Build android release apk on Phonegap 3.x CLI

In PhoneGap 3.4.0 you can call:

cordova build android --release

If you have set up the 'ant.properties' file in 'platforms/android' directory like the following:

key.store=/Path/to/KeyStore/myapp-release-key.keystore
key.alias=myapp

Then you will be prompted for your keystore password and the output file (myapp-release.apk) ends up in the 'platforms/android/ant-build' directory already signed and aligned and ready to deploy.

This is for Phonegap 3.0.x to 3.3.x. For PhoneGap 3.4.0 and higher see below.

Found part of the answer here, at Phonegap documentation. The full process is the following:

1. Open a command line window, and go to /path/to/your/project/platforms/android/cordova.

2. Run build --release. This creates an unsigned release APK at /path/to/your/project/platforms/android/bin folder, called YourAppName-release-unsigned.apk.

3. Sign and align the APK using the instructions at android developer official docs.

Thanks to @LaurieClark for the link (http://iphonedevlog.wordpress.com/2013/08/16/using-phonegap-3-0-cli-on-mac-osx-10-to-build-ios-and-android-projects/), and the blogger who post it, because it put me on the track.

In cordova 6.2.0

cd cordova/ #change to root cordova folder
platforms/android/cordova/clean #clean if you want
cordova build android --release -- --keystore="/path/to/keystore" --storePassword=password --alias=alias_name #password will be prompted if you have any

---

Previous answer:

According to cordova 5.0.0

{
     "android": {
         "release": {
             "keystore": "app-release-key.keystore",
             "alias": "alias_name"
         }
     }
 }

and run ./build --release --buildConfig build.json from directory platforms/android/cordova/

keystore file location is relative to platforms/android/cordova/, so in above configuration .keystore file and build.json are in same directory.

keytool -genkey -v -keystore app-release-key.keystore -alias alias_name -keyalg RSA -keysize 2048 -validity 10000

Following up to @steven-anderson you can also configure passwords inside the ant.properties, so the process can be fully automated

so if you put in platform\android\ant.properties the following

key.store=../../yourCertificate.jks
key.store.password=notSoSecretPassword
key.alias=userAlias
key.alias.password=notSoSecretPassword