At Google I/O today, we got to meet Android 12's hot new interface. Not only would Pixel phones get an early taste, but phones from 10+ other OEMs, including OnePlus, are lining up to give their own users a peek at the new 12 Beta. While OnePlus is making it available for both the new OnePlus 9 and OnePlus 9 Pro, it sounds like some users are facing pretty severe headaches — here's how to get your phone fixed if testing the beta goes wrong.

If you want to install this beta, make sure to unlock your phone's bootloader *before* installing the beta. If you don't, your phone will not be able to get past the setup process where the device verifies your old Google account for FRP (factory reset protection). Toggling OEM Unlock in developer options disables this check.

If you're like me and tried updating without unlocking your bootloader and unfortunately soft bricked your OnePlus 9 device (whoops), don't worry; I made this mistake on my OnePlus 9 Pro.

The good news is that this kind of bricking is easy to fix with an EDL restore; that means restoring your phone with a factory image using a Qualcomm chipset-level flash. XDA Developers has a great guide with links on how to restore your phone using EDL. The process is quite temperamental sometimes, but if you just keep trying it should end up working. After this experience if you still want to experiment with Android 12, you could either wait for the official Open Betas in a few months or unlock the bootloader and try again.

As of the time we publish, OnePlus has pulled the OTA updates for the Android 12 beta because of this bricking issue, but it's still good to remember that if this does happen again, an EDL restore will be able to fix your issue. If you don't want to risk your phone and want to see what's new with Android 12, live vicariously through us and check out all  our coverage from Google I/O.