How to change the version number on an existing APK without re-building

apk-change-version-number.md

This requires the latest version of apktool.

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

Works fine !
If you don't have the apktool command, download it here: https://ibotpeaches.github.io/Apktool/install/
And if play store gives you some error like signature not supported you should add this option to the jarsigner command: -sigalg SHA1withRSA -digestalg SHA1
So that command becomes:

jarsigner -verbose -sigalg SHA1withRSA -digestalg SHA1 -keystore $KEYSTORE_PATH -storepass $KEYSTORE_PASSWORD -keypass $KEYSTORE_KEY_PASSWORD $APK_PATH $KEYSTORE_KEY_NAME

Thank you @AndreiTelteu

We can install apktool using homebrew:

brew install apktool

How to find keystore file?

Hello

This is very useful! However when I upload to the playstore I get this error:

This release is not compliant with the Google Play 64-bit requirement.
The following APKs or app bundles are available to 64-bit devices, but they only have 32-bit native code: [17001]
Include 64-bit and 32-bit native code in your app. Use the Android App Bundle publishing format to automatically ensure that each device architecture receives only the native code that it needs. This avoids increasing the overall size of your app

How do I build using the apktool to be 64bit compliant?

I'm trying to do the same with aab. But changing AndroidManifest.xml is not enough... while upload aab I'm getting error that Version code already used.