Android screenshot to computer with adb

Problem:

How do I use adb to get a screenshot from an Android device or emulator?

I'd like to target a specific device when more than one are connected to adb.

I already know how to open adb shell and put a device in debugging mode.

Solution:

One method is the following:

1. Get list of devices:

   adb devices -l
   

   You should get a list that looks like:

   
2. Once you have a device identifier, such as "emulator-5554", you can use similar commands as below. (Replace "emulator-5554" with your device identifier).

   adb -s emulator-5554 shell screencap -p /sdcard/screencap.png
   adb -s emulator-5554 pull /sdcard/screencap.png
   

3. (Optional) remove the last screencap from your device (in this example, named "emulator-5554"):

   adb -s emulator-5554 shell rm /sdcard/screencap.png
   

Other notes:

If you've only got one device accessible to adb, you can simply do the following:

adb shell screencap -p /sdcard/screencap.png
adb pull /sdcard/screencap.png
adb shell rm /sdcard/screencap.png

If you'd like to see a one-liner to do the above, check out the neat example here: http://blog.shvetsov.com/2013/02/grab-android-screenshot-to-computer-via.html

References:

• https://developer.android.com/studio/command-line/adb.html
• For an elegant one-liner of the above, check out: http://blog.shvetsov.com/2013/02/grab-android-screenshot-to-computer-via.html