Can we change targetSdkVersion of an APK using Apktool

Question

I have an app on Google play store and I want to update it but I don't have the source code, when I tried to update it Google didn't accept the updated APK because it's targetSdkVersion is 27, I need to update it to 28, is there any solution for that using a reverse engineering tool like apktool ???

Help me please

Answer 1

apktool d $APK_PATH -o $OUTPUT_FOLDER

• Open the apktool.yml text file
• Alter the versionCode and versionName entries
• now rebuild!
• apktool build $OUTPUT_FOLDER
• next you need to re-sign the apk with the original keystore file jarsigner -verbose -keystore $KEYSTORE_PATH -storepass $KEYSTORE_PASSWORD -keypass $KEYSTORE_KEY_PASSWORD $APK_PATH $KEYSTORE_KEY_NAME ~/android-sdk/build-tools/21.1.1/zipalign -v 4 $APK_PATH $APK_OUT_PATH