4d ago

The state of Linux phones in 2025

Linux phones are still behind android and iPhone, but the gap shrank a surprising amount while I wasn’t looking. These are damn near usable day to day phones now! But there are still a few things that need done and I was wondering what everyone’s thoughts on these were:

1 - tap to pay. I don’t see how this can practically be done. Like, at all.

2 - android auto/apple CarPlay emulation. A Linux phones could theoretically emulate one of these protocols and display a separate session on the head unit of a car. But I dont see any kind of project out there that already does this in an open-source kind of way. The closest I can find are some shady dongles on amazon that give wireless CarPlay to head units that normally require USB cables. It can be done, but I don't see it being done in our community.

3 - voice assistants. wether done on device or phoning into our home servers and having requests processed there, this should be doable and integrated with convenient shortcuts. Home assistant has some things like this, and there’s good-old Mycroft blowing around out there still. Siri is used every day by plenty of people and she sucks. If that’s the benchmark I think our community can easily meet that.

I started looking at Linux phones again because I loathe what apple is doing to this UI now and android has some interesting foldables but now that google is forcing Gemini into everything and you can’t turn it off, killing third party ROMS, and getting somehow even MORE invasive, that whole ecosystem seems like it’s about to march right off a cliff so its not an option anymore for me.

255 comments

Missing those things would be a feature for me.
I'm much more worried about having a usable battery life and having basic phone functions like WiFi calling and MMS work.
- I see vo-LTE generally doesn’t work at all either.
  
  I agree that missing these things are features IMO.
  Typing this reply from SailfishOS with working VoLTE, MMS and all the things. Occasionally I have to restart a service but overall its pretty good
- Tap-to-pay and car assistance are must-have in today's world. 10-15 years ago, no. Today, yes. Bank apps is the other thing that can't be done either (because bank apps want a "certified" system to run on). Here in Greece, it's required you have a bank app on your phone to go with your daily life.
  Yes, we all want a simpler life, like it was in the past, so we can envision an OS system that "it's good enough". But reality is not on our side. Linux as an open source community phone OS, made by non-commercial/non-corporate entities, can't be an OS for the masses. It just won't tick any boxes for them in today's world. The current Linux phone OSes could be contenders 15 years ago, but not today.
  
  I've never used tap to pay. I don't want any banking info on my phone. In the US, we don't need any payment apps. Cash and cards work just fine and never run out of battery power.
  There's no way I would ever connect my phone to a modern car with anything other than an aux cable or a bluetooth adapter that plugs into the headphone jack. They gather up all the data they can an do who knows what with it.
  
  Are they must haves? I don't use tap to pay, pretty useless feature for me.
  Cars? I don't want or need android auto. Bluetooth is the only thing I care about.
  Navigation on the device is good enough for me, it doesnt need to use the screen.
  I have no interest in mobile banking, but that could be an issue if people are used to sending money to each other instantly via a bank app.
  
  "must-have" is subjective.
  Yes these things are required to achieve wide spread adoption but I personally could do without them.

I think problem number 1 might be solvable if GNU Taler succeeds in europe as the digital euro backend. https://taler.net/
Of course this would only apply to people in the EU, but who knows, others might follow.
- Never heard of it. I'm not from Switzerland, but what is this exatly and how can I support it?
  
  Switzerland has GNU Taler. They launched it there a few months ago, lucky for you. Check its website: https://taler-ops.ch/de/
  You just kind of need to wait for merchants to use it. Could become mainstream somewhere around 2028.
  From wikipedia:
  GNU Taler is a free software-based microtransaction and electronic payment system. Unlike most other decentralized payment systems, GNU Taler does not use a blockchain. A blind signature is used to protect the privacy of users as it prevents the exchange from knowing which coin it signed for which customer.
  The wallet is like cryptocurrency wallets in that when you lose it (lose your cryptographic keys or phone), you lose all the money inside of it. So you must keep it safe like your own physical wallet. It works with NFC, so it can replace Google Pay or Apple Pay or whatever.
  It also works offline, which is awesome. Though you do need to be online sometimes to refresh your digital money or they expire and become unspendable. The expiry is set by the GNU Taler operator.
  Do keep in mind that receivers are NOT anonymous. Only senders are anonymous. This is by design and is there to apply tax to merchants and also combat fraud, etc.
  You can learn how it works by reading their docs: https://docs.taler.net/
  The FAQ is also a good thing to read: https://www.taler.net/en/faq.html
- Is this similar to Wero as a back end or different parts of the process?

Don't want or need any of those things you mention. I want a phone, I want to be able to send messages, I want GPS and a camera. Good battery life, wifi and enough memory and storage... And then privacy...
- Same. Has that been solved yet?
  
  Vollaphone with Ubuntu touch can do that.
  https://devices.ubuntu-touch.io/device/algiz/

It's an interesting discussion to witness in these posts: convenience vs privacy and control.
The convenience and integration you get with commercial products like IOS or Android comes at a price. Everything that matters to you on a daily basis bundled together in one convenient package means that all things which define you as a person are conveniently interconnected for corporations to sell out your data for everyone who wants it.
GPS: your current whereabouts at any moment in time and a complete history of where you have been in the past
Payment functions: what you are buying and where you have bought it
Communication (Messengers, Phone): Who you communicate with and what you are talking about
Photos and Videos: Real life evidence from all the stuff mentioned above.
Web Browsing: Interests and Needs which will be used against you in a totalitarian surveillance state, at a glance
If you in 2025 still think this convenience is there to please you as a consumer I have bad news for you.
Convenience and interconnection of services look nice and useful but at the same time they're a privacy nightmare that makes Orwell's 1984 look like a bedtime story for children.
What this all comes down to: Strictly airgapping the boundaries between the different services is the only way to have a modicum of privacy. Photos do not belong in a cloud controlled by someone you don't know and should be taken from a separate device. Navigation belongs on a separate device with no internet connection, payment should not be done with a personal identifier at all (if avoidable) etc. Living your life this way might seem terribly inconvenient, but as someone who was alive at a time where all this convenience didn't exist I can tell you it has its advantages too. You'll rediscover what really matters.
- That's a bit extreme. Some of those are not linked.
  Yes you can not have cloud pictures without having to trust the server. But you can have an open source, inspected system that uses gps without any related data being shared. Gps doesn't send data, it's the system choice to create a way to send it to someone. You can have a Linux phone that doesn't chose to do that.
  You can have convenience with privacy, but the companies offering those services don't want that, nor do the consumers care.
  And those consumers would not care about a Linux phone.
- i, too, was alive at a time when all this convenience didn't exist but a large part of the world has moved on with forcing privacy nightmares.
  some of these "conveniences" are requirements for people. i keep a lot of my personal digital activities isolated (offline gps, minimal invasive app usage on my phone, custom ROM, blah blah) but when i have to travel for work, i am required by the company to use ride sharing (relies on gps), commercial messengers, and other invasive commercial apps (that rely on phone based payment systems). typically i pick up a stock android phone and a pay as you go plan for this to use as a "burner", using false information where possible.
  sure i guess i could quit my job and go hang potatoes in somebody's garage for $0.13 USD per year but i've made my bargain with the devil.
  the lines between privacy and convenience are fuzzy and ever moving. it's best to approach this with a bit of threat modeling first. figure out what you're actually worried about and what you can tolerate, then decide how much convenience you're willing to suffer.
- I think some of this data is stuff im fine to share with some caveats. I think we can have a world of convenience and a world where people have a decent level of privacy. Of course there will always be tradeoffs but we can find a sane middle ground because at the moment its 0 privacy.
  GPS data can be shared while im using a map to navigate and They must not "know who I am". I am ok to be a datapoint but I dont like when they build a personal profile with this information.
  Payments are fine if its my bank and they never sell that info.
  Communication must be encrypted and I do not want them knowing who I am talking to.
  Photo and video thats private should be encrypted but anything posted public is public. I would use cloud storage but it needs to be encrypted.
  Web browsing I dont mind if the site tracks what I do on the site but it must only be stuff I do on site and not build a profile using my off site data.

I switched to GrapheneOS like 4 years ago and at first I was bummed that I could no longer tap my phone to pay. But it's fine. I still go out with my wallet in my pocket, so it's no problem to just tap my bank card really... I'll take privacy over convenience thanks
- I havent taken my wallet with me in years. I prefer tap to pay as it is more secure than a physical card which can get lost or stolen.
  
  Hahahahahaha. No.

1 - tap to pay
I still don't see why phone-based tap-to-pay is even a good thing. What, I should hand over all my financial credentials to Google or Apple or Microsoft in addition to my bank? I think not. I'll just keep using a physical card, thank you. (Which, by the way, can often still use tap-to-pay as most modern cards have RFID chips embedded. No different than with your phone, except it's not tied to one of the big oligarchs, even less so if you use a credit union as opposed to a bank.)
2 - android auto/apple CarPlay emulation
Bog-standard bluetooth is more than enough for me.
3 - voice assistants
Why would I need a voice assistant? I can find out information almost as easily just using a search engine. And if I'm driving, I'm not so busy as to be unable to pull over to the side of the road if I absolutely need to check something. Or, you know, get everything ready before I go. At the further risk of yelling at clouds despite my relatively young age (I'm in my early 30s), I think voice assistants and IoT things are largely just fluff that over-complicate things in a world that is already over-complicated.
- 1 - you arent. You dont need to. They have it other ways. Tap to pay is done on device with a revokable token. If the device is stolen, the token can’t be easily accessed and can be remotely wiped at any time, unlike a stolen card which you have to call in to disable and even that doesn’t always go over well. 2 - Bluetooth doesn’t give me maps or a UI to access my music, podcasts, etc. 3 - feature parity wins people over. You aren’t going to bring people in to the ecosystem by selling on having less. You can sell on mandating less, but opening with “here are the things a Linux phones CANT do” will never get this off the ground.
  
  That's the problem. The things you think "people" need is what they already have and it can't be different. "I want to trust everything on a company online but I want my data to be private and safe." You have to choose. For those people who think they "need" what you say, they already have apple and Google.
  Just like Linux was never meant to replicate windows "features" like cortana and others, and it didn't, and it works for those who don't want those things which is why they want Linux.
  The requirements for Linux to have your "needs" would make me not want it, and then it would just be a poor version of apple without the trillions of dollars that come with it. It wouldn't please either side.
  The things open source people care will always be a minority. It's sad but it's the reality.
  
  Bluetooth works fine (or should work fine) with music, podcasts etc. I do it now with a phone, it's a standard I don't see why a mobile device running Linux would be any different.
  As for maps, the voice goes over Bluetooth so I don't see an issue there either.
- Not for nothing, tapping to pay with phone is not the same as using the physical card to tap to pay. In the former case, your actual card info is not transmitted.
  
  The former you said? So phones tap to pay are more private in principle?
  
  Tap to pay with the phone is also much smoother because it emits the NFC signal vs the card which is just inlayed in the card via the chip.
  Much smoother process.

I already don't have any of those things on my de-googled android. I'm used to it. Sure, they would be nice, but it's not a dealbreaker that I have to tap a card instead of my phone, or use Bluetooth instead of carplay, or type on my phone instead of talking to it.
- The only thing I was missing without Google was push notifications. And that works out of the box on my /e/ OS FP5. It provides the same API as GSF, but with a different, anonymous push service. I doubt that there will ever be a workaround for Google Pay, because you need the intersection of a well-known company and low level device integration for that to work. And as you say, it's not a big deal. The Graphene OS guys were pretty smug for a long while about how superior their sandboxed-GSF approach is, but look how that worked out for them. MicroG was always the right idea and if it can't be done with MicroG it isn't worth doing (on Android).

Actually I don't need any of those things you mention. It may be a mistake to assume that Linux phones should imitate Google/Apple phones.
- Obviously this is subjective, but I use android auto all the time and something similar for a linux phone would be really nice for me. Don't dismiss them just cause you wouldn't use them
- My thoughts exactly reading this list. I don't use any of those as-is and have zero interest. I do agree Linux phones seem a bit behind at the moment, but as soon as they're on par with say GrapheneOS, then we're golden.
- Same. Never use these things on Android.
- Dunno. GPS and map apps seems pretty important for something more mobile than a laptop.
  
  Doesn't GPS work on Linux phones? As for map apps, OpenStreetMaps based apps are free and more acurate than google (atleast in my region), the only thing that might be lacking is realtime traffic information.
  
  That's about the connection to Car Play, not GPS
- It's not that I want an imitation, but I do want certain functionalities to be available

Whatever you personally think about these features, you'll never convince the general public to do without them. We need widespread linux phone adoption as table stakes to affect our mobile world.
- Awwww man, why would you rebuke my argument before I even make it?
  Are the echos in the chamber that predictable?

Seeing where desktop Linux was just less than 10 years ago and where it is now gives me optimism for mobile Linux. But I suspect the overlap between developers and users of those 3 features is pretty small, so they might be a ways out.
I was about to suggest getting a head unit that isn't tied down to CarPlay or Android Auto, but then I realized I drive a really old car from the days you'd easily take out the faceplate or the whole unit to deter theft.
- Yea, modern vehicles tie a lot of things into the head unit and they just aren’t possible by going third party. But using the CarPlay/AA feature could be a way to bring similar choice to a system that is otherwise locked-in
- As a long-time Linux user I can't say I've noticed big changes in the last 10 years... Maybe I'm forgetting, but when I first used Linux on a desktop I had to compile drivers from source to have working graphics acceleration and WiFi. Things have come a long way since then, but by 2015 I feel like those big things were all sorted. There are still many small things but I think most of those are unchanged, too.

Everyone here just saying "oh I don't use that therefore no one needs it and should just lose it and switch to a Linux distro" is not helping anyone. This person told us their requirements to switch. How hard is that to understand for anyone. They also told us the requirements of most of the population. This concept should not be so hard to understand. Everyone has features they need in certain products. Some people don't care how headphones sound they just care that they make sound others are really picky audiophles. It's all preference
- Who said that? There is a lot of comments saying "I dont use those features maybe i should switch" but I dont see a single comment telling others to switch.

huh? which linux phone got useful since you'd stop looking? I run pmOS edge on competent hardware with lotsa RAM and fast storage and that thing isn't even close to being usable in everyday life.
just basic stuff, like turn it on and it works. the keyboard works. an intuitive UI that you use while walking and dodging other pedestrians. a rock-solid base that doesn't freeze and stutter with the menial-est of tasks.
the three things you mention couldn't be farther from my mind if I wanted to.
- Fairphone, FLX1, and jolla phones are supposed to be acceptable. They aren’t flagships but they are fine.
- My experience too with Linux on phones so far. Really, really want freedom of choice and to be free from Android. It isn't a real choice if I want a social life and a phone that isn't a brick.

Someone did do some work on reimplementing the Android Auto Client Server API.
Just needs time and interest.
https://github.com/tomasz-grobelny/AACS
- God i wish I was smart enough to contribute to these things
  
  It's not too late, I have faith in you
  
  Claude code can help

By tap to pay, you mean things like Apple pay and Google pay? We don't have that on degoogled androids, let alone on Linux phones...
- But they are still incredibly useful. I do and will put up with a fully-googled phone just for that convenience.
  
  do they come with a surcharge on every payment?

I'm personally really excited for Linux phones and want to move to one relatively soon. They've done amazing work on the experience of using them. What I'd really miss, based off of talking to folks and trying them at conventions, is:
battery life. My Pixel 3a lasts over a day on Android, likely much less on pmOS
UnifiedPush for notifications. I only see a Matrix client listed as WIP. Every other app (Fediverse, Signal) I would have to keep running in the background
Notifications while in sleep mode. Looks like we don't have "Doze Mode" from Android, so only calls & SMS work while asleep
Fingerprint sensor. More of a QoL but I kept my phone model specifically for the ergonomics of the sensor on the back, and being able to scroll with it. Communication with the sensor is not yet figured out

Are those actually the only things you find lacking? If so that's really good, practically the same as using LineageOS without any Google services.
I don't use any of the stuff you mentioned and might have to consider Linux mobile as a daily driver if it's that good. Especially if Google kills custom ROMs, it sounds like the people already running them would feel right at home switching to Linux mobile.
More importantly, how's the app situation? Can people generally expect most of the desktop GTK or Qt apps they're familiar with to be usable on a phone form factor? Is there a reliable way to run Android APKs on regular Linux now? At the very least F-droid apps?
- Yes most native applications are responsive and adapt to mobile.
  GTK has it built into it's widgets. But some third party apps on GTK/QT may not adapt.
  The capability is there though.
  
  As someone who spent some time on the topic (result), it's not that every new app is adaptive. Even if someone uses the nice new widgets of libadwaita (or previously libhandy (GTK3)), that app is not necessary running well on mobile if width-reqests demand a higher minimal width or content is just too wide.
  The same is true for QtQuick Components or Kirigami, which are the equivalent for adaptive Qt apps.
  That said, yes, many new apps developed with these technologies work fine OOTB without the developer even knowing; and if they are too wide or tall, fixing that is usually rather simple and not a full rewrite/redesign.
- To answer your question about Android apps, there is an application called Waydroid that can run on Linux phones. This essentially emulates Android and you can install apps on there. Some Play Store apps require access to Google Play Services, and even though MicroG tries to emulate it without being as privacy invasive, it is not perfect and some apps won't run well or even at all.
  I only use it for a few things that do not have any way to access through a web browser.
- Yes, you can even run android apps on Linux mobile using waydroid or something similar. So even if you need your stopgap android apps while waiting for Linux equivalents, waydroid has your back.
  As for me, I plan on using PWAs as much as possible.

tap to pay
I don't see why the Linux kernel couldn't add support for NFC devices or someone couldn't write a driver. I always pay for everything in cash anyway.
voice assistants
I know there are foss and local-only voice assistants for Android so it is possible. You'd be limited by the computing power of a phone so eg I imagine running ollama on a phone would be a huge battery drain.
- I don't think that's the issue with tap to pay. Linux already works with NFC, the issue is banks and payment apps.
- Which is why having it call out to something I control rather than a tech bros server is okay to me.

tap to pay, voice assistants, carplay...everything I hate about modern phones. Don't threaten me with a good time, Linux.
- You may not like tap to pay or CarPlay but I and a lot of others do.
  It’s a deal breaker for me to not have these two features in a product I’d like to spend hard earned money on.
- But those features are not OS implementation issues. They are simply hardware driver issues.

Would require banks and such to cooperate. Good luck with that, Microsoft and Google will just pay banks to keep us out
- #1 only happens if the EU gets it as a secondary part of whatever their plan is to de-americanize payment-processing

62 comments and not a-one mentioned Sailfish OS yet?
Yes, it's not 100% open source, yes, it used to do business with Russia but not anymore since 2022, yes, it only supports a few Sony phones (available cheaply on the used market) but it is a 100% Linux operating system!
It has been my daily driver for 5 years now.
Also, Finland bonus.
- They did release a new community phone too - C2. Nothing spectacular in terms of specs but still.
  
  Damn I keep forgetting that. I've been buying used phones for so long, it doesn't even enter my mind.
  The used phone market is so oversaturated, you can always get yesterdays favorite for a fraction of its new price.
- didn't it require an online account?
  
  You need to register to download it. After that, no. Unless you want continuous OTA upgrades.
- Yeah, pity is not available worldwide
  
  It surely is available - and usable - worldwide.

All I need is a smartphone that can run all my daily drives. Browsing, messaging, socials, banking, utilities and games. Especially with companies pushing that everything be done through an app instead of available through a browser. The problem is very few companies bother to develop Linux versions of their software.
- Oh I’m already having those arguments about installing apps. It’s one of the many reasons I’m leaving T-Mobile soon actually. If I have to call in I will but I don’t trust apps at this point and they are frankly unnecessary in almost every case.
- All I need is a phone that can connect to mobile networks and run a web browser with decent battery life and form factor. Maybe i could run a linux phone.

I don’t really see any of these as deal breakers, because I think the state of Linux phones in 2025 isn’t about being “finished” or “perfect,” it’s about being part of a bigger journey. Every limitation mentioned is just a reflection of where things stand right now, not anything permanent. What kinda excites me is that Linux phones are built around openness, community, and the freedom to adapt, qualities you don’t really get with mainstream options. Sure, there are missing features, rough edges, and some compromises, but none of that outweighs the value of having a device that puts you in control....
- While I appreciate that, I really want the freedom to use it that way I want to, not the way others are happy with. It’s open, which makes that theoretically possible, but I’m no Linux dev. I can’t create missing features. So I need to work with what people smarter than me came up with.
  
  I get what you mean. The openness invites possibility, but for a lot of us can feel limiting when we can’t build the missing things ourselves....

I don't use any of the "needs" you mention (phone payments, carplay, voice anything) and can't see any of them as necessary. I can see thinking of them as cool, but that is different. I don't particularly think they're cool, but that's just me.
That said, Linux is mostly a desktop system with a CLI and some GUI tools. Phones as we know them have considerably different requirements. Linux could be underneath it all, like it is in Android, but at the end there is a lot more besides LInux and its apps.
I did use Meego/Maemo for a while (Nokia N900 and N9) and they had nice aspects, but the phones were way too small and slow.

1 - tap to pay. I don’t see how this can practically be done. Like, at all.
Yeah, better go back to carrying pieces of plastic with you at all times. Bonus: you can leave your phone home and still pay for things.
- Better yet, cash
  
  You heathen!
  Actually I don't care.
  
  Yea but with cash you have to carry a fat wallet around and are limited to a finite amount of your money. I get that it has its advantages, but it has disadvantages too.
- That's fine if your bank provides tap-to-pay plastic, but not all do, so you end up more vulnerable to skimmers.
  Each contactless payment generates a transaction-specific, one-time code, that is extremely effective in reducing counterfeit fraud.
  https://usa.visa.com/pay-with-visa/contactless-payments/contactless-payments.html
- I dont use my phone to pay, I use my watch and have for years. Everywhere. And it works fine the few times I’ve left my phone behind.

Where I live, we do not have tap to pay, we just scan qr-codes. But I guess the vendor would need to enable that. But, if i have a physical card, that’s good enough for me.
- That's more secure.
  ...except when someone just puts a sticker of a malicious qr code over the merchant's qr code when they aren't looking ;)
  
  That’s unlikely to happen here. We have a universal qr-code system. And when you can into any banking app, it will display the vendors name.
  The payment processors, will distribute placards that have the qr-code and the vendors name, so it’s pretty easy to tell.
  Also, if it’s not a qr-code from a payment processor and it’s one, i could generate? Then the checkout screen is different.

Power consumption needs work also.
As for tap to pay, I've found I've used it a lot less after getting a mag safe wallet. It's a good stopgap imo

Yeah, Android Auto is definitely the thing I didn't think I needed and now can't live without.
I have no idea if there can be a foss alternative that would work with existing cars...
- What does Android Auto do?
  
  Your phone takes over your car screen as a second display, so you have decent and up-to-date navigation apps like gmaps or waze, with instant alerts etc, instead of those garbage GPS navigation devices.
- /e/OS works with Android Auto
  
  So does GrapheneOS apparently, as long as we're talking about Androids.
- Why? I don't drive and don't have a car but I can't imagine the car itself not already having the exact same features since modern cars already have what is essentially a tablet built in.
  Also, why not just have one of those phone holders on your dashboard like people have been doing before car integration was a thing?
  
  Cars have garbage software running on even more garbage hardware, Android Auto and Apple Carplay offload the processing to your phone which is orders of magnitude faster
  
  In car nav systems are nowhere near as up to date and useful as maps or Waze. And updating them is often as clunky as a new windows install. Some can only be updated by the dealer. It feels 20 years behind to use the systems offered by a lot of car companies.
  
  Many cars built in features are so terrible they border on useless. Some doesn’t even have things like GPS at all. My EV uses CarPlay for that and has no navigation built in at all, even though it has a GPS radio it uses for onstar services.
  
  Not even close by the time you get the car the maps are years out of date. And POI not even close to google or apple maps.
  
  but then you can't crash while swiping sub menus.

Help a non-techy out. I've fully switched my computers to Linux (fedora workstation, silver blue, and ubuntu). Been Linux only for several years now. Silverblue is probably my favorite. I'm willing to make the switch for my phone, too. But there are a few things I'm pretty reliant on:
My banking apps, cash app, and, embarrassing as it may be to admit, Grindr.
Any chance of getting those?
- You can run Android apps on a Linux phone via Waydroid, but banking apps could be an issue if they force these Google intrgrity checks. Grindr probably does not?
  Anyway, you should be able to fire up Waydroid on your Linux desktop and test this beforehand. I have never done this myself, so I might have misunderstood something.
  
  Grindr doesn't even work on GrapheneOS, it's security checks are insane. I tried the modded Grindr app and they instantly banned my account, so I decided the app isn't worth my time.
- Baking apps: pin the websites Grindr: use waydroid or switch to sniffies Cash App: oof, I don’t know if waydroid will be enough for this one.
  
  I've honestly never considered using my bank through a mobile browser. Yeah, it I can do that I'd be fine on that front.
  Sniffies is completely dead here, and the dudes that are on it are gross. Grindr isn't much better, but since everyone's on it you can occasionally find people who are willing to use protection or hosting someone other than some bushes. I'll try way droid and see if it works. If it doesn't, I googled it and it says you can use Grindr from desktop if you pay... I may end up having to do that if I made the switch.
  Which leaves cash app as the biggie. I'll try waydroid, but if it doesn't work I'll probably end up needing to keep android or switching to iOS (I hate iPhones:( ), or maybe even getting a second phone I use exclusively for cash app. No sim, just my wifi hotspot (can you do a wifi hotspot with a Linux phone yet?). In order to prevent overdrafts and accidental charges, I never spend directly from my bank account. I transfer exactly what I'll need for each purchase to cash app before the transaction and shop like that. Keeps me aware, and no accidental charges or surprises.
  
  Baking apps: pin the websites
  Typically if you want to check your account status sure, that work. Maybe do an IBAN transfer, if somehow 2nd step auth via their app isn't required, but typically mobile payment, even if it's not really mobile (e.g. scanning a QRcode on a desktop) requires their app. So in theory yes, in practice for most of the things people use banking daily it's closer to mobile payment IMHO, which is basically owned by iOS/Android AFAICT.

tap to pay. I don’t see how this can practically be done. Like, at all.
The same way it was done with Google, Samsung and Apple. Just has to become more popular until banks and credit card companies will have to work with developers to make it happen.
android auto/apple CarPlay emulation.
Again, it will have to require the compliance of OEMs. However I see the entirety of these systems disappearing soon as more OEMs want to lock users into paid subscriptions for such features.
voice assistants
I'm not convinced this will ever be useful. Several of the largest tech companies on the planet have tried and all have failed miserably to produce anything useful for decades at this point.
- For Linux it could be tied in with terminal commands using an LLM:
  "Install Firefox" -> apt install firefox
  "Open Firefox" - > firefox & disown
  aichat --execute already turns natural language into terminal commands through any OpenAI-compatible API (and OpenRouter provides free Deepseek R1/Kimi K2 access), so there just needs to be speech-to-text.

fwiw regarding point 3, I had Mycroft on my pinephone. Was toying with other distros at some point so I don't have it anymore, but it worked. Took a few seconds to process.

How old are you that you "need" these things.
Is not being able to use tap to pay, or having to plug in an aux cable really that big of an inconvenience?
- Phone projection for navigation has been significantly better than any built-in navigation on any car I’ve ever driven. The vehicle screens are typically larger than a phone screen so that’s a really nice feature to me.
  
  Yeah! CarPlay has been amazing to use for navigation. I wouldn’t consider a car that didn’t have something like this.
  With that being said, I could be against getting a Linux phone and just leaving an old Android or iPhone in the car for CarPlay use.
  
  Built-in car navigation is an useless addition. Just know your city, for car's sake!
- By that logic, I dont need a phone on me at all times and should just go back to a landline, pay cash for everything, and damn everything convenient.
  Some of us use these things and we want to switch to a system free from powerful tech bros. People like you tell us we are a problem for wanting features. That’s a ridiculous thing.
  I’m not going to screw with a cell phone while driving. Using the large screen I can quickly glance at, tap what I need or use a voice command on and get my eyes back on the road makes far more sense.
  
  Im not saying its a problem to want features, just saying its sacraficing freedom for convience, its a choice.
  If you really wanted to use a Linux phone, there are options. You would have to adapt, you would have to use non-standard solutions, but in the long run you'd have more freedom because of those sacrifices in convenience.
  None of the 3 things you mention was common place 10 years ago, its not that much of a setback to carry cash or a card, or to use a dedicated device for navigation. Its fine if you dont want to do that but dont act like you can't live without tap2pay or a voice assistant if you really wanted to.
- I'm 31 and would need those things. Makes driving a car how I want much easier. No awkward looking mounts anywhere. Plus I use a super tiny android phone at the moment so instead of looking at a postage stamp for a map I get to look at the big head unit.
  
  Okay I don't drive so im a bit out of the loop on this but last time i rented a car some 15-20 years ago it had GPS built in that didn't require connecting, it was a tablet sized interface on the console... is that not a thing anymore? Like do cars in 2025 not have functioning GPS without a phone connected to them? Thats wild if so. A 2008 Toyota Prius could have a built in console navigation system, it ran off a DVD or USB key that you got updates for by mail, and here we are in 2025 you need a phone just to power the cars computer for navigation.
- Tap to pay is essential to me. I never carry anything more than my phone, so no credit/debit card.
  
  So what happens if your phone is lost or stolen or damaged? How would you pay for a new phone?

Huh? Is that it for the major "issues"?
Don't get me wrong, everyone has different needs and wants, and so this might not work for everyone. I was hesitant at first to let go of mobile tap to pay, but I've been going strong for a year now and just take my wallet with me everywhere anyway. I have an older car so I literally can't even use Auto/Car Play, and I was never a voice assistant type of person ever.
My biggest needs are being able to use most of the apps I use, having easy communication with my family, and security and privacy (leaning more towards security). If I could find suitable alternatives to the apps I use, and texting isn't an issue (especially with iPhones, my family all uses them), then I'd gladly hop on over to Linux phones. I know someone is working on "WINE" for Android, and if that was doable and integrated well on Linux phones, I'd be set.
Gonna spend time researching now 🧐

When customs ROMs and most FOSS apps are killed next year on Android, we're all going to find out very quickly how much the trap has closed around us.
Same reason I loved to Linux on desktop, something that used to be cool and open and at least work mostly has enshittified beyond repair. I'm not going to let the bastards get me if I can help it.

What phones are adviceable these days for a daily driver? Is there any of them where ALL of the hardware does actually work? As in, most of the ones I've seen in the past had major bugs blocking from using either the mobile network, the camera, the sensors or just about everything that wasn't just the screen and touch input. I have a spare Pixel 7 and a Pinephone Pro (that I never got to work too reliably) I keep around for possible testing of stuff.
- Ive heard hood things about the FLX1 but I havent tried it myself.
  Im very tempted.
  
  Likewise, I think I'm just about to buy one for myself. I've never used tap-to-pay with my phone, nor a voice assistant, and I don't really want to. My phone is a web browser that can send text messages, make phone calls, and take pictures. My phone carrier is VoLTE-only for calls, and the FLX1 says that it has VoLTE now. I also need to use one specific Android app for work, but the FLX1 has some type of Android emulation which hopefully will make that usable.
  The FLX1 is also the only one that claims to have a working camera. I'm not sure how good the pictures look, but every other Linux phone always just says "partial support" for the camera on the PostmarketOS wiki. The FLX1, with the stock OS, should take adequate pictures from what I understand.
  
  I had to check the calendar to make sure it wasn't 1 April... seriously, it's called the ~~furry phone~~ furiphone?...
  
  Good reviews. Unfortunately the device is 18x10x4mm larger than my already gigantic Pixel 9

Reading these comments it looks like it's not quite time to switch over for daily use.
Graphene is not a linux OS, but you could get a used Pixel 8 running Graphene and be happy through to 2028.
- Depending on what bank they have, tap to pay won't work with Graphene OS either.
  
  That's not a deal breaker for me.
- GrapheneOS (like any other AOSP fork) is technically a Linux based OS. They run a modified version of the Linux Kernel. What matters is the changes they have made to the kernel, as well as enforcing AVB, SELinux, etc. etc.
  "Linux" phones that run modified desktop Linux distros are hugely insecure devices that lack many basic security and hardening features.

Didn't blackberry have a fairly good solution where they had an android sandbox running within their OS?

RCS text messaging is another to consider, at least in the US. The carriers implanted it in a proprietary way, so only Apple and Google apps have it. It's a poor substitute for an IM/chat app and not private and secure like it was promised due to poor implementations, but it's still far better than plain SMS. I still have people I can't get to use Signal or another secure IM app.
The Android Auto is the only one I'd be sad about. I love not having to use my phone's screen for navigation and the navigation built into most cars is crap and expensive to keep maps and data updated. I like being able to use any navigation app, though Google Maps/Waze is still the only one I've found that has both live traffic info, which is extremely important with my city, and reading the street names rather than just "turn left" it says "turn left on some street" so I don't have to look at the screen as much.
I use GrapheneOS and that's what I won't be able to replace once I finish my Immich and Home Assistant self host setups to replace Google Photos and Google Home/Nest, but st least they are sandboxed a bit.
Though Google has been moving to make it even more difficult to use their apps on these alternate OSes. Like I just found that Google Photos latest version pops up a not closeable error screen if it doesn't have full "photos and video" access. Doesn't work with the limited access or storage scopes that come with GrapheneOS, at least for now. I have photos I don't want google to scan and index even if they are not being uploaded, which they do now. It's obviously a ploy to get access to your data since it used to work fine. Now, I just use the mobile website instead until I have time to get Immich totally working and get people to switch if they want to see my stuff or share with me.
- I think JMP.chat supports RCS, and it lets you text through Cheogram or another XMPP client. I believe it also upgrades the connection if both users are using Cheogram similar to Signal when it supported SMS
  
  This is like a google voice number? Do they do VoIP and voicemail transcription, because I don't have a replacement for Google voice yet.
  https://jmp.chat/
  Edit: yes they do voip, voicemail, and transcriptions, but they do not do RCS yet. When they do, I might consider switching, especially if I can use their voicemail for my regular number, like gv.
  JMP does not (yet) support these features:
  RCS, which allows for video calls over the phone network.

the other two can be worked on. but point 1 is the entire reason we can't use degoogled android, which is imo almost as good as gnu/linux on a phone.
to expand on point 1: many governments and companies are now locking their services away inside squeamish proprietary apps that won't run at the tiniest sign of something they don't like. i used to have health insurance that didn't let me use their app if i had even the "developer options" enabled.

Which phone did you find where these are the only problem you encountered? I don't care about any of these things and haven't been finding any usable Linux phones.
- What problems have you had?
  
  They're slow and clunky as fuck for starters. Cellular is very spotty.
  Do you have a good alternative I can look into? I really, really, really want them to work. The only usable Linux phone I've seen is Jolla, but I'd much rather have Mobian or Arch on mobile or some other fully FLOSS alternative

The android auto equivalent for cars would be something I'd be interested in, that's the only reason I had to reenable google on my phone. I don't see any open source software that do it.
- True, but getting a dash-mounted phone holder isn't that different

I need none of that. Can I run OsmAnd?

Voice assistant through homeassistant is great. You can plug into an AI. There are guys using the SIP plugin to dial chatgpt from a landline.
https://www.reddit.com/r/homeassistant/comments/15jjkkm/i_built_chatgpt_into_my_rotary_phone_and_made_it/
Of course, you can also self host AI models if you have the hardware. I'm not there myself yet... but the tech is ready.

…they still have Linux phones?
- https://pine64.org/devices/pinephone/

google is forcing Gemini into everything and you can’t turn it off,
You can still shut off Gemini as of right now. I don't know what it'll be like in the future though.
- Google said they are going to make it so you can turn off directly interacting with Gemini but it will always be running in the background, spying on you.
  
  Source please

I fallback to a deGoogled phone precisely because Linux phone isn't up to my expectation in terms of convenience for now.
You can check my post history but just during the last few days :
replied to "Why did PinePhone fail" as I have 2 of these https://lemmy.ml/post/35398519/20774482
discussed on banking apps, authentication bottlenecks on iOS/Android https://lemmy.ml/post/35398519/20854067
... so yes, not there yet
PS: on "assistant" (I really think the naming is over-blowing capabilities) I have been using HomeAssistant daily for years now. I have a Nabu Casu on my shelf... and didn't even set it up because it was either 3rd party service dependencies (not why I rely on HA) or a very complex setup. So... I would recommend not looking there, at least few months ago when I received mine, sadly.

I was wondering what everyone’s thoughts on these were:
It doesn't work on GrapheneOS either, so I got separate devices I carry with me that do the tap-to-pay instead, and they've been a godsend. They're super compact as well and came for free when I opened the accounts.
I don't own a car, on ebike I use my screen.
Normally I use my fingers. If they're not available I yell cuss words at my phone until they're available again.

This is awesome because I don't want or need any of those things. If this is all that's missing, I think I'm ready for a Linux phone when my android dies.

3 - voice assistants. wether done on device or phoning into our home servers and having requests processed there, this should be doable and integrated with convenient shortcuts. Home assistant has some things like this, and there’s good-old Mycroft blowing around out there still. Siri is used every day by plenty of people and she sucks. If that’s the benchmark I think our community can easily meet that.
Of all the things that my phone is supposed to be able to do this is the one thing I never touch. It has never worked better for me than just doing it with my own two thumbs.
Does anyone actually use their voice to control their phone (not voice typing)?
- That's funny, I never use 1 and 2, but I use 3 often.
  I used to use tap to pay, but I recently acquired one of those adhesive credit card holders that has obviated my need for to pay.
  I have an old car and just have my phone in a holder if I need to see turn by turn directions. Unfortunately the credit card holder fucks with the phone stand a little bit, but it mostly still works. The few times in my life I used android auto I disliked it.
  I most often use voice assistant to ask for a song to play on Spotify. This was really convenient with "hey google" while I was driving or had my phone in my pocket listening to headphones, but I live without it these days.

"Damn near usable day to day" - what I've been hearing about Linux since the beginning of time
- Maybe not true for phones, but the linux desktop IS usable day to day, and I'd say this has been true for atleast the last 5 years. KDE and GNOME are both fully fledged desktops, and with the popularity of snaps and flatpaks there isn't really alot getting in the way of software installation either. Even wine/proton has come so far I don't see the "linux bad for gaming" as an actual excuse anymore.
  I started using linux exclusively on desktop in 2021 and I'm not any kind of programmer or anything, just a regular user. :)
  
  Yeah that's what I'm saying, desktop finally seems to be there so we can expect phones to get there in a mere 20-25 years when everyone is using Neuralink or whatever

So in other words they're perfectly suited for day to day use?
I have zero need for any of the janky bullshit features you listed, so this is great news!
- Literally my reaction. What is a good Linux phone to try?

Android is open source, or big part of it. If Android auto part is open source (I am not sure), someone could in theory use this to have car mirroring. I think it’s a very useful feature that no one is forced to use. I don’t see why some people are against it in the comments
- a quick Google returns some projects listed but I didn't dig in

255 comments