How to Root the Motorola Moto X (Sprint)

Motorola Moto X – The only smartphone assembled in the U.S.A. – has lately seen a buzz around the web for its unique feature of customization. Unless you’ve been living under the rock, you’d know that the Moto X can be customized (yes, physically) to match with your needs. If you like blue, you can have it in blue color unlike other smartphones who just follow the choices of their manufacturers. That was about the physical part, what about the software side? Well, a root method is already available for the Motor X so you can have the software side customized as well. So if you got a couple of minutes and access to a PC, here’s what you’ll need to root your device.

I. Before You Begin:

1. This will void the warranty of your device. However, you can reinstate the warranty by unrooting your device if there’s any unrooting procedure available.

2. You must have unlocked bootloader of your device. Head here to unlock your device’s bootloader.

3. You should have appropriate drivers installed on your PC. If you don’t, download the latest drivers from here.

II. Downloading Required Files:

1. Fastboot (Download link’s given in the first post)

2. Unofficial CWM Recovery (Download link’s available in the first post)

3. SuperSU (Download link’s available in the first post)

III. Flashing a Custom Recovery on the Motorola Moto X (Sprint):

1. Download and place all the files on your Desktop.

2. Extract files from the Fastboot archive over to your Desktop.

3. Copy all the files located inside the Windows folder over to your Desktop. It’s just two files, fastboot.exe and one other.

4. Turn OFF your device.

5. Turn it back on by holding down Volume DOWN+Power buttons together.

6. Release the Power button when you see your device booting up.

7. You should now be in Fastboot mode.

8. Plug in your device to your PC using the USB cable.

9. Launch a Command Prompt Window on your Desktop. To do that, simply hold down the Shift button and right-click anywhere on your Desktop and choose Open command window here.

10. Type in following command into the Command Prompt Window. Make sure to replace recovery.img with the actual name of the Recovery Image you downloaded.

fastboot flash recovery recovery.img

11. It should flash the CWM Recovery on your device, shouldn’t take too long to finish.

12. Once the recovery’s been flashed, boot into the same at least once a time and select disable recovery flash. It’ll prevent the stock recovery from replacing your custom recovery.

13. You’re done!

Great! You’re done with flashing a custom recovery, let’s root the device now!

IV. Rooting the Motorola Moto X (Sprint):

1. Connect your device to your PC using the USB cable.

2. Copy the SuperSU zip over to the root of your SD card.

3. Once the zip has been copied, unplug your device from your PC.

4. Turn OFF your device.

5. Reboot your device into the newly installed ClockworkMod Recovery mode.

6. Once there, select install zip from sdcard followed by choose zip from sdcard.

7. Choose the SuperSU zip to be flashed on your device.

8. As soon as you select the zip, it’ll begin flashing it on your device.

9. Once the zip has been flashed, reboot your device.

10. You’re now rooted!

Excellent! Your Motorola Moto X has been successfully rooted and equipped with a custom recovery to help you flash custom ROMs! Enjoy!

V. Flash a Custom ROM (Optional):

1. If you are ready to flash custom ROMs on your device, head to the How To Flash a Custom ROM on the Motorola Moto X (Sprint) to learn how to do that.

If this procedure helped you please thank/donate to the original developers here.

3 thoughts on “How to Root the Motorola Moto X (Sprint)”

  1. Can you clarify what this part in #12 of flashing a custom recovery means?

    “Once the recovery’s been flashed, boot into the same at least once a time…”

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