Hi everyone,
I made this account after four years of going through the subpar experience of using a Fairphone 4. In the end I feel stupid. Stupid for buying into this idea, stupid for trying to convince others it’s a great product and company, stupid for having hopes, that it would get better.
I bought my phone four years and two days ago. In the beginning I was way to excited for my new, repairable, fairer and “European” phone. I actively went around and showed people this marvel of technology, that seemed to combine new technology, with the premise of keeping it for years to come. At that time Google, Samsung and co didn’t promise years of support yet and the FP could at least keep up with the low/mid end devices of the big players.
I think it really just started after upgrading to Android 13, before that I might have just overlooked some bugs and annoyances, that I felt fatigue in using my phone and supporting all of this. With the switch to A13 I was already using my FP4 for well over a year. Bugs are bound to come, but usually they are resolved. Not with Fairphone.
Horrible battery life. I am on my second battery. Sounds good but, that one is down to 75% yet again. I am not using my phone heavily, the most I do is watch YouTube on it in the evening, but by then my battery usually is already down to 15% or less. On some days I need to charge my phone a second time, so I can actually make it through the day. Fairephone recommends I should replace my second battery in autumn of 2027… i wish.
Volume controls s*ck. Whether you want to listen to music or make a phone call, the volume can’t be set correctly. With music on the lower volumes you have massive jumps and on the phone the entire room can listen to your call when you are on the lowest volume setting.
Phone calls take ages to appear. Though this seems to have stopped for me somewhere close to the release of A15, but I couldn’t find anything about a fix. Maybe I’m just going crazy.
Bad touch feedback with their own screen protectors. Is that just a me problem though?
Just to name the ones that come to mind right away and are actually annoying in day-to-day usage. Either way, continuing with things I started to “dislike” with the Fairphone and the company behind it.
Updates are slow. Beating a dead horse here, but every two months (if we are lucky) for security updates? They are named that for a reason. After breaking everything with the A15 upgrade we haven’t seen a single quick fix. Which gets me to my next point.
Upgrades are even slower and break your phone. Upgrading from A12 to A13 was already a bad experience and made me wait the A15 upgrade out… no surprise there, when basic functionalities are now broken and long known bugs/annoyances are still there. My guess: they are gonna stay broken till the end of the FP4.
No communication. Why is not a single FP-representative talking to the community? Whether trough the forum, email, blog or in their app. Pure silence for what feels like eternity. Even when they released the A15 upgrade they made fancy posts everywhere (since they actually can say they achieved a big milestone) and when everyone freaks out there is like one post saying “we’re on it” and then dead silence again. No quick update on anything. And I’d be surprised if they actually fixed anything for the next planned security update. And if they did, why not post about it or even push the update sooner.
These are all things that others have already pointed out in various posts, and it always comes down to one thing: they are never addressed by the company. Nobody seems to give a single … about us, the users. Is that some kind of kink play, that I am just not into? I am just tired and here is where I might end my journey:
I am still on A13 and with the horrible release of A15 I don’t want to upgrade at the current state it’s in. Not happening. Since the upgrade means they probably stopped supporting A13 altogether (still patch version of September), I will need to make the decision: “up”grade to A15 or get a new phone that still receives security patches.
My current thought is, that I will wait for the next regular Fairphone update, see what has been fixed and follow the forums to see if those things have actually been fixed. If their are no substantial fixes, I will start to look for a new phone.
What is your thought on all of this? Am I just way to negative and I am seeing things in the wrong light? Is the A15 upgrade not as bad as people have made it sound? What did I get wrong about my unqualified statements? I’d love to hear from other users, what their thoughts are and I still want to hold on to this idea of keeping my phone for at least five years… but at what cost.
Same curriculum here: Initially fell for the breathless hype, thought that even after subtracting the obligatory 10% marketing exaggeration, this would still be a great idea. Especially the repairability and the long support.
Little did I know the marketing exaggeration was actually 50%, and while the phone itself was OK (not great, just OK), the software was subpar, and Fairphone dutifully degraded it further over the years (with one notable exception, the camera upgrade, but which should had come on release, not years after). The story of the FP4 is a long list of adding new bugs (some users experienced, some not), and a number of which were never fixed (bugs, not users). Which means that every FP4 user has their personal list of bugs. I don’t have the ones you mentioned, I do have others: Telephone calls I can’t hear the other person, screen stubbornly going pitch black dark (I wear glasses, I need a minimal amount of brightness), and some others.
Sadly after my experience with the FP4 (just over three years) I have changed to a Google Pixel 9a as my main phone.
The FP4’s nail in the coffin was the botched A15 release. It was a sad day to come to that decision but after putting up with it’s various idiosyncrasies for three years and purchasing a replacement battery my FP4 has been cast aside. I might have another look at it when/if fixes are rolled out. I’m not holding my breath though!
I can only echo this. The FP4 will be my last Fairphone. The question is just when this will happen.
Of course - i guess like all of us here - the sustainability aspect was important to me, but overall it is just too much marketing and not enough service.
The software is just bad. Security updates are way too slow, bugs are not resolved and there is no “fair” reaction of any of them from FP.
The hardware general is enough for me, however the battery life is thevworst of any phone i had. I would need to exchange the battery every 9 month to have a decent runtime. Which would go hard against the sustainability aspect.
What is worse however in my ecpirience is the customer support. They give a 5 year guarantee on the phone, which is 100% marketing. I had a display malfunctioning and after 3! Month they gave the answer that they do not exchange faulty spareparts and i would need to send in the whole phone. What use is a guarantee, if it means you do not have a working phone for half a year?
So in summary unfortunatly a good idea, however very poorly executed.
I’ve had mine for just over three years, and the only noticeable improvement due to any update since then has been the camera upgrade, which was very welcome (although the camera has a bit of a tendency to make the shutter sound but not take the photo.)
I feel that my phone has become less responsive and generally slower when using mobile data over time. I have deleted loads of files and quite a few apps from time to time, hoping to speed it up. It used to pick up 5G really well, but these days it needs to have almost full phone signal and to be stationary, and is still slow at loading. The back arrow has always had a tendency to take me back two or more steps instead of just one (except with “free” online news publications, which take me through several pages of adverts to go back one step, which I guess is down to their software tricks). Nowadays, the phone sometimes closes screens and apps randomly - it stops replay of audiobooks from time to time, which is infuriating when I’m driving - and fairly often it drops calls even when I’m stationary. Often when this happens, I call back and get silence, although the call shows as connected, or the same thing happens to the person calling me. The person at the end cannot hear what I’m saying if I try to use the speakerphone, which rules out sharing a call with someone else beside me.
Basically, I feel that I can’t really rely upon the phone. which is extremely disappointing, since it’s the first phone I purchased outright, based upon the ethical and sustainable ethos, and the reviews, and I had expected to be able to use it for a few years more.
I’m amazed at the lack of response from Fairphone to the myriad issues I see raised in the forum - it feels as if nobody from the company actually cares, once the consumer has made the purchase.
I’m giving it a bit more time, but researching other options as I don’t have much faith in its future reliability. Of course, friends and family members who have seen all the issues I’ve had with it, are resolutely set against ever getting one.
Well, I am everything else but a power user. A few calls and messages, its required for some banking, Telegram, route planning and navigation (my new car has a built in navigation now), thats it. My FP4 now is 2 and a half years old.
In the first year I had some issues with the GPS signal, bending contacts fixed that (took a while to find the reason).
I started off with A11, upgraded to A12 and A13 without problems. Now I am on A15 w/o any major issues. Updating went like a charm, and I like the dark background.
I’m gonna keep my FP4 until it dies, or becomes practically useless (no more security updates) after that, unless there’s a major change in approach (which I doubt) I will be going with another phone maker.
The software side is spot on. If you look at their financials they’ve been really squeezing along before the FP5 release (haven’t checked after) but it makes it clear that expenses had to be cut, and the software development team is likely much smaller than it’d need to be. Same thing with support and the slow response.
What’s cool about the FP4 is that it’s officially supported by Ubuntu Touch, so in the long run could be used as a good off-ramp system from the Android/iOS duopoly ecosystems.
Also on the topic of their store, I feel like they should always have parts and accessories in stock. It’s not the firt time when I have/want to buy something but unluckily out of stock.
Yep, feel the same even after mere 2 years of owning this brick.
I was really sold out on the idea of “reparability” and “sustainability”. First I was on E/OS, then i returned to original one just to use Google Pay. Thankfully, I don’t need it anymore and I’ll just have to wait for E/OS with new security patch (already released). I really hope it will fix the battery issue cuz it was pissing me off this whole year. The same way with calls, cellular network and etc.
Such a shame that this company basically ran the “startup” scheme and left customers of old phones with zero support and zero parts. Way to go “Fair”phone, too bad it was all fake and not that different from Apple or Google.
I would have just thrown it in the close and buy some Xiaomi or whatever. It would be cheaper and at least would work with less bugs, and parts would be actually available. But I’m too stubborn on idea of using something ‘till it breaks, so guess I’ll have to push it through another year or two.
some really hard feedback here — maybe a little too hard.
In the end, the hardware of the FP4 is okay. The software bugs are horrible, that’s true.
But! This forum overreacts a little bit. I remember the discussion about whether we would get an A15 release or not. Even then, when Fairphone’s commitment was clear, some people were still hating and trying to find arguments for why Fairphone was lying.
So yes: horrible software, yes, problems — but not the disaster that some people are trying to make of it.
Hey rolle, thanks for the positive reply. Really lightens my mood and makes me think that there might be a way to get rid of the bugs I’m experiencing. After all it seems like people don’t experience my exact bugs, but different combinations of mine and others.
If I do end up upgrading to A15, I am definitely gonna wipe my phone and do a fresh install of it. I did do one a couple of years ago, but maybe this could help.
For now I’ll look into what phone to buy if A15 is actually as buggy as users report it to be. Not a lot of good options out there to be fair tough.
Hope you have many more years of trouble free time with your FP4.
A suggestion only loosely related to this post. Anyone very unhappy with any old FairPhone product, instead of throwing it away or tucking it in a drawer, send it back to FairPhone. They’ll recycle it, no? And’ll have some measure of discontent…
I don’t know what happened in the forum, but I was not believing in the A15 release. There was nearly no communication other than “A14 doesn’t work, we’ll skip it and go straight to A15. Trust me bro!”. I couldn’t believe my eyes when A15 actually dropped and was expecting Fairphone to give up on upgrading the FP4. I was wondering how they would fulfill their promise of five years of security patches though, which would have been tough, since they’d needed to patch them on their own.
But in the end they did deliver, that is correct. They delivered in the old Fairphone way, not great… not even good, but here you go, we fulfilled the promise.
As you can read from my tone, I am still pessimistic about the bugs being fixed (such as the double reboot) and if they are being fixed at what time. I expect bugs of this magnitude to be fixed in the next planned update or even sooner with an emergency update. We’ll see what happens. I might just be wrong and they end up fixing bugs after all. I wish to wrong!
Just wanna say this, if I wasn’t clear before: I want to keep my FP4! Like 99% of the users of a FP, I bought it to last. It hurts to say, that I might buy a new phone after ONLY four years.
Hey vaa, that is a great idea. I might just do it with a different company though, since I don’t want a “Fairphone gift card”. After all I am not intending to buy anything from them again in the near future!
The idea still stands, that I will resell/recycle my phone after I switch to a new one!
I can understand you perfectly. I had the FP2/FP3 and now the FP4.
I always tried, despite all the faulty updates, positively forward to
But now, with the bad A15 update and no help in prospect, no statements in prospect
On the part of Fairphone, unanswered tickets that don’t even after seven weeks
I was slashed, I also have no desire for the company anymore.
It was a nice time, but in the next six months I will leave from Fairphone.
If sustainability causes so much trouble, that’s not my way.
Hi, without trying to excuse the actual phone problems/deficiencies that everyone on this thread has described, I’m noticing that some of the issues - particularly app related - are probably intrinsic faults of Android o/s; (maybe relating to very large app demands - could this be ram handling?). Eg, when error messages suddenly appear out of nowhere for background apps suddenly “not responding: wait/close?”, and this is happening on FP phone (mine is 2!), non-FP tablet (same A version), all within the same 5-month period, I can’t but help suspect that something odd is going on within the o/s !! Or my antivirus s/w is buggy!
In general, it’s probably smart to keep in mind that users who are 70-90% content are much less likely to come to the forum and post about it than people who are grouchy about something. It’s actually a leftover survival instinct; we didn’t stay alive out there in the wilderness by paying attention to the flowers and the butterflies, we stayed alive by noticing every snake and rotten fruit we possibly could.
As an average user on the FairPhone OS, my experience was pretty… average. I didn’t have significant complaints, and it wasn’t doing anything incredibly fancy either. I’ve said this before, but a significant part of what I was buying had to do with the supply chain values, and potentially the repairability; that’s still 100% worth it for me.
After about a year on FP5, and in the middle of some US political uncertainty last year, I decided that having so much Google woven into my phone didn’t sit well with me any longer. I had intended to stay with the FP OS for at least a couple years more, but changed my mind and switched to eOS. I’m now definitely into my second FairPhone year, and more satisfied with the current setup than any phone I’ve previously had.
All of that circles back to my original point; since things have been going well, I just don’t find myself here as much. One less voice giving regular positive feedback.
Hm. I’ve had mine since January 23 and never encountered any real issues, except for a slight period of ghost touching that disappeared after a screen replacement, and I’ve put my phone through a lot. Several custom ROMs and rollbacks, and now recently even a slight run on Postmarket and UT. I’ve rolled it back again and I’m now just waiting for the dec security patch so I can relock my bootloader without bricking.
I’m really satisfied. I’ve been on a Samsung Galaxy A17 for a week or three now while waiting for the dec 25 patch, and I’m getting impatient for getting back to my fp4. When I had to replace my broken screen that was super easy, and I assume the same will apply for my long overdue charging port repair. My battery still lasts for up to 2 days before I have to charge (yes, really), and I’m honestly kind of surprised that I have yet to change it…
I haven’t really noticed any software issues except for normal android jank (believe me, my new out of the box A17 is much more irritating) and the aforementioned ghost touches - though those might’ve been caused by hardware damage. I’ve actually come to enjoy this android experience due to being so much closer to stock and not filled with idiotic ads and bloatware (looking at you, samsung - I got a mcaffee ad in my notifications???). I would prefer less Google, but then again, they do kind of control android so you will have to do that job yourself on other devices as well…
I think @PSZ has great points! Most FP users I know IRL are satisfied, with one exception who is running into some bugs with phone calls. I think I’m gonna keep my phone for as long as possible, though I’m unsure if I’m gonna continue buying new FPs or just get other (android) phones second hand in the future. Now that even budget samsungs have software support until 31 (!) I don’t think I’d be too irritated with other manufacturers - though I sincerely hope the EU rule of all new phones needing a replaceable battery kicks in before that happens!
All in all- I’m really satisfied with my FP4, and I’ve given this phone hell. Yet, everything still works, and does what I need a phone to do and some more
edit: I can also add to PSZs point by saying the reason I opened forums today was to see if there was any indication of dec security patch release date since I’m getting impatient - I just happened to drop into this comment section
re: battery life – for the past year/year and a half my FP4’s battery life has been atrocious. running out of juice in the middle of the day used to be the norm for me, and the phone would heat up quite badly. however, the custom ROM I use (iodéOS) has recently added changes that the Fairphone’s official Android 15 update introduced to (I think) the kernel, and it’s been night and day for me. I easily make it through the day on one charge with the kind of use that just a few months ago would require me to top up at least once (often twice) during the day. I’m quite disappointed that it’s been going on for so long, and the replacement battery that I bought last year (since I thought maybe the original was degrading badly) has probably worn down significantly over those last 12 months, but I’d say there’s some light at the end of the tunnel.
