What phone brand do you like the best?
What phone brand do you like the best?
*In terms of privacy, customisation, camera quality, and battery time.
For the longest time I have only used either iPhone or Samsung. I plan on switching to Android for the next phone I get, but I find that Samsung phones are often too big for me and put too much energy on camera quality (I don’t take many photos). I have started to look into brands such as Nokia and Motorola, and I would like to know what you guys think of them. Additionally, do you suggest any other phone brands aside from them? My biggest priorities are privacy and long battery time. Bonus if the phone can run LineageOS (I have excluded Graphene as they are only compatible with Pixel phones).
Thank you for any answers. Cheers!
I don't get people claiming stock iPhone is private. We literally have very little idea. It's a closed system. It's private if you take Apple's word but all the other manufacturers also have similar claims. Why trust Apple and not them?
On top of that you end up locked into their ecosystem, unable to use most FOSS applications or have cut down versions of them because daddy Apple didn't like some features.
The downside of Google Pixels is that they don't have jack connector and sd slot.
But I accepted the deal just to use GrapheneOS (I bought one used on ebay). Sometimes the battery lasts 3 days without being recharged.
People at GrapheneOS should really focus on some brand that cares about users on the hardware side.
For me it has to be Fairphone. They are more expensive than the others to buy new but they are more aligned with openness and free software. They receive updates for a long time, are well supported by CalyxOS, /e/os, Linux mobile OSs etc, are repairable, you can carry extra batteries, usually have an SD card slot and two SIM slots and are more environmentally-friendly than others.
If privacy is important, a custom ROM is highly recommended or rather mandatory. Most brands have locked boot loader which can't be unlocked immediately without voiding warranty. Some let you to using some bs proprietary software but only after few months. That was the only reason I had to resort to getting a pixel. So look into all the brands available to you and check their policy on custom rooms before looking into the mobile themselves.
second hand Xiaomi + flash Lineage, good hardware for the price, community support
Oneplus with lineage os is pretty good but they sorta make it a pain to unlock the bootloader if the phone was not originally factory unlocked.
Xiaomi and Oneplus have some battery beasts of phones.
Not under your specs but the Sony Xperia line offers a headphone jack + microSD, can be unlocked, & has flagship specs (1 & 5). The 5 & 10 models are also smaller devices that actually fit in one hand too. This characteristic combo does not come in the other models folks are suggesting. Older models have LineageOS for microG support if you want an ungoogled phone (but beware the stock camera app is trash).
i daily a Fairphone 4, has neither the best camera nor the best battery life. but it's the most repairable and durable phone i've owned.
i've had extremely good experieces with oneplus phones, dunno about custom ROM support though.
i've also heard good things about modern motorola phones, if the ROM support is there it's worth a shot imo.
I just got a OnePlus 12 and this phone is fantastic. Bootloader is unlocked and you can do whatever you want. Battery is amazing. Charger is insane. Camera is more than decent. Price is very reasonable for what it offers.
If you like, you can try my non root smartphone guide which works with any Android phone from the last 5 years, and even upto phones as old as Android 7 Nougat. (NOTE: Please do not use phones that old for daily driver, they have security risks.)
You can do 99% of the stuff fancy custom Android builds claim to provide without needing to root or unlock bootloader (this one prevents lots of risks alone), as far as privacy or security goes. Sure you may not be able to change your boot screen or use some fancy Xposed mod, but that is the cost of extra security. You can use Wavelet or RootlessJamesDSP without root instead of Viper4Android for sound improvements.
I do have a ranking of phone brands in there that is a bit old, but free of political biases, and still relevant. Your options for a LineageOS compatible phone might be low. Xiaomi and Motorola are good options. Avoid OnePlus if you want to use full 48/64 MP camera resolution, they lock it to their own app intentionally. https://www.celsoazevedo.com/files/android/google-camera/f/post-05/
Not sure what else I could tell, depends on whatever roadblocks you encounter upon research.
If you want a great cameraphone with bootloader unlocking, maybe buy a second hand Xiaomi 14 Ultra in few months?
As I usually unlock bootloader, I just buy cheap Chinese phones from around 100 bucks, right now I'm using a FreeYond M5 5G. Debloated and rooted. Working like a charm.
Edit: I prefer Motorola over Nokia.
I focus on the OS. However, I like the moto phones. I've had mine for 5 or 6 years and I don't have any reason to change.
Custom ROM support relies a lot on a phone either being unique in some nerdy kind of way or having widespread community interest (especially appeal to Indian consumers since many community developers are Indian). The Google Pixel and Fairphone lines consistently have great support due to the first reason, while cheaper Chinese brands often have decent support for the second reason. Nokia is in a bad position in both respects - its phones are neither interesting or particularly cheap/good value for money - so its support is generally pretty bad.
If you plan to just use a phone with the stock ROM then they are all equally bad when it comes to leakage to Google. However brands that try hard to force you into their heavily modified Android ecosystems like Samsung and Xiaomi are particularly bad for privacy since they have a ton of extra data collection built in that is either forced or suggested to you quite heavily (many features are locked behind additional privacy policies and account logins). You are better off going with something as light as possible in that case. Since you mentioned Motorola, I'll add that I have a razr 2023 and beyond a few optional apps that I can disable, it is pretty standard Android with no additional data collection or accounts required. Motorola phones can have dogshit software support, though. Like this one I have is less than a year old and it's already taking them 4 months to push an update.
I've asked a similar question not long ago and the consensus was pixel, even though I had already ruled them out in my question.
I still haven't changed phones but I'm leaning on a nothing 2a, since it's reasonably priced for the storage that I want.
However, I've been looking at phones based on the specs I want and check XDA forums and see how active they are, in the hopes I get a phone popular enough that has long term community support
I'm using a SHIFT6mq with LineageOS. It's similar to the Fairphone (expensive, but repairable, sustainable, good Custom ROM support), but it's got a few different design decisions and much higher build quality compared to the FP3 I had before.
I use a grapheneos pixel
So I’ve gone back and forth between Apple and Android for the past decade and a half: I currently daily an iPhone 12 mini because I like the UI, size, ease of use, and the fact that I don’t use my phone as a multimedia device. If I could do akin to GrapheneOS or CalyxOS on iPhone I’d stick to it.
In the future once my iPhone breaks or finally becomes obsolete, I intend to go to either a used Pixel or a Fairphone. Both are supported by secure OSs but I also dislike how big both of them are.
TLDR: love iPhones, appreciate Fairphones.
Well Nokia is a no no They don't allow bootloader unlock, I would recommend that you check which privacy oriented custom ROM you want to install and check the supported phones they have listed and buy one of those models for installing the ROM
The hardware is wholly unremarkable, but the pixel line supports Graphene. Custom Roms are a necessity if you care about privacy even a little bit, but there are other options.
Unfortunately in many places, illegal searches are the rule, not the exception and as such security is almost as critical. If you need security AND privacy there is simply no substitute.
Motorola hardware looks kinda nice though...
Samsung Ultra all the way. It has top of the world hardware, software support
AND I can customize my phone the way I want.
HTC (Wildfire, Desire Z, [rip!]), Samsung (they are/were easy to flash; S3, S5, S7, A5 2017).
I once had Nexus 5 (by LG [rip!]) - I was disappointed, poor quality.Nowadays, you should have control of a baseband firmware too!
So, looks like the Pixels are the best option.
