Android Emulator: Installation error: INSTALL_FAILED_VERSION_DOWNGRADE

Question

It means you're trying to install an app with the same packageName as an app that's already installed on the emulator, but the one you're trying to install has a lower versionCode (integer value for your version number).

You might have installed from a separate copy of the code where the version number was higher than the copy you're working with right now. In either case, either:

• uninstall the currently installed copy

• or open up your phone's Settings > Application Manager to determine the version number for the installed app, and increment your <manifest android:versionCode to be higher in the AndroidManifest.

• or https://stackoverflow.com/a/13772620/632951

You can also consider adding -d flag to adb install. It should ignore this error.

adb install -r -d abc.apk

First uninstall your application from the emulator:

adb -e uninstall your.application.package.name

Then try to install the application again.

This was happening in my project because I was using an XML resource to set the version code.

AndroidManifest.xml:
android:versionCode="@integer/app_version_code"

app.xml:
<integer name="app_version_code">64</integer>

This wasn't a problem in prior versions of adb, however, as of platform-tools r16 this is no longer being resolved to the proper integer. You can either force the re-install using adb -r or avoid the issue entirely by using a literal in the manifest:

android:versionCode="64"

This can happen when trying to install a debug/unsigned APK on top of a signed release APK from the Play store.

H:\>adb install -r "Signed.apk"
2909 KB/s (220439 bytes in 0.074s)
        pkg: /data/local/tmp/Signed.apk
Success

H:\>adb install -r "AppName.apk"
2753 KB/s (219954 bytes in 0.078s)
        pkg: /data/local/tmp/AppName.apk
Failure [INSTALL_FAILED_VERSION_DOWNGRADE]

The solution to this is to uninstall and then reinstall or re run it from the IDE.

INSTALL_FAILED_VERSION_DOWNGRADE

All Android apps have a package name. The package name uniquely identifies the app on the device. If same packageName as app that's already installed on the device then this error Showing .

1. You can uninstall the application from your device first and then install the fresh one .
2. You could simply increase the number by one each time a new version is released.

In Marshmallow, I got this error,

Installation error: INSTALL_FAILED_PERMISSION_MODEL_DOWNGRADE
Please check logcat output for more details.
Launch canceled!

Looking for solution I searched and came here. I deleted the app but still have this problem in Nexus 6. Later found that in,

Settings > Apps > [My app name] have to removed for all user.