My Fairphone has to restart twice before it works properly

Help Fairphone 4
1

I’ve been having an issue ever since I got my Fairphone 4, and I’d like to know if I’m the only one?

Every time I restart my phone—or turn it off and then back on—the first boot seems to work. I can unlock the SIM card and the phone. But after that, I can’t open any apps (not even Google’s).

I have to restart it a second time to be able to use it. I’ve also noticed that the second restart takes longer than the first.

Am I the only one, or do other people have the same problem?

I hope my explanation is clear enough.

2

Have you tried clearing the launcher cache? (Settings/Apps/standard or system apps/start or launcher apps or whatever they are called in English/Name of your Launcher App → Then: Settings/Apps/your launcher/Storage)

3

I have the default launcher installed by Fairphone: Quickstep. But clearing the cache doesn’t do anything else.

4

Maybe try installing another launcher, lawnchair for example, and check if the problem persists. (You can uninstall it and switch back to Quickstep with all its settings intact afterwards.)

5

Oh no, I’m not going to mess around with the app launcher! My Fairphone is already very unstable since the update to Android 15. I don’t want it to turn into a brick.
Anyway, given the problems I’m having with it, I’m going to switch to a Google Pixel. Even if it means running my Fairphone on /e/OS.

6

/e/OS is generally a good idea (not so sure about Google Pixel).

Maybe you want to try starting the phone in safe mode once to check if the problem is caused by third party apps.

8

This is certainly unusual. It sounds as though your user account isn’t initially recognised.

  • Which option do you use to initially unlock the phone (I’m not talking about the SIM code)?
    Password / PIN / Pattern / Swipe / None?
  • Go to Settings > System > Users. Is the setting Allow user switch enabled?
    Are any other users defined apart from “You”?
  • Could you indicate the value of Settings > About phone > Build number ?

Yes. If the phone behaves “normally” in Safe mode (let it run for several hours if you can live without your apps), then it’s probable that a “factory reset” would sort you out. Make sure to back up all the data you want to keep before doing that, of course.

Changing launcher is nothing compared with changing the OS!