How to Officially Unlock the LG G6 Bootloader, Install TWRP and Root

This guide is for officially unlocking the bootloader of the LG G6 H870 European edition, and the USA carrier-free US997 edition. This method will not work on any other models, such as H871/2/3/ or H870K/DS. It also will not work on carrier-tied US editions.

We are unlocking the bootloader through the official LG Developer Unlock Program. The process is fairly easy, just pay attention closely to all the steps I’ve given. Be warned that this will factory reset your device, wiping all data. You can use a tool like LG Backup app or LG Bridge to backup and restore your data after the bootloader has been unlocked. At the bottom of thise guide, I also provide the steps and tools necessary to install TWRP and SuperSU for rooting your LG G6.

Requirements:

• European LG G6 H870 or USA carrier-free US997
• ADB installed on your computer. See “How to Install ADB on Windows”
• Your device IMEI – can be found on the packaging box, the settings menu under ‘About’, or by dialing *#06# on the phone dialer.
• An LG Developer account – sign up HERE by clicking the “Start Unlocking the Bootloader” button at the bottom of the page.
• Official LG device USB drivers

1. First begin by enabling USB Debugging on your device. Go into Settings > About Phone > Software Info > tap ‘Build Number’ 7 times until Developer Mode is activated. Now go to Settings > Developer Options > enable USB Debugging.
2. Also enable OEM Unlock while you’re inside the Developer Options.
3. Now connect your device to your PC via USB, and hold Shift + Right click inside your main ADB folder, and choose “Open a command window here”. Make sure ADB recognizes your device by typing ‘adb devices’ without the quotes. If it does, you will see your device’s serial number displayed in the command window.
4. Type the following ADB command to reboot your device into bootloader mode: adb reboot bootloader
5. Once you’ve entered the bootloader mode, use the following ADB fastboot commands to obtain your specific Device ID: fastboot oem device-id
6. The ADB terminal will display a long string, which is your unique Device ID used to generate the bootloader unlock key.

Example: 

$ fastboot oem device-id(bootloader)
(bootloader) Device-ID(bootloader) CD58B679A38D6B613ED518F37A05E013(bootloader) F93190BD558261DBBC5584E8EF8789B1(bootloader)

7.  To generate a proper unlock key, you will need to paste together the 2 lines of output into one continuous string without “(bootloader)” or spaces. In the example above, the Device ID would be:

CD58B679A38D6B613ED518F37A05E013F93190BD558261DBBC 5584E8EF8789B1

8.  Now copy your Device ID and your IMEI into the LG Developer’s Bootloader Unlock site, and press the ‘Confirm’ button. In a few moments an unlock.bin file will be emailed to you, so download it onto your computer, placing it inside the main ADB folder.
9. With your device still in the Fastboot mode, enter the following command to unlock the bootloader: fastboot flash unlock unlock.bin
10. Now you can reboot your device with: fastboot reboot

Installing TWRP and root after unlocking the bootloader

10. Download TWRP and SuperSU and place TWRP inside your main ADB folder, and transfer SuperSU.zip to your device’s SD card.
11. Re-enable USB debugging, since your device was factory reset after unlocking the bootloader.
12. Reboot back into the bootloader with ADB, remember the command is: adb reboot bootloader
13. Once you’ve booted into bootloader, enter the following fastboot command: fastboot flash recovery twrp.img
14. After TWRP has been successfully flashed, unplug the USB cable and power off the phone. Now boot into recovery by holding Volume Down + Power button, until the phone reboots. As soon as you see the LG logo on your device, release the Power button and quickly press it again, without ever releasing the Volume Down button.
15. You should be brought to a Factory Reset screen. Navigate through it, choosing “Yes” twice until it boots into TWRP. Do not be worried, this is not going to actually factory reset/wipe your data, as long as we have successfully flashed TWRP.
16. Now in the main TWRP menu, go to Install > choose the SuperSU.zip from your SD card, and swipe to flash it. After SuperSU is successfully flashed, you can Reboot System from inside TWRP.

You’re done!