The Android Software Development Kit (SDK) helps the development world to build, test, and debug applications to run on Android. The Android SDK comes with Android Studio, the official integrated development environment (IDE) for developing Android apps. Android Studio provides valuable documentation and other tools that can be of great help during the investigation of an Android device. Alternatively, you can download just the platform tools, which are components of the Android SDK and include tools that can interact with the Android platform, such as the ADB, fast boot, and so on; these will be described in more detail in the following sections.

A good understanding of the Android SDK will help you to get to grips with the particulars of a device and its data on the device.

During a forensic investigation, having these tools helps you connect to and access data on Android devices. The Android SDK is updated very frequently, so it's important to verify that your workstation also remains up to date. The Android SDK can run on Windows, Linux, and macOS.