Android App Not Install. An existing package by the same name with a conflicting signature is already installed

Question

In my emulator, when I try to do an upgrade of my apk programmatically. I get:

Android App Not Install.

An existing package by the same name with a conflicting signature is already installed

I'm still in the testing phase of this upgrade, so the file I download is a signed apk of a previous version, which I think should work without any issues.

From the suggestion in: an existing package by the same name with a confilcting signature is already installed I tried to run the emulator both in debug mode and in normal mode... neither worked.

Any thoughts on what I'm missing?

Solution 1

The problem is the keys that have been used to sign the APKs, by default if you are running directly from your IDE and opening your Emulator, the APK installed in the Emulator is signed with your debug-key(usually installed in ~/.android/debug.keystore), so if the previous APK was signed with a different key other than the one you are currently using you will always get the signatures conflict, in order to fix it, make sure you are using the very same key to sign both APKs, even if the previous APK was signed with a debug-key from another SDK, the keys will definitely be different.

Also if you don't know exactly what key was used before to sign the apk and yet you want to install the new version of your app, you can just uninstall the previous application and reinstall the new one.

Hope this Helps...

Regards!

Solution 2

I had the same error message, but these answers did not help. On a 4.3 nexus 7, I was using a user who was NOT the owner. I had uninstalled the older version but I kept getting the same message.

Solution: I had to login as the owner and go to Settings -> Apps, then swipe to the All tab. Scroll down to the very end of the list where the old versions are listed with a mark 'not installed'. Select it and press the 'settings' button in the top right corner and finally 'uninstall for all users'

Solution 3

 Go to Settings > Apps, find and open the app info. Then, open the overflow menu (3 vertical dots), and choose Uninstall for all users.

Go to Settings > Apps, find and open the app info. Then, open the overflow menu (3 vertical dots), and choose Uninstall for all users.

Solution 4

If you don't want to bother with the keystore file, then just remove the package altogether for all users.

Connect your device with Mac/PC and run adb uninstall <package>

Worked for me.

Ref: https://android.stackexchange.com/questions/92025/how-to-completely-uninstall-an-app-on-android-lollipop

Solution 5

If you are using the debug apk, the key that is used to sign it is in

C:\Users\<user>\.android\debug.keystore

If you use that same key, there should not be a conflict when installing.

View more solutions

Comments

[James Oravec]

I'll make an unsigned apk and download the unsigned apk and see if that solves it, if it does then I can test the signed apks with hardware. I'll accept the answer if this is the case.

[James Oravec]

I'm trying to do the upgrade from within my program, so doing the manual uninstall/install won't work.

[James Oravec]

When I did the unsigned app install I simply get app not installed. I checked the emulator settings and it has Allow installation of apps from unknown sources checked. So this does not seem to be the solution.

[James Oravec]

I'm going to do a non dev sign the apk and do a manual download/install inside the emulator. The emulator should then download the other non dev signed apk and try to do the upgrade. If this works, I'll accept your answer. Thx

[James Oravec]

giving you an up vote for the suggestions. I think it helped us get to the final solution. thanks!

[ShawnFeatherly]

I had to swipe over from "Downloaded" to the "All" list to find it in the Apps list.

[jmcmann]

As you mention, make sure you scroll all the way down to the bottom - the "not installed" apps are not listed in alphabetical order.

[mm2001]

THANK YOU!!! This was also my problem after lending my test Nexus 7 to a friend. Thought my keys were corrupted... I deleted that user just to reduce future confusion.

[Piyush Patel]

Saved my time. Kudos.

[heisenberg]

@MartinCazares is there anyway to get the apk key? so I don't lose my app data?

[Martin Cazares]

Well, if you installed the app, you should have the key, otherway how would you sign the apk? If the previous apk was not created by you, then you need to ask to the developer of that apk for the key, other than that there's no way to get the key that was used to sign an apk...

[Ricardo]

Thanks. I had to login in all users and uninstall 1 by 1.

[Aritra Roy]

This is the perfect answer. Better than the "marked as correct" one. Thanks a lot.

[Bala Vishnu]

Worked for me. Thanks

[Alexey]

It is a strange thing that this is happening. Hm. But thanks for the solution, worked indeed :)

[marcwjj]

Thank you so much! I think this is a problem when you have multiple profiles setup for the android device.

[SKT]

I logged in to a public computer just to upvote this answer

[Vivek Warde]

I am unable to uninstall using this method, showing "not installed" but not leaving itself from list :(

[zdp]

Thank you! The solution is not intuitive and you saved me a bunch of time!

[Arslan Sohail]

Thanks alot Santiago,last day i changed my machine hard drive from mechanical drive to the Solid State drive therefore i need to upgrade my Windows,i was facing the same issue then i copied the debug.keystore file from the previous windows folder to the new windows folder the issue gets resolved :)

[Thomas Weller]

Very similar to the popular answer stackoverflow.com/a/20084044/4136325 above, don't you think?

[Martin Koubek]

yes, this is the trick - uninstallation of the app for all users

[Kaustav Banerjee]

Thanks so much!! I was logging in from the "owner" and uninstalling. But it was still showing the error. Then I realized, there was a guest account!! I had to uninstall from there too!!

[Gustavo Magalhães]

Thanks for the answer, because it actualy solved my problem, I am programming with a friend and we had this problem frequently, now that we are sharing the debug key, everything is fine.

[Georgi Tenev]

This helped me - thanks. For some reason I had two version of my app appearing there even after deinstalling it through my home screen.

[Keshav Gera]

Thanks Joro Tenev Voting Me

[Yunnosch]

1. Very 2. short 3. could 4. use 5. explanation.

[perozzo]

Thank so much for this! You saved my day and my team! Haha

[Ron]

That worked for me, but...now when download from my website, the app does not download (at least to the Download folder). No errors reported. Just doesn't happen. When I plug my phone into my computer I can copy the APK to the phone and install with no errors reported.

[Tarit Ray]

I have an application in LIVE in playstore, now I kept installed that app in testing device and now For updating newer version of app I'm updating "versionno" and "versionname" in app build.gradle file. Now I have made an release build with signed key, now while im trying to install that build in it through an error ::: An existing pacakage by the same name with a conflicting signature is already installed . And not getting installed too . Kindly help .

[Tarit Ray]

I have an application in LIVE in playstore, now I kept installed that app in testing device and now For updating newer version of app I'm updating "versionno" and "versionname" in app build.gradle file. Now I have made an release build with signed key, now while im trying to install that build in it through an error ::: An existing pacakage by the same name with a conflicting signature is already installed . And not getting installed too . Kindly help .