… you could also put an alternative Android-based OS on it… CalyxOS, eOS, Iode etc… they all have transitioned to Android 14 by now for the FP4 (as far as I understand) and have quite decent documentation about how to do it yourself or maybe there’s a local angel around who could assist you.
I’m using a FP4 with eOS and I am very satisfied with it.
That doesn’t relieve you from doing a proper back up either way so I understand that you might as well just opt for the eBay way…
I don’t think, that an office requiring Android 14 for some unknown reason will allow an unofficial Android clone instead.
That might be. The poster wasn’t very specific on that. But since the phone seems to be owned (only) by the poster and he was addressing the forum instead of internal IT, I assume it really only needs to fulfill the “Android 14” requirement (as it’s the case with my company).
But yeah another good point to be answered first.
worth mentioning that CalyxOS does automatic upgrades and also it locks back the bootloader after install for security. not sure how the others work in this aspect, but CalyxOS takes care of itself after installation
3 posts were split to a new topic: Custom ROM and banking Apps
I asked the FP support what happened to the plan to roll out A14 to the FP4 in Q1 2025. The stated regarding the Qualcomm issue:
This is taking a little longer than we anticipated. Hopefully, we should know more later this year.
No A15, I guess, and I really doubt that they will be able to provide A14 at all.
or no A14 and directly A15? Whos knows, too much room for speculation because of no communication…
Could you edit the quote for clarity please 
I assume everything starting with the emoji isn’t actually part of the reply, right?! 
Or does they mean Qualcomm here? If that’s the case then well, [expletive] (apparently I’m not allowed to post “bad words”…)
@Lars_Hennig thank you 
Later this year is still bad but doesn’t shock me at all.
The mailinglist thread where @lucaweiss asked a different LTS kernel team (can’t remember the name rn) if switching the FP4 to that kernel would be possible to buy them some time made it very clear that this is going to take a while.
So far we are only talking about more clarity later this year, actual updates, who knows…
…sure would be nice if we’d get more than radio silence in the meantime, because this situation su**s quite frankly 
Promised months ago and still nothing. Impossible to get any answer from Fairphone. My work apps will stop working on the phone the end of this month. What about ethics and durability? and durability?
Although I can understand your frustration, the update was never really promised for a fixed date and Android 13 is still up to date security wise, so Fairphone is not responsible for your employer just watching on numbers of the major version of Android.
Even with Android 13 the FP4 is still safe to use.
I got an answer from FP support within few days, stating that the planning for A14 will not stand due to known issues with Qualcomm not supporting FP. This is frustrating and the FP4 hardware seems to be too old to have long term support, which is/was generally getting more important only in the past months.
FP is not the only player in this game and not responsible for this issue (only for the using a Qualcomm SOC). That is Qualcomm in the first place. FP can only hope for them to react in a sustainable way.
Great, I have a warranty on my FP 4 until July 2027 
What about them? When have they ever cared about the ethics of anything but the factory workers and the environment?
Fairphone has shown time and time again that they don’t really care about the consumers, and can’t be trusted to deliver anything on time for this phone, ever. Android 12 was delayed, Android 13 was delayed (compared to the competitors anyway) and to a lesser extent every single security update has been delayed. It should come as no surprise that A14 and even A15 are going to be heavily delayed. The customer support responses are delayed too for that matter. The deafening communication of this company isn’t very ethical to me, nor is the complete lack of interest in fixing the issues this phone has had since release.
As for durability, the phone technically works even with the major issues like the A13 battery drain, the ghost touch and microphone issues. I’m affected by all but the ghost touch, instead the ghost touch fix is messing with me in ways I could never have imagined.
My Fairphone is currently in permanent airplane mode to fix the battery drain, and is largely used as an alarm clock. Since the A14/A15 update clearly isn’t coming in 3 weeks as we’d have hoped, I’d suggest you to do the same and replace the device. Maybe sell it to someone with better tech luck.
I looked into Android common kernels EOL listings and with a quick search found following:
End-of-life (EOL) for Android-4.19 kernels was January 1st 2025.
So this could be the major problem for FP4 to get A14, because the used kernel in our device is not supported for an upgrade any more.
In the wayback machine I found a copy of Android common kernels | Android Open Source Project which was saved in November 2024: Android common kernels | Android Open Source Project
From what I would assume, the main problem could be timing of development. If development have started earlier, all qualification tests for A14 could have been passed before end of 2024.
That is just a guess and hopefully Fairphone will prove this as a wrong guess. I also had a FP3 with similar informations from Fariphone about A14 which was cancelled last year due to kernel issues.
Maybe FP4 owners are lucky to get A14 nonetheless like FP2 got A10.
Okay, that’s pretty sad to see. Especially because some have foresaw this coming. When the phone released I saw some comments discussing the chip’s age and how qualcomm tends to treat their old products.
You could blame fairphone for picking this soc back then. But qualcomm can also go *.
And yet, at the end of the day, this is all speculation, because Fairphone won’t say a thing. I don’t even own a FP4 but I can feel the second hand rage about being left in the dark.
Fairphone for the love of god say something.
The good thing is that if they eventually succeed with A15, we’ll have a 5.x kernel, hopefully 5.4 or 5.14, which would add support for some great hardware (like some USB Ethernet dongles or docking stations).
the phone is durable, however its insane that apps are unwilling to support even the directly previous android version. Android gives plenty of tools for devs to make it easy.
unfortunately google no longer publishes the distribution of android versions, but according to other sources (like this) an app that only supports android 14 does not support 87% of devices.
I know this does not make a difference for you. but other than fairphone not communicating with is, the blame is not really on them.
if you can allow yourself to do basically a factory reset, you could try out Calyx OS. it is android 14. they have automated installers. people say banking apps run on it, if you do not disallow it to install microg, and if you enable the safetynet function in the microg settings (with a simple tick box).
if it runs fine, you can keep it. if it doesnt, you will be able to go back.
android 14 support is defintely possible to be achieved for the fairphone 4, as calyx has shown it, which i have installed on it october last year. it has a 4.19 kernel.
The issue probably isn’t porting it.
The issue is that Google has to approve the build.
Oh, I thought the issue was with qualcomm.