The last time I switched from one os to another it was from android to iphone (I currently have an iPhone XR since 2020). One of my main concerns with android is it’s privacy unfriendly ecosystem. I’m not in the delusion that Apple is perfect, but imo at least a step up from Android/Google.
I’ve always rather admired the FairPhone, because of it’s ideology and reusability, but it came shipped with Android, which is definitely a no-go for me as far it goes for my cellphone. My iPhone is nearing the end so I was doing some researching and came across the happy realization that the FP5 comes shipped with e/OS (Murena). I’m very glad with this, we certainly need more OS’es with the potential to become more mainstream, since my feeling is you’re vendor locked in either iOS or Android.
Ideally if I had an Android phone lying around I would try and flash it with Murena to see what works and what doesn’t. Instead I would like to ask the community about your experiences with the FP5 and e/OS, and if any of you have ever made the switch coming from iOS. I’m not expecting it to be the same, but would be very glad to hear about your experiences with the FP5, specifically with Murena.
I switched less than a year ago to an FP4 from an iPhone 12. It’s a lot of manual work to transfer things over that don’t transfer between iOS and Android easily (e.g. two-factor authentication), but I’m very happy to have made the switch. e/OS has been great for me, but be sure to find out how to backup your stuff like photos and messages. Also, e/OS doesn’t have RCS, so be aware of getting used to downgrading from iMessage to SMS.
e/OS has a page on transfering from iOS. It won’t work for everything and is kinda out of date, but it got the big things out of the way for me.
only a community edition is available on Android 14. This means if you brought a Murena phone you will have to unlock your bootloader, manually flash, put up with yellow bootloader warning.
/e/ Fairphone 5 official is Android 13.
In the interest of fairness, I do not know how Iode Fairphone 5 arrives (locked/unlocked, yellow warning or not)
Sorry, I read their gitlab repo releases and saw that 2.8 is released based on lineageos21 so it should be android 14. I stand corrected that it is for community builds only for now.
“We are proud to deliver the /e/OS 2.8 version for supported devices whether they are on an official or a community build.”
Thank you for your detailed answer! Indeed, Android itself is a great project and I often use it in one sentence with Google, which is not 100% the same. I stand corrected. I used to root my android phones and put on a custom ROM. However that leads most of the time to a drop in warrant.
I’ve taken my time to study the E/OS documentation, thank you very much for the link, and it’s a nice idea that they took out all the Google and put it on a more mainstream phone (which besides is also satisfying my ethical needs).
Thank you for taking the time to respond. I think Iodé looks very promising. I’m having an old Android tablet lying around and am going to flash with Iodé so I can get an idea of the look and feel. Iodé even made an installer for Linux so it immediately felt good for me and saves me some time!
Thank you so much for sharing your experience! That’s great to hear. I’m not worried about downgrading from native iOS apps. I’ve got plenty of alternatives in places after I made my last switch from Android . It will take some time yes to make the switch, and also to convince my wife to start using alternatives to share photos (she has autism so any major switch in daily tools will require a lot of energy on her part and a lot of leading in from my part).
Thanks everyone for taking your time. I will probably make the switch, now I’m just curious about if it’s not a better option to buy a ‘normal’ FP5 and flash it rather than buying it directly with eOS or Iodé on it. Any thoughts?
I brought a Murena one because I wanted a 100% OEM experience, but with a de googled ROM. So fully locked, no funny messages and reliable OTAs.
… and it kind of did deliver that, but they seem to be struggling with the FP5, or to keep up in general at the moment. I really hope they can improve and do well still.
I am not sure if the Iode FP5 will give that kind of stock experience or not. MIght be worth asking on their forums. I ended up flashing my Murena FP5 with Iode because I wanted Android 14+ and working 90Hz screen and I now have a yellow warning, but the bootloaders locked and the OTA experience is good.
If you don’t care so much about OEM feel and support then its probably cheaper to just get from Fairphone
edit: Murena offer cloud services too, not sure if buying a device from them gives a discount/etc for that. Another thing to check or consider.
I bought a FP5 from Orange, (in France), on a black Friday deal and they even bought back my dead screen Samsung S9 for 105€ so it ended up being quite a good deal.
However… installing e/os is stressful. There’s an anti rollback feature to contend with which risks bricking your phone and even tho I’ve done this multiple times on Samsung devices, this was harder.
Once installed it’s very smooth. I don’t miss any of the Gapps stuff and am constantly asked to install for other people.
However, as an earlier poster said, e/os seem to be having trouble with the OTA upgrade to Android 14, (e/os U), and get very defensive if you ask about it. I wonder whether the internal culture of the project can ever address mainstream expectations as well as their existing tech-savvy users.
In short, if you’re happy with a community project and prepared to get your hands dirty from time to time, go for it. If you want the customer service and support which you might get with a mainstream phone, maybe look elsewhere.
Can you link what exactly you are referring to, as I see the FP4 already gets official 2.8 -u (A14) so why should the FP5 not, what are the obstacles? That an OTA upgrade is possible is an improvement already that wasnt at all possible in the past, and this is irrespective of the custom ROM used.
This leads to the interested clientele splitting up into a rather relaxed faction and into a seemingly rather nervous faction, why ever the latter may be (the rather relaxed faction of course would never understand) .
. It will take some time yes to make the switch, and also to convince my wife to start using alternatives to share photos (she has autism so any major switch in daily tools will require a lot of energy on her part and a lot of leading in from my part).
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