How to install libhoudini on a custom Android x86 rig

So I've actually managed to find a pretty new tutorial about this and I've successfully installed and used libhoudini on my rig.

The newest Android-x86 isos from http://www.android-x86.org actually have a bash script executable that will help us install libhoudini. So these are the steps:

  • Enable this option: Settings>Apps Compatibility>Enable Native Bridge
  • Go to the Android console (Alt-F1 or install a terminal emulator)
  • Login as super user / root
  • Run /system/bin/enable_nativebridge

NOTE: If you look at the script itself, you will see that the script will try to download the needed file if your device doesn't have one. But there's a chance that the server of the file will be down and the wget will loop indefinitely. If that's the case, this is what you have to do:

  • Download the appropriate houdini.sfs from https://github.com/rrrfff/libhoudini
  • Move / copy houdini.sfs to /system/etc
  • Go to the Android console (Alt-F1 or install a terminal emulator)
  • Run /system/bin/uname, if it says x86-64, rename houdini.sfs to houdini64.sfs
  • Run /system/bin/enable_nativebridge

I hope it helps anyone who wants to run ARM apps on an Android-x86 using libhoudini. Cheers.


For android x86 64 bit Oreo, I first downloaded houdini.sfs( [http://dl.android-x86.org/houdini.php?v=9_y][1] or any other link you trust) version 9y for 64 then enabled native bridge in androidx86 settings. Afterwards I downloaded a root browser to move houdini.sfs file to system/etc/ but before moving it, I renamed it to houdini9_y.sfs. When the file is moved to system/etc/ then you can go to the command line (ALT+F1 to go to your system console ALT+F6/7 to go back to the android interface.) Type in system/bin/su to grant you root privileges then type in system/bin/enable_nativebridge. You should be done after that and apps should work that require libhoudini on it. This worked for me on a lenovo x carbon 1 running android-x86_64-9.0-r2.iso installtion.


The first answer from @Bawenang is very helpful, but unfortunately the http://goo.gl links in the enable_nativebridge script are now forwarded to HTTPS by Google.

wget on android-x86 does not understand SSL, therefore the download fails.

A workaround is to edit the script and insert a proper link, e.g. the ones from this page are quite easy to type:

https://github.com/Rprop/libhoudini

In the script you only have to replace one of the URLs, e.g. for x86, replace the one that is preceded by v=7x or v=8x.