a daily scenario.
Are we going to get a working iOS on Android phones ever?
Hackios Reddit thread showing the iOS 16.7.16 booting on a Redmi Note 10 Pro. | Image by Reddit
Not on modern models, no. These ports rely on older iOS versions and kernels that don't have security features preventing such hacks.
Even though this project is still active and a "work-in-progress," chances are development will freeze once the interest fades and these guys get bored.
The best-case scenario is an old Android phone running an old iOS version, which may sound fun, but the whole thing requires knowledge and effort far beyond what the average Joe (myself included) possesses.
Speaking of, please don't try this at home, unless you're prepared to permanently brick or damage both the iPhone X (which is a vintage model now) and the Android phone you're trying to mod.
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Mariyan, a tech enthusiast with a background in Nuclear Physics and Journalism, brings a unique perspective to PhoneArena. His childhood curiosity for gadgets evolved into a professional passion for technology, leading him to the role of Editor-in-Chief at PCWorld Bulgaria before joining PhoneArena. Mariyan's interests range from mainstream Android and iPhone debates to fringe technologies like graphene batteries and nanotechnology. Off-duty, he enjoys playing his electric guitar, practicing Japanese, and revisiting his love for video games and Haruki Murakami's works.
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