Samsung has great hardware, but their version of android is getting more and more bloated. And android itself is moving in a direction reminiscent of how I felt about Windows after win7.
Some 20 years ago I used Cyanogenmod on a Samsung phone, and that worked great, but it seems to no longer be active.
I see many alternatives, such as graphene, lineage, et.al… what are the pros and cons of each? For one I see that GrapheneOS only supports the pixel.
Note: I’m not 100% ready to deegoogle entirely, so if possible I would like to keep some features related to Google Play and its services.
I’d love an actual linux phone again; I bought a Neo FreeRunner early 2008, and while the tech wasn’t very mature at that point, it was my daily use phone for a while.
And no, I’m not buying a fucking iPhone. Made that mistake in 2009.
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I am on a Samsung S23, rooted via Magisk. Debloated with Universal Android Debloater NG. I am running Android Firewall + to block user and system apps that are not essential for normal operation, including the Play Store. I only unblock it once every month to update some system critical packages. I am also running AdAway to block specific hosts that some system critical packages make connections to without my permission. I am also using App Manager to block internal trackers and to disable app ops and permissions that are not needed for normal operations. The hosts that I allow my phone to establish connections to that are owned by Google and that possibly collect data are
play.googleapis.com(don’t remember this one),android.googleapis.com(neither this one),play-fe.googleapis.com(to update apps at the Play Store) andmtalk.google.com(for push notifications).The reason I go such lengths instead of “simply” ditching Google, is because a few dear friends are on the Japanese spyware Line and because I use USB Audio Player, a paid app, whose certificate doesn’t validate without logging in to the Play Store. All in all, two apps… But I rather translate that into “friends” and “HiFi music”. 🙂
I am really happy with my setup and it works without any hickups - expect for when I push it too far, because I like to experiment by removing packages that people don’t recommend removing but that are closed source and thus cannot be verified without decompiling. Which is a skill I don’t have.
Question: did you install MicroG or something, on that Linux phone? Asking since you’re saying that you’re not ready to completely degoogle yet.
Yes, using it because of revanced. The main thing keeping me on stock android is the BankID app (long story short: nationwide 2fa user authenticator used for loads of things here in norway), and I know people have reported that it doesn’t work on “alternative” phone OSes. I am, however, taking steps to go back to using the old-school Keychain OTP generator instead.
As a fellow former CyanogenMod user, I run GrapheneOS. I like that it gives me the most control over my hardware, of any of the Android variants I have tried.
Edit: I buy phones specifically looking for GrapheneOS support, now. But for non-pixel phones, I have found LineageOS to be fine.
I’m currently leaning towards graphene, as my current phone will have to be replaced at some point. Even if I’m not ready to 100% degoogle, I am taking steps to avoid things that require Big Corpo Mobile OS. For example, any Norwegian knows about BankID… it’s basically a very convenient 2fa app for anything that requires a personal login such as bank, taxes, Healthcare, etc. While the app itself is pretty good, they have effectively tied themselves to apple and Google, and it probably won’t work on any of the alternatives.
This June I’m going back to the OTP Keychain dongle that I used a decade ago.
It’s obvious that banks want to move users away from it for practicalreasons, but they do concede that not everyone can rely on an app on a smartphone, so my excuse of “I work on ships and don’t always have wifi or cell coverage available” was good enough.
You can go with GrapheneOS. Currently, it’s only Pixels supported. GOS and Motorola have a partnership and GOS on a Moto should be available in 2027.
I installed GrapheneOS on a Pixel for my dad along with Sandboxed Google Services so I know you don’t have to fully degoogle with GOS. The good thing with this setup is Google only gets the info you allow it to have.
Sandboxed GS can also be installed in a second user profile.
lineageos is the direct continuation of cyanogenmod since 2016. just grab any android phone that supports lineageos and you’re good. microg provides you google services, but it’s still dependant on google’s servers. i use mine without google services at all, aside from not having push notifications it’s very usable.
I actually already use microg for ReVanced. I think the long term plan will be graphene, but short term will be lineage on my current device.
There’s essentially Lineage (formerly Cyanogen, or a fork of it) and Graphene.
Ignore /e/ OS - it’s Lineage with their crap on it.
Go read about those two.
Ignore /e/ OS - it’s Lineage with their crap on it.
It’s actually quite a bit more than just that. But hey…if you want to be a hater, no one is going to stop you.
20 years ago Android phones didn’t exist, let alone CyanogenMod.
CyanogenMod was for iPods and iPhone, and released in 2009, so if we round a smidge, 20 years.
All those alternatives are Android, but mainly degoogled, lots are pretty good, I like CrDroid on my Poco F3, this is a very nice ROM, Graphene, Lineage, etc are all fine.
Main problem is mainly a lot of banking apps will not work, oh yes you can install Magisk, SuperSU, Zygist, SusFS, keybox, Mask Integrity, Autofix, TEE hacking, spoof a lot of things, etc and BANG! your bank app or Google Wallet will work and you can tap to pay with NFC! It will work 2 or 3 weeks until a google update/bank app update, and you re-spend countless hours on XDA or Telegram to find how to fix this. Until next time.
If you don’t tap-to-pay or your bank app does not mind running on an insecure OS, everything else is perfect in all those ROMs, pick one.
If you want a real alternative, you have the Apple world but you already made the mistake before 😜, or Ubuntu Touch maybe.
Great point about bank apps.
Thankfully I never got in the habit of tap to pay with my phone.
The amount of data that bank apps want to slurp up in the name of “security” makes me uncomfortable, anyway.
I just bank via web browser, today.
There are many alternatives. None of them are “good” yet.
Nothing is perfect.
But every alternate Android ROM I have tried has given me a dramatic speed boost over what shipped with the phone.
I guess there are other definitions of “good”, haha.
For me good==fast, and GrapheneOS is the most responsive phone OS I have used, and therefore the best.
Ah yeah I wasn’t considering graphene OS an android alternative when I made that answer because it’s made with android. Graphene is fantastic, all things considered.
The real answer to a good Android alternative is probably not another android fork, but another Linux distro, like SailfishOS that the Jolla Phone ships with: https://commerce.jolla.com/products/jolla-phone-sep-ii-2026 It has support for Android apps though, so you can still use your bank app (probably), but it runs them in sandboxes
