Install Android Sdk CLI Tools On Ubuntu Server

Install Java Development kit (JDK)

To install a JDK compatible with ubuntu server, use the command below

sudo apt install default-jdk

Download Android Studio Command Line Tools

Now, the next step is to download the command line tool zip

Note: MUST be the Command line tools only Version

To get the latest command line tool go to the link below

Android Command Line Tools

then choose the one for linux

commandlinetools-linux-11076708_latest.zip

you can either click the package and copy the link on the [Download Android Command Line Tools for Linux] and right click then copy link address or

https://dl.google.com/android/repository/ append the package name to this url

now that you have the link for the command line tool, it's time to download it.

First, go to the root of your server by cd ~

Second, use wget <command line tool package url here> like the command below

wget https://dl.google.com/android/repository/commandlinetools-linux-11076708_latest.zip

Note: make sure you have wget installed for this one, if not, use sudo apt install wget

Extract the Package and Set Environments

now, create a dir where you want to place the sdk tool, for example:

# ANDROID_SDK_ROOT will set a reusable variable you can use in the later commands
ANDROID_SDK_ROOT=/opt/androidSdk sudo mkdir -p $ANDROID_SDK_ROOT/cmdline-tools 

now you need to unzip the tool and set the -d directory you want the extracted files to go, in my case I placed it in the directory I created inside /opt dir

Note: make sure you have unzip installed, if not, use sudo apt-get install unzip

sudo unzip commandlinetools-linux-11076708_latest.zip -d $ANDROID_SDK_ROOT/cmdline-tools 

now move it to another folder called latest if you want, since in the future you might need to install multiple versions of the command line tool and might want to switch version

sudo mv $ANDROID_SDK_ROOT/cmdline-tools/cmdline-tools $ANDROID_SDK_ROOT/cmdline-tools/latest

after the extraction, it's time to set the environment variables

using zsh, just add something like this to your .zshrc make sure to change the path to the one you set on your server

export ANDROID_SDK_ROOT="/opt/androidSdk"

export PATH="$ANDROID_SDK_ROOT/emulator:$ANDROID_SDK_ROOT/tools:$ANDROID_SDK_ROOT/tools/bin:$ANDROID_SDK_ROOT/platform-tools:$ANDROID_SDK_ROOT/cmdline-tools/latest:$ANDROID_SDK_ROOT/cmdline-tools/latest/bin:$PATH"

now you can restart your shell or just do source .zshrc

then check if the tools are installed properly by running sdkmanager --version

if you encounter an error like this;

Error: LinkageError occurred while loading main class com.android.sdklib.tool.sdkmanager.SdkManagerCli
        java.lang.UnsupportedClassVersionError: com/android/sdklib/tool/sdkmanager/SdkManagerCli has been compiled by a more recent version of the Java Runtime (class file version 61.0), this version of the Java Runtime only recognizes class file versions up to 55.0

just upgrade your JDK version to the compatible version ex. sudo apt install openjdk-17-jdk-headless

and if you try to run the sdkmanager --version command again, you should get a result like 12.0

Accepting Licenses

To use the command line tools, specially the SDK, you need to accept the licenses first, to do that just run the command below

yes | sdkmanager --licenses

Installing Packages You Need

Below is the command I used to install platform tools like adb and sdk platforms like android versions 11 to 14

yes | sdkmanager "platform-tools" "platforms;android-30" "platforms;android-31" "platforms;android-32" "platforms;android-33"

For More Info on SDK Manager Commands Go Here: sdkmanager

if you encounter an error like the one shown below when installing ackages

Warning: Failed to read or create install properties file.

you need to update the permission of your sdk root, to do that you can execute the command below

sudo chown -R $USER:$USER /opt/androidSdk

remember that the path you are changing the permission is the ROOT of your SDK

and just to fix other potential issues that might come from lacking some libraries, you might want to install libgl1-mesa-dev using the command below

sudo apt install libgl1-mesa-dev -y

after the installation, you can check if all packages are installed by using the command below

sdkmanager --list_installed

and now you are all set up and ready to start or continue your project that needs Android SDK on a headless ubuntu server.