I've been running GrapheneOS for 7 months now and I'm not going back. When I bought my Pixel 10 last year, I wasn't actually planning on trying Graphene for a while....until I noticed Google had force bundled a 'Wicked For Good' movie promo theme with the latest security update.
Ha! Me too! Exact same. Bought a Pixel 10. Intended to do the default Android for a while. But it was filled with ads for “Wicked” which had me looking at my phone with a sneer on my face I couldn't erase - as if someone had smeared feces all over it and threw it on my bed.
So I jumped straight to GrapheneOS, which was way easier and less extreme than I had been warned. So beautifully minimal, with no crap. Now my phone feels like a simple Linux (Void/Arch) PC. So wonderful.
Brother, you didn't take anything here, you still depend on Google good will allowing the pixel devices to be just open enough so that Graphene can be installed on them, but that can always change in the future devices on a whim or even now via e-fuses on the Tensor SoC.
Google is the one in control here giving you the temporary illusion of control. Kinda like the people plugged into the Matrix. But they can afford to play the long game over years or decades till they monopolize the market and kill any small competitors from becoming threats, and then rug-pull you.
For you to be in control you need a (almost)fully FOSS phone, from HW, to modem, to EFI-boot stack, not just the OS and the temporary permission from the manufacturer of a closed source HW stack to replace their OS.
What you are describing is not Google’s alturism but keeping competition in check. If Google didn’t “allow” GrapheneOS it opens up a new market segment for other smartphone manufacturers. Apple really cashed in on privacy for a few years so it’s not unfathomable that Xiaomi or someone else goes all in on “privacy focused android” in absence of pixel+graphene combo.
I don't think any Chinese company can pull the privacy card. They're bound by their government to spy on their customers just like American ones are.
Otherwise Huawei would have already jumped into that gap. They have their own Google-independent OS now so they could have marketed it to privacy enthusiasts where the lack of Google services would have been a positive not a negative.
> Apple really cashed in on privacy for a few years
Apple didn't "cash in", their marketing dept made sure privacy/security engineering got just enough budget to pull off miracles & then spend even more to successfully make the public forget about the very nasty Celebgate.
Years ago I looked into GrapheneOS, and I ultimately didn't go with it because, at least at the time, they only supported pixel phones (specifically pixel phones that Google actively had security updates for). I realized that if I got that OS, I would be at the mercy of Google supporting the device in order to continue using GrapheneOS.
In the end I just opted out of the android ecosystem altogether and went with a flip phone that I used as a hotspot for an iPod touch (we only used over VPN with locked down DNS and nothing google related).
My privacy lasted about two weeks, because unfortunately Spotify was able to fingerprint that device to Facebook.
TBF if Google locked down the devices like that it would be a GPL violation. Not their first or whatever but still, there's a reason for them not to do that beside "being nice"
It's also because so many Linux developers are on the payroll of big tech. Look at all the submissions. And look at the key people in the Linux Foundation. All a bunch of business suits with compromised motives.
Linux is no longer the community-driven choice. It's big business with billions hanging on the line. The grassroots origins are long over.
And how many options are there exactly? How many of them are capable of at least making and receiving a phone call without any issues 99% of the time?
While I agree with your general sentiment, I feel necessary to acknowledge that it's just not there (yet?). GrapheneOS is a great option if you want to have a fully working and secure device.
Your point is valid and yeah, it's a never-ending fight just to keep the control we have. Things like the Play Protect API and loads of Android apps being coupled to Play Services is it's own big challenge we're stuck with just to stay within the Android ecosystem
When I got a new phone last year, I purposely got a Pixel (open box 9a) to put GrapheneOS on it immediately. Been happy living the de-Googled Android life since.
I was sad that I had to go through the OOBE setup on the stock image to unlock the bootloader. At least it doesn't force an internet connection and login, unlike Windows.
If it's any consolation, the wipe* requirement before unlocking the bootloader is generally a good thing, even if it's inconvenient. Someone who is targeting your personal data gets access to your encrypted phone, either by stealing it or in an evil maid situation. They unlock the bootloader and install privileged code that helps them recover the symmetric encryption key or intercept your PIN. Then they either have your data or wait for you to enter the PIN. In theory recovery shouldn't be possible (access to the key depends on a secure element that rate limits brute-force attacks), but security bugs do happen. Wiping* your data before removing the bootloader's signing requirement is an extra layer of protection.
*It doesn't actually wipe your data; it just destroys the symmetric key, making the data permanently unreadable.
I run a litany of Google (and other corporate/business apps) apps in Private Space under the owner's profile, which is only unlocked when I need it for something. That space's connection can go out over a WireGuard tunnel if I need those apps to be on any specific networks, while the rest of the phone's traffic is unaffected. The file systems stay functionally separate (although that's not a major concern given how file encryption is handled, plus the dream that is Storage Scopes), and that space has its own camera app and such.
The Owner profile itself doesn't run Google Play Services, so when that Private Space is locked and dormant it's effectively a degoogled stack.
Some will invariably argue that an old pocket-sized Linux PC with a cellular modem is a superior experience, and for some specific things it may well be, but GrapheneOS is the only viable option for someone looking for a user-respecting modern phone with very few limitations.
> I'm not looking to fully de-Google but I want Google as apps and not my OS.
This is entirely possible as other posters have explained. But I think it kind of defeats the point of Graphene, at least somewhat. Google is already profiling every aspect of your life by reading your emails, files, calendar, location, etc? In that case, OS access becomes moot.
I think that GrapheneOS makes most sense as part of a broader move towards privacy-respecting alternatives. I see the sandboxed Play Services as something useful perhaps in a secondary user profile, for the odd commercial app required and only available from the Play Store.
I agree and have moved mostly away from everything Google. But it's hard to replace maps. I know open street maps exists but it's hard to beat Google's data gathering.
I think OSM is way way better. It has every little path in the hills I walk. On Google Maps I'm just walking in a featureless green blob. OSM even has unofficial trails that are no more than a worn-down line in the brush.
Maybe for cars Google is better but I don't use those. But even there I see really detailed stats.
OSMAnd is a really great full featured mapping app. A real tool that you can configure in detail. And Organic maps is more simple and quick like Google maps.
I use Google Maps on Graphene. It works perfectly. You still get the benefits of the rest of the phone being degoogled. Just allow it to access your location only when you're actively using the app. When it's closed, it's closed.
There are players in the OpenStreetMap ecosystem attempting to change that. I know the team behind Organic Maps are actively working to make their app as viable as possible by sourcing appropriate data for example.
I actually find that it blows Google Maps out of the water for cycling (which is why/how I discovered it). I haven't really used it for driving much because my own car has a builtin nav, so can't really comment on that.
I believe one of Graphene OS's main features is that they allow you to run google play services in a sandboxed environment, so you can run your standard google apps but without the standard android deal where google play services has unfetteted access to all your phone's location/data/etc info
Yes, you install the Google Play store via the GrapheneOS App Store. The OS comes with like 5 apps out of the box. The rest is up to you.
Biggest caveats that I've encountered: tap to pay via Google Wallet is a no go, Android Auto can be flaky, MDM managed work profiles don't work at the moment, and some apps that use the Google Play integrity API fail to validate and refuse to work (I've only encountered one app that fails, and plenty others that work.)
In general, I'm moving towards a de-Googled life and GrapheneOS is a great entrypoint towards that.
My end-run around Google's absurd unwillingness to certify GOS for Google Pay has been Garmin Pay, which has worked virtually everywhere I've ever tried it.
I'm hopeful that an OEM Motorola device will get certified for Google Pay.
Seedvault is still woefully insufficient, but it sounds like there's work being done to replace it. I can't imagine the enterprise crowd will overlook that and I'm hoping the Motorola partnership enables faster development.
Yeah, I'm hanging on with GrapheneOS (on a Pixel) until their native-hardware (Motorola) phones come out, which hopefully will solve this. As I understand it, third-party (banks and so forth) app vendors have to accept their security attestation, which they don't right now, but (I hope) will with Motorola behind them.
I hate how common it's become for companies to force you to install things on your personal phone. Even worse is some of them demand you install a MDM profile on your personal phone which feels 1000% over the line of reasonable.
I think Google authenticator implements the standard OTP which lots of apps (including keepass) should support.
Microsoft uses their own propietary crap
I use a basic OTP password instead of Microsoft's ironically less secure (see SMS as 2FA) with my work MS account. Perhaps your org disabled it but it is definitely something a Microsoft account can do.
Same, I've got a Pixel 9 and GrapheneOS works perfectly on it. I really love having full control over the OS on my phone and being able to decide what actually runs on it.
I took the plunge into GrapheneOS a week ago. I picked up a new Pixel10 Pro and never even tried the stock OS (except to unlock the boot loader).
I've got almost everything working the way I want. There were a few non-essential banking apps that won't install. The most annoying problem I had is when I tried to install Strava, which I cannot get working. The app installs, but it will not let me sign in. I guess I need a replacement, because I use that app a lot.
That Motorola phone that lets you install Graphene can not come soon enough. Pixel phones are not sold worldwide so it feels like they're gatekeeping security. I know that's not the case really, but there's very few ways to successfully degoogle otherwise.
I just moved away from GrapheneOS to Motorola because I decided I needed an audio jack again. There's definitely some annoying things about leaving, but at least now I can use again the three apps that didn't work for me on GrapheneOS...
Phone hardware is a hellscape it doesn’t surprise me at all that they need to keep the number of supported devices small in order to deliver a decent product.
Despite Google's other failings, it was the OG supporter of data portability, and that spirit extends to its phones. No other phone manufacturer with wide distribution comes close. It's unfortunate that the people who design the hardware do such a poor job with the resources at their disposal.
Is it still the case that Android backups leave much to be desired when compared to iphone? Pretty much the only reason I use Apple is that I can switch to a replacement phone and it’s exactly the same state as the last backup.
I don't see anything they offer for security that's not also in AOSP/LineageOS/eOS/stock/etc.
Which is not to say that's not enough for most people, but why highlight them? It doesn't seem comparable to the laser-focus GrapheneOS has on security
I've been using Graphene on my Pixel 7a for about a year and I'm happy I made the switch. For sure it is a bit rougher than using Google's OS, but not enough to make me regret it.
The main things I miss are (1) when I'm entering text I can't swipe left and right on the space bar to scroll the cursor left and right, and (2) the texting app doesn't just attach reaction emojis to a message -- it quotes the whole message and prefixes it with something like "Marty like blahblahblah". When there is a whole family text chain it isn't uncommon to see the same message 7 times as various people react to the original message.
Anyway, I looked at Google's Android 17 blog and yikes:
"With deep integration between hardware, software and AI, we’re transforming Android from an operating system to an intelligence system. It's about delivering new helpful experiences that anticipate user needs, and it brings more opportunities for engagement with your apps."
> The main things I miss are (1) when I'm entering text I can't swipe left and right on the space bar to scroll the cursor left and right,
GrapheneOS is compatible with the vast, vast majority of Android apps, so you can use GBoard or FUTO keyboard (which I recently switched to from GBoard), to get the ideal experience.
FUTO recently revamped their swipe to type model and it's now more accurate than GBoard in their testing. I am a huge swipe type person, so this is what held me in GBoard's clutches, but now I'm free.
The dataset is open source and anyone can add to it if you're on a mobile device here: https://swipe.futo.org
> the texting app doesn't just attach reaction emojis to a message -- it quotes the whole message and prefixes it with something like "Marty like blahblahblah". When there is a whole family text chain it isn't uncommon to see the same message 7 times as various people react to the original message.
Google messages, the experience you get on PixelOS, is also compatible with GrapheneOS, but you will have to afford network access to sandboxed google play, among other things. I couldn't tell you specifically, but it will work out of the box before you restrict anything. Many people choose to use this setup because it opportunistically adds e2ee for chats between iPhones and other Androids using Google messages.
There's also other SMS apps, but I focused on switching people to Signal so I barely ever use SMS.
Once I replaced the default apps, GrapheneOS became a premium phone experience.
The problem I still have with the futo one is that it can't swipe type in multiple languages without switching every time. Gboard can do that. I use 3 languages intertwined constantly so I need that.
So I still use gboard but block its internet access.
Yes! FUTO keyboard, then go into VOICE INPUT → MODELS → Explore Voice Input Models → English-244: “Best for the most accurate results, but more demanding.”
The voice recognition is built on Whisper, and is amazing. You can speak conversationally for a long time and it gets everything right, with smart decisions based on context.
I just did. I had been using FUTO voice, but I see that FUTO keyboard also supports voice input, so I'm not sure if I should delete FUTO voice as being redundant now.
I don't believe it's necessary, it's move of an "if you want a dedicated voice keyboard, the UX is a little better" option. I don't have both installed though, as anecdotal evidence.
Thanks for your thoughts. I use FUTO voice usually, but there are situations where typing out a short message is better -- eg, in a restaurant or doctor's office or someplace where voice input might bother other people.
I've found graphene's keyboard far more error-prone than the stock android keyboard, but I also don't care to learn swipe to type.
The feature I'm missing is simply that rubbing my finger left or right on the spacebar in text mode causes the cursor insertion point to move left or right on in the text I'm entering. It makes it sooo much easier to correct typos.
FUTO and GBoard has the feature you're describing and I use it all the time. Pretty much anything you miss from Pixel UI can be attained by simply installing Google's app from the playstore.
Problem (1) is a keyboard problem, not a GrapheneOS problem. Graphene comes with the stock AOSP keyboard which is very basic, but you can absolutely replace it. Personally I'm using the FUTO Keyboard and it does have that feature, as well as swiping, speech to text and much more.
Maybe you can try installing another SMS app for problem (2)? Much like the stock keyboard, the stock Messaging app is just the AOSP app. Honestly it works fine for me so I don't have a recommendation.
Regarding 2: that is literally how SMS reactions work. Apps that recognize it just interpret it as "put that emoji on that message". It is unfortunate that it doesn't do that tho.
RCS is different, which you can sometimes get working by installing Google Messages¹, which is essentially the only app that supports RCS any more. Google runs essentially all the servers too.
---
1: There are no third-party RCS apps² because, unlike SMS which has an API and a shared database on the device, RCS is extremely locked down and it's literally impossible to create one in stock Android. This is also why it's only "sometimes" on GOS, the details are very complicated and rather enraging.
2: Samsung had one, but they're shutting it down in favor of Google Messages. A tiny number of other devices / telecoms have their own too, but they're rapidly shutting down as well. RCS is very nearly fully controlled and implemented by Google now, except for iMessage as a client only, for now, and there's no encryption between iMessage<->Google Messages last I checked (but there apparently is between Google Messages... but no normal person can really verify that because it's Just Google Everywhere).
I agree with this post and add one anecdotal data point.
I had installed graphene os on a pixel but after a couple months and a couple loops between lineage, stock, and graphene, I eventually settled on stock android. I have group messages with family and some of the family are on apple, some on android, and RCS only works with google messages and google services installed.
It's infuriating that I can't send RCS messages unless google allows me to. I want to go back to email or MMS. Supposedly after a month (!!) RCS group chats will fall back to MMS, but that was not my experience. Also, if you turn RCS on/off you may get kicked out of group messages [0].
Yeah, it's pretty awful tbh. I generally recommend disabling RCS, after learning a lot more about it - it feels like a hostile grab at global messaging at this point, heavily entrenched by telecom agreements. Use Signal or something instead.
Initially there were some promising details planned, but much of it hasn't panned out, and plus now it's Just Google™. Like, roughly everyone has heard that RCS brings E2EE privacy, right? Would it surprise you to learn that it was only added to the spec around a year ago, and nobody has it implemented yet? Google has their own thing between Google users, Apple has their own iMessage-only thing, and they both drop crypto when you cross the streams because it isn't in the spec. And neither is practically auditable (allowing auditing is part of the spec btw - have you seen that UI?).
Yeah RCS always has been an embrace extend extinguish thing. The carriers were super pissed to lose their SMS revenue to WhatsApp and iMessage so they came up with this shit to be an active partner in the loop again, and they can bill for it again. Consumers didn't fall for that and it died off.
Unfortunately Google revived it but it's a very poor standard for interoperability. Not only because the lack of true E2EE in the open spec but also because you need to be a blessed party to run an RCS server and communicate with others. You can't run your own or choose a party you trust. It's either your carrier if they bother to run one, or Google.
It's just another power grab. Don't fall for its 'open' guise. They want you to use it so they can make you dependent and lock you in again. There's nothing open about it. If you want privacy, use signal. If you also want an open and federated network, use matrix or xmpp with OMEMO.
I used to dread the promised deep system integration of AI, but honestly after setting Claude up on a server box and having it do sysadmin stuff for me that I've been putting off for ages I see the vision. I don't really want to mess with the details of working through system orchestration tasks, I want to say "spin up this service" and start using it, "change my config so X happens" and it does, and knows what needs restarting to pick up changes and all the fiddly knobs and configs that need syncing and their bespoke formats. I think Nix tried to unify this for people, but it arrived too close to LLMs so a lot of value (in this dimension) has been delivered by other means.
The point is, I'd like to be able to set up services, configuration, and run tasks on my phone this way too, ideally offline. If this system integration is what gives me programmatic control of my most personal computer and the ability to finally set up decent automated tasks and workflows then so be it.
The vendors are never going to give you control over your computer no matter what vision they try to sell you on. The whole point, from their perspective, is to use their control of your computer to gain more control over you, which they hope to then exploit for profit.
The thing is they don't setup their "intelligence system" for the type of task you wanna do. They are integrating it for tasks like "buy me a plane ticket for my next holidays", "order diner for me, the usual"...
Other people have noted that you can switch out the keyboard and SMS app (which I did).
My single (minor) issue with GrapheneOS is the adaptive screen brightness. On the stock Android OS on a Pixel I'd mess around with the sliders for a week or two on a new phone and then it learned what I liked. Now it has a few set values, one of which is always too dim for me in darker conditions so I have to mess with the slider each and every time. I don't believe there's a way of fixing that.
Other than that I'm glad I switched, especially when I read about new "features" they add that I know I'd hate.
What are North American people doing for replacing contactless payment? Last time I checked, the solution was to use Curve but it only works for Europe.
It's infuriating that they won't do this for non Google Android. It's in the best interest of both the bank and the card owner. Credential theft risk goes down to basically zero when backed by a fingerprint authenticated virtual card.
I'm sure contrats between Google and banks provide the financial guarantees that not open-source project would be able to. Unless governments mandate there's zero interest from banks to put extra effort into building for unpopular solutions
Banks don't want the headache of supporting multiple weird phone OSes and it's understandable. As long as they don't require running an apple/google-certified device and OS I don't care.
> Banks don't want the headache of supporting multiple weird phone OSes and it's understandable.
Commercially, this makes sense.
I am surprised that most nations of the whole world are fine with every citizen relying on one of two american companies for their lifestyle interactions though. I would have thought more nations would legislate their banks must support other options for sheer sovereign resilience.
Does it though? The people in this thread are like "just use a card". Well I've done that for years and had my card skimmed, lost, and stolen over the years. The cost wasn't trivial either. The credit card company knocked it off my balance but also lost on sales when I didn't have my card while they issued me a new one. It cost the credit card company actual money in both lost sales and in dealing with the fraudulent transactions.
Now if I was allowed to use my rooted Android phone during those years? It would have been locked down tighter than the vast majority of Windows boxes.
People forget that one of the value-adds of credit cards in the first place is that suddenly you didn't have to walk around with a big wad of cash. Credit cards gave you that extra level of security. Even if someone stole it, it's useless to them as soon as you make a phone call to the CC company. We can verify a transaction with a yubikey-like secret store on your device that never shares the private key with the operating system and which generates a virtual credit card on the fly. That's literally how Apple Pay and Google Pay already work. So whether a device is rooted or whatever literally doesn't matter.
Use a solvent to dissolve the plastic from the card then epoxy the extracted antenna and chip innards to the back of your phone case. Problem solved. (I'm only 50% joking, you can actually do this but maybe epoxy isn't the best option.)
I have these cards I keep in my (RFID-blocking) wallet, one for each credit account. Then I just pull them out and tap to pay. It's super convenient - no app required!
People can't steal your card info via proximity to your wallet over NFC even without an RF blocking wallet. This is tinfoil hat security cargo culting, like putting tape over your webcam while leaving the laptop's microphone connected (audio from your room is much more useful than 2834823428 frames of your greasy face).
The person mentioned it like it's a feature for them, but I haven't heard of it being anything other than a marketing gimmick, so I was curious for their perspective.
It's even available in my country! Never heard of it, would have assumed it's not being sold here. Let's see what that costs when I click the "shop now" button that's front and center
> Attention required!
> Sorry, you have been blocked
> The action you just performed triggered the security solution. There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase, a SQL command or malformed data.
Thanks cloudflare *handshake* garmin. I suppose I'll stay with chip and pin for now
The post doesn't say - what's new? Anything to look forward to besides the security patches for A17 being available for longer than they will be for A16?
Asking as an A11 user who will probably soon need to switch to a new device. I haven't noticed anything on other people's phones that isn't available on mine, including on my work phone that runs an up-to-date GrapheneOS (but I don't need to do much more than calling and 2FA, so I might just not be seeing it). Anything you guys are excited for, or any protips of things to check out that were released recently?
Ah, right I forgot they are discontinuing ChromeOS. Makes sense that current Android releases are focused on getting the Android laptop experience on par
Does GrapheneOS run on tablets? I don't see a whole chat app (shown in the example) fitting on my phone screen alongside something like a web browser, and the screenshot is from a square screen
It's complicated. The Tensor G2 Pixel tablet was a solid device, and you can still buy it new from Google (with no choice on color or size in my country), but production has been discontinued and the two direct generational successors were canceled, in sequence. First it was skipping a generation, then it was canceling it entirely. The rumored "Pro" version also appears to have been axed.
I've used mine daily since it came out, and it's a great experience. I'd recommend picking it up for anyone who wants GOS on a larger screen. An iPad it isn't, but my iPad Pros have sat almost totally dormant since I got it years ago.
It lacks horsepower compared to the latest Pixel Pros, but that hasn't been a practical concern in anything I've done with it so far.
>Those are just the devices we initially tested it on which mainly has to do with which devices were available to the people working on the port.
>To clarify the 2nd paragraph, we've ported GrapheneOS to Android 17 for all of the supported devices. That's a list of the devices we already built and tested it. Our initial public release will be available for all the supported devices and we'll have tested it on each by then.
I've been thinking it might be worthwhile to showcase that you can make GrapheneOS look beautiful or the same as stock Pixel UI. When I was considering switching from iPhone I had this misconception that it would look ugly or wouldn't look the same as Pixel UI, which is not the case at all. When I asked about it I wasn't given this clearcut answer that you can make GrapheneOS UI look the same or better than Pixel UI.
It means they rebased all their changes on top of the new version. This is usually time-consuming because AOSP is not developed in the open, so you can't do this incrementally as things change -- you just get a massive drop sometime after release.
Android makes yearly releases. It is developed in cathedral-style. Google releases the source as a single big update. GrapheneOS is a fork. They need to port their customizations and extra software on top of the new release.
I've been running GrapheneOS for over an year now. Bought a Pixel 6a last year as a cheap way to test waters, but pretty soon I upgraded to discounted Pixel 9. It took a while to set the basics (coming from iPhone), and I'm still have a couple of stuff missing, but at this point don't intend to use anything else (for as long as possible).
The biggest hurdles for me were - should I use separate profiles and how to get apps. Initially, I started with a separate profile for google stuff (like play store/services and apps downloaded from there, like Viber), but eventually I moved everything to the owner profile (and took a bit of a privacy and battery hit in the matter of convenience). Still, being able to control many app permissions, gives me a good state of mind that apps are not doing more then I expect.
Just looked at what android 17 brings to the table and I'm mildly excited - especially improving performance and adding more permissions (like ACCESS_LOCAL_NETWORK)
I made the same mistake after being burned by the PinePhone, buying a heavily discounted Pixel 6 to test various Android forks, which eventually included GrapheneOS. I quickly knew I'd found home upgraded to a 9 Pro XL.
permanent reminder that graphene and all other "alternatives to android" depend on extracted binary blobs. tons of them. which is the reason new (kernel) versions are such a chore/achievement.
I had been using LineageOS + microG for many years on my Pixel 3. I upgraded to a Pixel 8 and tried out GrapheneOS and the install experience was good, but I found some odd performance quirks - apps would be slow to install and run, downloads were slow, etc. Has anyone had similar issues?
Many apps that work on microG don't work in GrapheneOS without installing Google services anyway. I'm by no means across the full privacy implications, but my feeling is microG balances privacy and usability better for me.
I've since switched back to LineageOS+microG and am happy with it. Just my experience.
>but I found some odd performance quirks - apps would be slow to install and run, downloads were slow, etc. Has anyone had similar issues?
not sure about downloads specifically, but app installs are slow because grapheneos forces AOT compilation (JIT is disabled), presumably for security reasons.
A lot of developers are lured into building in a dependency on Google services, so yes you'll need microG or, as GrapheneOS prefers, the original Google code running on your device for those apps to function. Or patch the app, like Langis does for Signal (not necessary for it to function without Google in this case, but it removes its calling out to Google's apps and services for those who don't want that). If you're happy with that setup and don't need protect-from-the-government levels of security (street thugs aren't going to ransomware your device by abusing an unlocked bootloader or send exploit chains that work on anything but the hardened allocator), LineageOS is probably the better choice for you. GrapheneOS has some nice things like easily denying the network permission for an app (even if they could theoretically work around it with intents) and having a custom A-GNSS server, but you can do the same on LineageOS by using root and something like AFWall+ for the network and configuring Graphene's A-GNSS (SUPL) proxy in the system settings (don't forget to donate if you use it and are able)
Since grapheneOS only supports latest Google pixel phones, I tried installing LineageOS on my Mi11. Sadly, if you own a Xiaomi, you can’t just install another os. You need to unlock the bootloader and Xiomi limits you with a global quota of daily unlocked phones, you basically need to enter at midnight and hope. This is a complete nonsense, we have zero governance on our devices after paying them so much.
To get a sense of the project and its goals I recommend reading this post[1].
Buying a used Pixel is economical, environmental, and likely doesn't support Google. Pixels are the only secure and open android devices that could work for the project and meet the extensive requirements[2]. This is because GrapheneOS takes real steps to protect user privacy and security, not features that degrade security and don't increase privacy. You are going to be doing much more against Google by using GrapheneOS because it comes with 0 google services by default and takes advanced steps to protect you from all apps and services you install.
If you are still not willing or able to purchase a Pixel, GrapheneOS has a partnership with Motorola to help them create compatible devices which will be available soon[3].
It makes sense that an open source project would focus on one series of phones since their time and resources are limited.
That said, Google's hardware is behind their competitors and they've had a lot of problems in the past few years. The Pixel 8 Pro has hardware WiFi problems, the 9 and 10 are both minor updates with prices that are far too high, the 10 is eSIM only, etc.
> The Pixel 8 Pro has hardware WiFi problems, the 9 and 10 are both minor updates
The prime difference between P8 pro and P9 pro is that the newer one is nearly a usable size (just about fits in a pocket now). The battery also got substantially better in two ways: on mobile data (when you're on someone's WiFi, odds are you're also near a charger) you get 33% longer use time on all variants of the P9 and 55% on the P10 and P10p (9 to 12 and 14 hours, respectively), and hours of use per 30 minutes of charging went up from 4.6 for the P8 to 6.3 for the P9(p) and 6.2 or 7 for the P10 and P10p, respectively
The rest is indeed relatively minor but it's not an unwelcome upgrade. Prices didn't change much when buying second-hand 1.5 years after release, when the newest devices are out and nobody cares about the generation-before-last despite >5 years of updates remaining (plus however long you think it's fine without updates)
The Pixel was never sold in my country so it's much more difficult that you think. Even if it was I wouldn't buy it because I don't buy Google products.
> If you are still not willing to purchase a Pixel for whatever reason, GrapheneOS has a partnership with Motorola to help them create compatible devices which will be available soon[2].
I don't see how it's relevant. I couldn't possibly have made it any more clear I would not buy a Google device, new or used, because I don't like Google.
Because AOSP is open source and can be built without Google Play running at the background unlike the other alternative: giving up privacy to yet another big tech Apple.
Graphene adds many privacy features on top of regular AOSP. But it only works on phones that has good security features that are not woefully outdated or completely closed-off. Google has complete control over Pixel supply chain and they can make their phones with all bells and whistles for their ends and they behave a bit benevolently and expose the interfaces to the user too.
Most Android phones use Qualcomm which doesn't give a flying fuck about giving control or privacy to the users.
Only silver lining to this is they run a lot of discounts and promotions on them, and it's possible to buy them at a significant discount. Got my first Pixel 10 on a very cheap contract with trade-in promos on top, and got a second Pixel 10 at a 70% discount from the RRP.
It's not possible to buy them at all where I live, even if I wanted to funnel money to Google - which I do not. I have gone to great lengths to de-Google my life.
Absolutely, and it is irrational to refuse to buy hardware from Google (which, with Graphene, is under your control) when the alternative is to either run a Google OS on a third party phone (and give up control of the software), or Apple (equally bad), or some impractical and less secure alternative like a Linux phone incompatible with Android apps.
So I jumped straight to GrapheneOS, which was way easier and less extreme than I had been warned. So beautifully minimal, with no crap. Now my phone feels like a simple Linux (Void/Arch) PC. So wonderful.
Brother, you didn't take anything here, you still depend on Google good will allowing the pixel devices to be just open enough so that Graphene can be installed on them, but that can always change in the future devices on a whim or even now via e-fuses on the Tensor SoC.
Google is the one in control here giving you the temporary illusion of control. Kinda like the people plugged into the Matrix. But they can afford to play the long game over years or decades till they monopolize the market and kill any small competitors from becoming threats, and then rug-pull you.
For you to be in control you need a (almost)fully FOSS phone, from HW, to modem, to EFI-boot stack, not just the OS and the temporary permission from the manufacturer of a closed source HW stack to replace their OS.
Edit: Apparently Motorola is doing just that.
Otherwise Huawei would have already jumped into that gap. They have their own Google-independent OS now so they could have marketed it to privacy enthusiasts where the lack of Google services would have been a positive not a negative.
Xiaomi? Privacy?
Apple didn't "cash in", their marketing dept made sure privacy/security engineering got just enough budget to pull off miracles & then spend even more to successfully make the public forget about the very nasty Celebgate.
In the end I just opted out of the android ecosystem altogether and went with a flip phone that I used as a hotspot for an iPod touch (we only used over VPN with locked down DNS and nothing google related).
My privacy lasted about two weeks, because unfortunately Spotify was able to fingerprint that device to Facebook.
The Linux kernel developers see what Tivo did as a "feature" rather than a "flaw" and refuse GPLv3.
Linux is no longer the community-driven choice. It's big business with billions hanging on the line. The grassroots origins are long over.
While I agree with your general sentiment, I feel necessary to acknowledge that it's just not there (yet?). GrapheneOS is a great option if you want to have a fully working and secure device.
Your provider can run arbitrary code there.
I was sad that I had to go through the OOBE setup on the stock image to unlock the bootloader. At least it doesn't force an internet connection and login, unlike Windows.
*It doesn't actually wipe your data; it just destroys the symmetric key, making the data permanently unreadable.
I'm not looking to fully de-Google but I want Google as apps and not my OS.
The Owner profile itself doesn't run Google Play Services, so when that Private Space is locked and dormant it's effectively a degoogled stack.
Some will invariably argue that an old pocket-sized Linux PC with a cellular modem is a superior experience, and for some specific things it may well be, but GrapheneOS is the only viable option for someone looking for a user-respecting modern phone with very few limitations.
This is entirely possible as other posters have explained. But I think it kind of defeats the point of Graphene, at least somewhat. Google is already profiling every aspect of your life by reading your emails, files, calendar, location, etc? In that case, OS access becomes moot.
I think that GrapheneOS makes most sense as part of a broader move towards privacy-respecting alternatives. I see the sandboxed Play Services as something useful perhaps in a secondary user profile, for the odd commercial app required and only available from the Play Store.
Maybe for cars Google is better but I don't use those. But even there I see really detailed stats.
OSMAnd is a really great full featured mapping app. A real tool that you can configure in detail. And Organic maps is more simple and quick like Google maps.
https://www.here.com/products/wego
https://here-wego.en.aptoide.com/app
https://k2-fsa.github.io/sherpa/onnx/tts/all/index.html
I actually find that it blows Google Maps out of the water for cycling (which is why/how I discovered it). I haven't really used it for driving much because my own car has a builtin nav, so can't really comment on that.
YMMV of course.
You can install nonprivileged google stuff on the main account.
Alternatively you can setup a private space (accessible to the main user but mostly separate from the main system) with a few clicks in the settings.
If you prefer more friction / isolation you can setup a separate user where you can install the google stuff.
Biggest caveats that I've encountered: tap to pay via Google Wallet is a no go, Android Auto can be flaky, MDM managed work profiles don't work at the moment, and some apps that use the Google Play integrity API fail to validate and refuse to work (I've only encountered one app that fails, and plenty others that work.)
In general, I'm moving towards a de-Googled life and GrapheneOS is a great entrypoint towards that.
I'm hopeful that an OEM Motorola device will get certified for Google Pay.
Edit: Apparently that's Europe only? I'm in Europe so yeah. I didn't know that.
My understanding is that even with pseudo-D2D (device-to-device) transfers Seedvault doesn't backup everything[1].
Are there more-functional, non-root, local (non-cloud) alternatives?
[1]: https://github.com/seedvault-app/seedvault/wiki/FAQ#why-do-s...
However, some apps that I need for work, like Microsoft Authenticator, no longer work under GrapheneOS.
https://www.theregister.com/on-prem/2026/03/10/microsoft-tig...
Is this an antithesis to Don't Be Evil?
I've got almost everything working the way I want. There were a few non-essential banking apps that won't install. The most annoying problem I had is when I tried to install Strava, which I cannot get working. The app installs, but it will not let me sign in. I guess I need a replacement, because I use that app a lot.
Still boggles my mind the fact Google doesn't sell their phones worldwide. Obtaining a Pixel has proven to be quite difficult for me.
What other phone would you pick?
https://volla.online/en/operating-systems/volla-os/
Which is not to say that's not enough for most people, but why highlight them? It doesn't seem comparable to the laser-focus GrapheneOS has on security
The main things I miss are (1) when I'm entering text I can't swipe left and right on the space bar to scroll the cursor left and right, and (2) the texting app doesn't just attach reaction emojis to a message -- it quotes the whole message and prefixes it with something like "Marty like blahblahblah". When there is a whole family text chain it isn't uncommon to see the same message 7 times as various people react to the original message.
Anyway, I looked at Google's Android 17 blog and yikes:
"With deep integration between hardware, software and AI, we’re transforming Android from an operating system to an intelligence system. It's about delivering new helpful experiences that anticipate user needs, and it brings more opportunities for engagement with your apps."
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/06/Android-17...
GrapheneOS is compatible with the vast, vast majority of Android apps, so you can use GBoard or FUTO keyboard (which I recently switched to from GBoard), to get the ideal experience.
FUTO recently revamped their swipe to type model and it's now more accurate than GBoard in their testing. I am a huge swipe type person, so this is what held me in GBoard's clutches, but now I'm free.
The dataset is open source and anyone can add to it if you're on a mobile device here: https://swipe.futo.org
And you can learn about it here: https://swipe.futo.tech
> the texting app doesn't just attach reaction emojis to a message -- it quotes the whole message and prefixes it with something like "Marty like blahblahblah". When there is a whole family text chain it isn't uncommon to see the same message 7 times as various people react to the original message.
Google messages, the experience you get on PixelOS, is also compatible with GrapheneOS, but you will have to afford network access to sandboxed google play, among other things. I couldn't tell you specifically, but it will work out of the box before you restrict anything. Many people choose to use this setup because it opportunistically adds e2ee for chats between iPhones and other Androids using Google messages.
There's also other SMS apps, but I focused on switching people to Signal so I barely ever use SMS.
Once I replaced the default apps, GrapheneOS became a premium phone experience.
So I still use gboard but block its internet access.
The voice recognition is built on Whisper, and is amazing. You can speak conversationally for a long time and it gets everything right, with smart decisions based on context.
My stupid thumbs text no more.
I've found graphene's keyboard far more error-prone than the stock android keyboard, but I also don't care to learn swipe to type.
The feature I'm missing is simply that rubbing my finger left or right on the spacebar in text mode causes the cursor insertion point to move left or right on in the text I'm entering. It makes it sooo much easier to correct typos.
Maybe you can try installing another SMS app for problem (2)? Much like the stock keyboard, the stock Messaging app is just the AOSP app. Honestly it works fine for me so I don't have a recommendation.
RCS is different, which you can sometimes get working by installing Google Messages¹, which is essentially the only app that supports RCS any more. Google runs essentially all the servers too.
---
1: There are no third-party RCS apps² because, unlike SMS which has an API and a shared database on the device, RCS is extremely locked down and it's literally impossible to create one in stock Android. This is also why it's only "sometimes" on GOS, the details are very complicated and rather enraging.
2: Samsung had one, but they're shutting it down in favor of Google Messages. A tiny number of other devices / telecoms have their own too, but they're rapidly shutting down as well. RCS is very nearly fully controlled and implemented by Google now, except for iMessage as a client only, for now, and there's no encryption between iMessage<->Google Messages last I checked (but there apparently is between Google Messages... but no normal person can really verify that because it's Just Google Everywhere).
I had installed graphene os on a pixel but after a couple months and a couple loops between lineage, stock, and graphene, I eventually settled on stock android. I have group messages with family and some of the family are on apple, some on android, and RCS only works with google messages and google services installed.
It's infuriating that I can't send RCS messages unless google allows me to. I want to go back to email or MMS. Supposedly after a month (!!) RCS group chats will fall back to MMS, but that was not my experience. Also, if you turn RCS on/off you may get kicked out of group messages [0].
[0] https://support.google.com/messages/answer/7189714?hl=en
Initially there were some promising details planned, but much of it hasn't panned out, and plus now it's Just Google™. Like, roughly everyone has heard that RCS brings E2EE privacy, right? Would it surprise you to learn that it was only added to the spec around a year ago, and nobody has it implemented yet? Google has their own thing between Google users, Apple has their own iMessage-only thing, and they both drop crypto when you cross the streams because it isn't in the spec. And neither is practically auditable (allowing auditing is part of the spec btw - have you seen that UI?).
And that's before even touching on the utterly massive amount of the spec that's clearly designed for businesses only, to send you highly customizable interactive UI. Which you can't use as a person. Or build your own app for. https://developers.google.com/business-communications/rcs-bu... / https://rcsforbusiness.google/
It just does not smell good. It's not in our best interests to let it win.
Unfortunately Google revived it but it's a very poor standard for interoperability. Not only because the lack of true E2EE in the open spec but also because you need to be a blessed party to run an RCS server and communicate with others. You can't run your own or choose a party you trust. It's either your carrier if they bother to run one, or Google.
It's just another power grab. Don't fall for its 'open' guise. They want you to use it so they can make you dependent and lock you in again. There's nothing open about it. If you want privacy, use signal. If you also want an open and federated network, use matrix or xmpp with OMEMO.
The point is, I'd like to be able to set up services, configuration, and run tasks on my phone this way too, ideally offline. If this system integration is what gives me programmatic control of my most personal computer and the ability to finally set up decent automated tasks and workflows then so be it.
Why would we expect the same company to exhibit a completely opposite philosophy as they add LLM features?
My single (minor) issue with GrapheneOS is the adaptive screen brightness. On the stock Android OS on a Pixel I'd mess around with the sliders for a week or two on a new phone and then it learned what I liked. Now it has a few set values, one of which is always too dim for me in darker conditions so I have to mess with the slider each and every time. I don't believe there's a way of fixing that.
Other than that I'm glad I switched, especially when I read about new "features" they add that I know I'd hate.
Commercially, this makes sense.
I am surprised that most nations of the whole world are fine with every citizen relying on one of two american companies for their lifestyle interactions though. I would have thought more nations would legislate their banks must support other options for sheer sovereign resilience.
Does it though? The people in this thread are like "just use a card". Well I've done that for years and had my card skimmed, lost, and stolen over the years. The cost wasn't trivial either. The credit card company knocked it off my balance but also lost on sales when I didn't have my card while they issued me a new one. It cost the credit card company actual money in both lost sales and in dealing with the fraudulent transactions.
Now if I was allowed to use my rooted Android phone during those years? It would have been locked down tighter than the vast majority of Windows boxes.
People forget that one of the value-adds of credit cards in the first place is that suddenly you didn't have to walk around with a big wad of cash. Credit cards gave you that extra level of security. Even if someone stole it, it's useless to them as soon as you make a phone call to the CC company. We can verify a transaction with a yubikey-like secret store on your device that never shares the private key with the operating system and which generates a virtual credit card on the fly. That's literally how Apple Pay and Google Pay already work. So whether a device is rooted or whatever literally doesn't matter.
If you wouldn't mind reviewing https://news.ycombinator.com/newsguidelines.html and taking the intended spirit of the site more to heart, we'd be grateful.
> Attention required!
> Sorry, you have been blocked
> The action you just performed triggered the security solution. There are several actions that could trigger this block including submitting a certain word or phrase, a SQL command or malformed data.
Thanks cloudflare *handshake* garmin. I suppose I'll stay with chip and pin for now
I don't really see the appeal of contactless payment, pulling a card out really doesn't take much time.
Asking as an A11 user who will probably soon need to switch to a new device. I haven't noticed anything on other people's phones that isn't available on mine, including on my work phone that runs an up-to-date GrapheneOS (but I don't need to do much more than calling and 2FA, so I might just not be seeing it). Anything you guys are excited for, or any protips of things to check out that were released recently?
This should have the full list; it's not a ton of changes, which speaks to how perfected Android has become.
https://android-developers.googleblog.com/2026/06/Android-17...
Edit: not discontinued but 'merge with Android' https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ChromeOS
I've used mine daily since it came out, and it's a great experience. I'd recommend picking it up for anyone who wants GOS on a larger screen. An iPad it isn't, but my iPad Pros have sat almost totally dormant since I got it years ago.
It lacks horsepower compared to the latest Pixel Pros, but that hasn't been a practical concern in anything I've done with it so far.
No love for 9 or 9a? I guess it's still coming eventually.
- A 9a owner running GrapheneOS
>Those are just the devices we initially tested it on which mainly has to do with which devices were available to the people working on the port.
>To clarify the 2nd paragraph, we've ported GrapheneOS to Android 17 for all of the supported devices. That's a list of the devices we already built and tested it. Our initial public release will be available for all the supported devices and we'll have tested it on each by then.
As an iPhone user, I really like what Oppo is doing with their ColorOS: https://www.oppo.com/nz/coloros16/
https://source.android.com/
They've ported the patches to work on top of the latest release.
The biggest hurdles for me were - should I use separate profiles and how to get apps. Initially, I started with a separate profile for google stuff (like play store/services and apps downloaded from there, like Viber), but eventually I moved everything to the owner profile (and took a bit of a privacy and battery hit in the matter of convenience). Still, being able to control many app permissions, gives me a good state of mind that apps are not doing more then I expect.
Just looked at what android 17 brings to the table and I'm mildly excited - especially improving performance and adding more permissions (like ACCESS_LOCAL_NETWORK)
Many apps that work on microG don't work in GrapheneOS without installing Google services anyway. I'm by no means across the full privacy implications, but my feeling is microG balances privacy and usability better for me.
I've since switched back to LineageOS+microG and am happy with it. Just my experience.
not sure about downloads specifically, but app installs are slow because grapheneos forces AOT compilation (JIT is disabled), presumably for security reasons.
lineageos has built-in firewall for years now. no need for afwall.
Buying a used Pixel is economical, environmental, and likely doesn't support Google. Pixels are the only secure and open android devices that could work for the project and meet the extensive requirements[2]. This is because GrapheneOS takes real steps to protect user privacy and security, not features that degrade security and don't increase privacy. You are going to be doing much more against Google by using GrapheneOS because it comes with 0 google services by default and takes advanced steps to protect you from all apps and services you install.
If you are still not willing or able to purchase a Pixel, GrapheneOS has a partnership with Motorola to help them create compatible devices which will be available soon[3].
[1] Privacy and security on computing devices need to become far stronger to protect people from pervasive violations of their rights. https://xcancel.com/GrapheneOS/status/2044440381803069778#m
[2] https://grapheneos.org/faq#future-devices
[3] https://xcancel.com/GrapheneOS/status/2028448871374803007#m
That said, Google's hardware is behind their competitors and they've had a lot of problems in the past few years. The Pixel 8 Pro has hardware WiFi problems, the 9 and 10 are both minor updates with prices that are far too high, the 10 is eSIM only, etc.
The prime difference between P8 pro and P9 pro is that the newer one is nearly a usable size (just about fits in a pocket now). The battery also got substantially better in two ways: on mobile data (when you're on someone's WiFi, odds are you're also near a charger) you get 33% longer use time on all variants of the P9 and 55% on the P10 and P10p (9 to 12 and 14 hours, respectively), and hours of use per 30 minutes of charging went up from 4.6 for the P8 to 6.3 for the P9(p) and 6.2 or 7 for the P10 and P10p, respectively
The rest is indeed relatively minor but it's not an unwelcome upgrade. Prices didn't change much when buying second-hand 1.5 years after release, when the newest devices are out and nobody cares about the generation-before-last despite >5 years of updates remaining (plus however long you think it's fine without updates)
> If you are still not willing to purchase a Pixel for whatever reason, GrapheneOS has a partnership with Motorola to help them create compatible devices which will be available soon[2].
Ok? Wake me up when that happens.
Okay, see, that's an important thing to add to your original post. Saves everyone a lot of time.
If they don't sell them in your country, it's not "no thank you" as you said, it's "this doesn't apply to me".
Graphene adds many privacy features on top of regular AOSP. But it only works on phones that has good security features that are not woefully outdated or completely closed-off. Google has complete control over Pixel supply chain and they can make their phones with all bells and whistles for their ends and they behave a bit benevolently and expose the interfaces to the user too.
Most Android phones use Qualcomm which doesn't give a flying fuck about giving control or privacy to the users.
I still don't want a pixel, so I went with a used ebay phone and installed lineageos.