The Kindle Fire is a great little tablet, at a fantastic price point and is perfect for those hooked into the Amazon ecosystem. The Kindle range runs Android, albeit a very customised Android to a point where it is almost unrecognisable. As part of this customisation and integration into the Amazon ecosystem, the Google Play Store is nowhere to be seen. Luckily, with a bit of work, you’ll be able to hook your Kindle Fire back into the Google services.

Here we’ll show you how to get the Google Play Store on your Kindle Fire.

For this method to work, you’ll need to have your Kindle Fire rooted.

  1. First off, download the ES File Explorer App from the Amazon App Store which will allow you to transfer and launch the necessary files.
  2. Download the necessary Google Play files from here and extract the files from the compressed file.
  3. Open ES File Explorer and enable ‘Root Explorer’ by going into ‘Settings’ and selecting ‘Root Settings’ and checking the ‘Super User’, ‘Root Explorer’, and ‘Mount File System’ options.
  4. Return to the folder where you extracted the downloaded files and install ‘GoogleServicesFramework.apk’ and reboot your Kindle.
  5. Once the reboot is complete, cut the ‘vending.apk’ file and paste it in the /system/app directory.
  6. Long press on the ‘vending.apk’ once it’s moved and select ‘Properties’. You’ll need to change the permissions to make sure that ‘read’ and ‘write’ are checked for ‘User’ and ‘read’ is checked for ‘Group and Other’.
  7. Install ‘vending.apk’.
  8. Return to your homescreen and look in your Home-> Apps section and open the ‘Market’ icon to launch it and sign into your Google account.
  9. Finally, you’ll want to return to the folder with the extracted files and install the file ‘gplay.apk’, reboot your Kindle, and enjoy Google Play on your Kindle Fire.

Drop us a comment to let us know if you have any issues with getting the Google Play Store on your Kindle Fire.

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64 COMMENTS

  5. Hello,
    I have followed your instructions, installing ES File Explorer and Drop Box to download the Google files. When I open ESFE on my Kindle and go to settings, there’s no choice for root directory. If I choose tools,then I have Root Enhancement with Back Up Data and (Un)Install apk Automatically, both with check boxes. When I try to click on them, nothing happens.

    Under Fast Access/Tools/Root Enhancement, I tried to check the box and get two different error messages: It cannot get root access on your device OR Sorry, test failed. This feature can’t run on your device.

    There are no other choices for Root that I’ve been able to find.

    Any further help will be appreciated.

    Thank you for your further assistance,
    Dan Tresko

  7. Yo! Just finished your tutorial, and it worked perfectly. I got my kindle to run the google app store just perfect. Thx for the files, and step by step play through. Worked like a charm.

  11. Will you loose your previous games if you upgrade your Google play? We play clash of clans and don’t want to have to start over. Thanks

  13. I opened ES File Explorer in my 1st gen. Kindle Fire and clicked “Settings” and looked for “Root Settings”. It’s not in the list. Cant find Root Settings anywhere.
    On the “Fast Access” menu, I found “Root Explorer” with a button set to Off. I clicked that and it says, “Sorry, Test failed. This feature can not run on your device.”
    Can I make that feature operable?

    • You have to root first. I recommend installing Key Root Master, (find tutorials on YouTube) for easy rooting.

  14. This worked for me. I did have to fiddle with it a bit as, like some others have noted, things aren’t always in the place they were when this was written. ESFE has prolly been updated and changed a few times since April ’14

    The one problem I ran into was after installing Play Store, I could not log into my Google account, but installing the GPlay.apk before log in and an extra reboot did the trick.

  19. when i go to acces the google play store it keeps shuting it down and givs me the google play store has stopped mesage

  20. ive done it as it says, but i get the message “google play services has stopped” every few seconds. did i do something wrong, or what

  21. Regardless if you root your Kindle Fire or not, the Google Play store will never run on it, even though it may appear to be installed. The fact is that in order for any device to access Google Play, it has to first of all run a full unaltered version of Android, which the Kindle fire does not; and secondly, the device has to be Google certified, which the Kindle Fire has not been. Anyone who claims that it is possible to access Google Play from a Kindle Fire, or any other non- Google certified device, simply does not know what they are talking about. I can assure you that doing so is impossible.

  22. the process worked fine for me, installed perfectly, then i went to the store to download hay day, it downloaded, started up, then said the game can’t run without google play services, directed me to the store to download play services, did that, and ever since then i keep getting a constant “google play has stopped” message. can’t do anything. tried factory reset and repeating the process but can’t even get as far as I did the first time. Very annoying.

  23. i enable root explorer but i went to sttings and i cant find the root settings. also it keeps saying all these google stuff keeps stopping. help!!!

  24. I got to step 9. I can open the Google play store and I am signed in but when I try to download any app an error comes up saying that it can’t retrieve the data from the server.
    Do you know what the problem is?
    Thanks

  26. Everything appeared to load, but I get an “error retrieving information from server” trying to install from the Play Store

  28. will getting google play on my kindle delete apps i already have? I downloaded clash of clans and i don’t want it deleted.

  30. I also ran into the problem saying that it was a bad Zip file. The entire process of rooting I actually found to be pretty easy except for putting Google play services on it for things like YouTube and what not. Everyone I’ve tried just continuously crashes and throws up error messages. Sure wish this would’ve worked so I can finally be done messing with it

  32. I have had my Fire HD 10″ for 6 months and have yet been able to load Google Play. I have even purchased books from Amazon to get it. Amazon has not been any help at all.

  33. I had successfully install Google play in my kindle fire for awhile & download some apps. Suddenly today I can’t open playstore / update apps that I downloaded from play store. What should I do?

  34. So I love this it’s great and it works on my kindle fire and my kindle fire fifthgen but I have one problem, constantly get a notification that google play services neds to be updated

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