In the near future, we'll be shipping a properly secure implementation of a duress PIN/password along with a properly secure panic wipe based on wiping without requiring a reboot. We also plan to make device admin API use our wipe-without-reboot approach until Android ships one.
I didn't brick mine, but got very close to it. Was able to run some command prompts to it while it was giving me a blank screen and managed to factory reset/ get it to where I wanted. Man was I worried I just turned my $1,000.00 phone into a paperweight. After that near miss, I gave up on rooting/ custom roms even though I enjoyed tinkering with them. Maybe I should give it another go.
If you just want to play around you can get a Pixel 7a for $374 USD from store.google.com while it's on sale. You can pay in installments.
I don't really like Google as a company, or idea of changing phones often, but it's pretty cheap for a brand new smartphone, and buying from Google gives the option for having an unlocked bootloader unlike if you bought from a service provider's store.
I need a slightly less secure walkthrough to allow, essentially, android auto and google maps to operate.
I did without for a while, and it wasn't pretty.
Lets just say I went from a sketchy hospital district to a very sketchy dead end in a neighborhood that had lookouts. Working nights, this was not a great time to drop in unannounced.
It constantly annoys me that it doesn't present a change log for system updates. It's just like here you go, install this, maybe this one has security updates, you'll never know. Doesn't even tell you what version it is installing.
Some Samsung devices (Galaxy S series) have a proper hardware that met the requirements of GrapheneOS team but Samsung doesn't offer a proper support for other ROM's. Pixel devices are very similar to the old ADP (Android Dev Phone) in matter of software because they are the few one or even the only OEM that provides a smartphone with the ability to lock the bootloader after the installation of a different ROM
Would be great if they also countered Google's dark patterns in the notification bar toggles and revert back to the old working design.
I'm not saying it's even close to the same priority as this. But you know... Google's decisions are downgrading the platform and the experience.