Over the past few months, we’ve fallen short in communicating with you about certain issues that you have been flagging on the forum, such as the long wait times for customer support and the long overdue Android 14 update for the Fairphone 4. We’re truly sorry about that. It was never our intention to leave you in the dark, but rather, to wait till we had something solid to share. However, saying nothing is not the way to go. We want to make this right. So we’re sharing this update to explain wh...
This is pretty sad to hear. Fairphone was next on my list of phones to try when my current phone gets too old. With the US boycott, I might have to go back to Samsung, but I hate the bloat.
After about 13 years of experience with a lot of Android phones, I’m never buying anything other than Google Pixels again. Every other manufacturer just fucks up the software so badly I can’t deal with it.
And no this is not an ad, I hate the state of Android atm, but it is what it is.
To each their own. My main issues with Google is the subpar chipset and the short battery life. Also the fact that you can’t remove the Google search bar from the Pixel launcher.
You can change the Google Search bar to another search engine, at least in Europe. You can’t remove it entirely, but I just tried it and I can set it to DuckDuckGo
That’s a decent complaint, but making that a deciding factor for which smartphone to buy seems like shooting yourself in the food because the cheese was too orange-colored when choosing a sandwich
xiaomi doesn’t allow third party launchers anymore?? what a shitty change. since when is that?
also, I would rather have “subpar” hardware and a decent OS than trendy hardware and all the bloat and datamining of the world. but that honestly excludes most phones.
This is pretty sad to hear. Fairphone was next on my list of phones to try when my current phone gets too old. With the US boycott, I might have to go back to Samsung, but I hate the bloat.
why would you choose samsung, of all?
If you are looking for a device smaller than 155mm from at least 2023, you can choose between
https://www.gsmarena.com/results.php3?nYearMin=2023&nHeightMax=155&nRamMin=6000&idOS=2
Edit: Xiaomi allows third-party lauchers but blocks gestures navigation.
After about 13 years of experience with a lot of Android phones, I’m never buying anything other than Google Pixels again. Every other manufacturer just fucks up the software so badly I can’t deal with it.
And no this is not an ad, I hate the state of Android atm, but it is what it is.
To each their own. My main issues with Google is the subpar chipset and the short battery life. Also the fact that you can’t remove the Google search bar from the Pixel launcher.
https://www.androidpolice.com/google-pixel-9-needs-great-battery-life/
https://old.reddit.com/r/GooglePixel/comments/1jorwd3/battery_megathread_april_2025/mnybfar/
You can change the Google Search bar to another search engine, at least in Europe. You can’t remove it entirely, but I just tried it and I can set it to DuckDuckGo
To each their own, but not being able to just remove it just seems weird to me.
That’s a decent complaint, but making that a deciding factor for which smartphone to buy seems like shooting yourself in the food because the cheese was too orange-colored when choosing a sandwich
The battery life and hardware were definitely bigger factors.
xiaomi doesn’t allow third party launchers anymore?? what a shitty change. since when is that?
also, I would rather have “subpar” hardware and a decent OS than trendy hardware and all the bloat and datamining of the world. but that honestly excludes most phones.