Fairphone announces the €599 Fairphone 6, with a 6.31" 120Hz LTPO OLED display, a Snapdragon 7s Gen 3 chip, and enhanced modularity with 12 swappable parts
There's a deGoogled version too!!
I would prefer GrapheneOS (If I can live with the irony of getting a Pixel phone just to deGoogle it...). Sandboxing there is way better. But you lose the Repairability.. Gotta check and compare the new EU metrics too.
They are just two different devices.
I not only want a degoogled version but also a secure one. Sadly developing a secure android is rather hard. The Graphene team does it pretty well. Others try it too, but sadly they are not close.
Degoogled version is €50 more, for whatever reason
the reason: support for developers. You can install it yourself to save that amount.
People don’t want to pay for privacy. That’s the real problem with end users. Imagine if more people did so. What a world we could have. Nah. Let’s be cheap AF!
Because the built in software is usually there because the manufacturer is receiving money from the software company. That's why consumer devices are always bloated with garbage.
Just an update, I learnt that GrapheneOS developers are 'aggressive' towards other FLOSS projects (following comments on other thread, but you can searx grepheneos+controversy and see for yourselves).
So now, I might just prefer an FP6.
is the bootloader locked with eos?
Is it really de-googled if it still runs Android?
the degoogled roms like eos calyx lineage graphene are not just aosp zero work roms with no gapps inclueded. the devs do work on changing as much google related code as they can even within aosp. nothing is perfect obviously, but im pretty sure there are compatible mobile linux distros even.
It's too bad they dont ship to Canada. I'm in the market for a new phone and would seriously consider this.
The state of mobile phone market in Canada is so frustrating. Not only is our market dominated by 3 players who refuse to actually compete with each other, but we miss out on half the cool phones that the rest of the world gets too.
Clove Technology resells to outside the EU
But also consider potential carrier compatibility issues with importing
Thanks for the tip!
I had a look at the bands and it is indeed compatible in Canada! 🎉
Source: GSMArena + Fido support
Same US. EU gets the best stuff.
Why does The Fairphone (Gen. 6) not have an audio jack?
After some of the criticism that we received about removing the headphone jack from Fairphone 4, we did consider bringing it back for The Fairphone (Gen. 6). However, we realized it would be at the expense of increasing the phone’s dimensions. We also looked into the consumer data and Fairphone 4’s weight and thickness were more of an issue than the lack of a minijack, so we decided to keep the same approach, although it was a difficult decision. We didn’t want to invest in OLED technology for the display and then not have improved the phone’s dimensions and weight. But just like with Fairphone 4 and Fairphone 5, we will still offer an adapter, which has had overall positive user reviews.
"We heard the criticism but decided that no, you would still need an adapter to use headphones, plus a USB-C hub to be able to charge the damn thing while listening to music or watching videos"
Funny how that's the same excuses that we get for modern laptops terrible design. "We HAVE to make it thinner so there's no space! You wouldn't want a laptop that's not complete shit if it meant it'd also be less thin and breakable, now would you?"
Let me expand, as I usually deal with surveys and population feedback. There's loud feedback, and there's statistically significant feedback.
People who want a headphone jack are very loud. They will interject this issue into every feedback opportunity given. They will mention it on the comment sections, forums, q&a sessions, answer their surveys accordingly, etc. That's all fine and their prerogative.
However, when you look at the statistics. They are unfortunately a very tiny minority of the entire population. They are not statistically significant for decision making. They don't have the volume to move sales significantly. This sucks, of course, and I personally wouldn't mind the return of headphone jacks, smaller phones and bigger batteries as a fair trade for thicker phones.
But unfortunately, the vast majority of the market is pre-occupied with other things. The phone screen is too small, the phone weights too much, the phone is too thick, I want to bring my phone to the pool without fear of it breaking, etc. They are not as passionate about it, not like the headphone people are, but they far outnumber them in several orders of magnitude. In the end, if the product doesn't sell, it won't matter how much it was worth to a single passionate person. It will sink the company if it doesn't have mass appeal. Making phones is already an extremely expensive endeavor.
You can get good Bluetooth earbuds for under $50 and a USB-C to AUX dongle for under $15.
The average person is fine with Bluetooth earbuds or an adapter, and audiophiles would not find the inbuilt DAC/amp on a phone to be adequate.
People who want a headphone jack [...] are unfortunately a very tiny minority of the entire population.
People interested in paying more for fair trade materials and repairable phones are also a very tiny minority of the entire population.
Of course I don't have any statistic, but I would guess that the proportion of people wanting a Jack is significantly higher in the group of people interested in buying Fairphone that on the general population.
In my particular case, I'm still using my Fairphone 3, and I'm not buying a Fairphone again unless it has a Jack.
You know why there aren't more users complaining about this? Because they flat out did not buy the device for that reason (e.g. me). Removing the jack is also extremely hyprocritical coming from a "sustainable" company.
What statistics? People buying thin phones over thicker phones doesn't mean much when that's almost all that's being sold nowadays and every phone is trying to be as thin as possible. It seemed to me that 90% of what we're told people want is actually just what companies want to push on us because it's cheaper and more profitable.
All the people I know who are average users couldn't care less about how thin the phone is, two mm more or less doesn't make any difference. They care about screen size and being able to use it without too much hassle. If they get a phone without an audio jack half of them will just assume that they can't plug earphones at all. And they are not the ones who will complain. But then, Fairphone isn't marketed towards average users, so maybe their users have different priorities? Idk
Okay, I'm going to ask... why don't you use wireless?
Edit: some results are in, and the only reasonable answer is better audio quality, although that's probably no longer true. The rest are fairly weak reasons.
Lol'd at the 10m extension cord though, thanks for that one.
wireless headphones run out of battery, and most seem to have atrocious build quality and battery life.
Latency issue, in some use cases it's not acceptable to have 0.1~0.3 sec lag, like racing games or rhythm games.
(Yeah, I know there are some wireless protocols to make latency shorter, but it might cost a lot to buy a supported headphone, and it's still useless if the phone doesn't have proper protocol supports.)
1.Wired headphones deliver better audio quality 2.Wired headphones are harder to lose 3.Wired headphones don't need batteries, so: a)less e-waste b)no need to check if they are charged 4.Wired headphones are more secure, connection cannot be intercepted and phishing attacks with BT are not possible 5.While wired headphones are plugged, no one can take your phone without you noticing
It's about options. You can still use Bluetooth even with a phone that has a 3.5mm jack. I also run live sound and have used the ability to plug my phone directly into the board for background music multiple times.
Let me give you simple example. When I take a flight, I like to watch my own media. Those flights sometimes are upwards of 10 hours. If I use wireless earbuds, both the earbuds and my phone will run out of battery and I have to charge them separately. However, since I have a phone with a headphone jack, my earbuds never run out of battery, I can charge my phone while I'm using them and I don't need to use a single adapter.
Oh yeah, and the audio quality is also better.
Interesting that they seem to be using a consumer grade Snapdragon chip this time, typically they used weird chips ment for industry applications if I'm not mistaken. Wonder what sparked the change, did Qualcomm start supporting their chips for longer?
Probably yes.
And probably due to EU mandating new phones to be supported for longer.
https://energy-efficient-products.ec.europa.eu/product-list/smartphones-and-tablets_en
Looks like it.
Starting with Android smartphones running on the Snapdragon 8 Elite Mobile Platform, Qualcomm Technologies now offers device manufacturers the ability to provide support for up to eight consecutive years of Android software and security updates. Smartphones launching on new Snapdragon 8 and 7-series mobile platforms will also be eligible to receive this extended support.
They only used a weird chip for one generation (the last generation; 5)
They only did that once for the FP5. It was a terrible choice, leading to high battery usage and compatibility issues. They only did that because when it came out, 5 years of software support wasn't something crazy any more. Samsung already provided the same on their mainstream flagship phones. So to top that they chose that embedded chip with 10 years of support from Qualcomm. But 10 years is practically speaking really hard overkill, especially considering the very impractical downsides of that chip.
By now, most major phone brands have support times rivalling what Fairphone is bringing to the table, and for that to work, Qualcomm has to support their mainstream phone chips for longer.
Snapdragon 7s Gen3 is a pretty decent chipset. Decent display too. 8GB RAM is a bit on the low side. Camera is all about how good processing is. It's not that crazy expensive if all works well and considering what their goal is.
I'm on an S10e with only 6GB of RAM and it's still running smoothly. If it was still getting security updates I would keep it for way longer, but alas it's not so I'm going to upgrade to the new fairphone (not thrilled about losing the headphone jack and getting a larger phone, but I support their overall goals so it seems like the best choice for me)
headphone jackn't :(
This this this.
They want to sell their buds and headset.
don't misunderstand me, those are great repairable bluetooth devices, but if i were to not have a headphone jack and just a "long lasting repairable phone" , i'm sticking to my Google pixel.
Just get a cheap usb c -> 3.5mm adapter. Problem solved.
I doubt it's some conspiracy, but it does still suck. I'm on my 3rd USB port on my fp4 because I use wired earphones. Replaceable USB port was my initial reason for buying a fair phone otherwise I'd likely be buying a new phone every year.
USB C is not up to that kind of use, and BT ear buds suck...
They want to sell their buds and headset.
Not sure if it still is that way, but when i bought my FP4 years ago, free buds were included.
FP would be a good choice for Graphene.
Unfortunately Graphene have said they will only use pixels (or potentially their own phone in the future) because no other phones have the Titan M2 security chip.
It's a shame though, because I'd love to have Graphene on it.
Yea but with the recent news (see his Mastodon) he's looking for other vendors.
many rom developers stated before, that fairphones have a pisspoor security
Problem is, it is not IP68 rated, which is a dealbreaker for someone with an active lifestyle; especially since I sometimes manage to get water even into my IP68 phones. It would be good if they made a Pro model or just made the regular model more expensive since I will gladly pay for privacy and quality on a device that is on me at all times. For now I will stick to my Pixel 9 Pro.
I just want them to make a true flagship phone. I personally wouldn't mind paying extra for a more ethical phone, if it had all the bells and whistles and wasn't half obsolete straight out of the box.
A big problem they have is that they have to rely on Qualcomm for security updates, and the flagship chips simply don't get 8+ years of support. Fairphone uses Qualcomms IOT chips, which come with much longer support.
Qualcomm will have to change that, what with the EU now mandating a minimum of 5 years of updates after the phone is no longer sold.
So if Qualcomm expects their SoCs to be on the market for 2-4 years, like they do right now, they will have no choice but to provide updates for 7-9 years.
I wouldn't be surprised if, given this development, Fairphone turn to the more conventional chips other OEMs use, which would likely also be a win for battery life.
What features would that include that the phone doesn't already have? I'm currently an iPhone user, but I'm looking to move to a more open source alternative.
Better SOC and cameras. If it has to last 5+ years these have to be very good on release date.
better cpu, 2 sim slots, a programmable button cause this dumbass launcher switch is a joke, at least 5000mah battery, at least a sceen mount fingerprint reader or even a working face recognition like in pixel phones.
a 2 year old motorola phone has all of these for some reason, for only 300 bucks. i can pay 40 bucks for a battery change every 4 years, thats still a better deal to be honest.
Wireless charging
If they are all about swappable parts, and being able to upgrade your phone how you want ... Shouldn't this just be a module upgrade... Of the main part? Maybe I don't understand it ... At the very least the old parts should work with the new system right? Unless something major has changed.
Exactly. Framework does it correctly; fairphone does not.
Not putting in a 3.5mm jack says enough. They sell Bluetooth earbuds I wouldn't call that "fair". It leads to more landfill. Phones with 3.5mm jacks also have BT, and don't start about USBC singles, that's more to buy and more landfill when they inevitable break.
I hope my phone lasts until we get a framework phone.
So with framework you can keep the cpu and camera and swap out the Mobo for a better one?
Did some digging, but it doesn't appear the band compatibility with US carriers is improved at all. Am I wrong here?
Would that be a problem when travelling to the... oh, right, we're not doing that anymore... would this be a problem for Europeans travelling to Canada?
why you gotta be so rude about it? like we're forced to live here, your bragging doesn't help anyone
From their own site it would seem they don't. There is a "US" version but you can't buy a Fairphone from the website directly.
Rofl if they dump them on ebay as new from a third party US shipper.
https://m.gsmarena.com/fairphone_6-13955.php
There is some band overlap, but I am no expert.
I would totally buy one of these if they were sold in the US. Sadly, last time I checked the newest phone wasn't sold here. So I doubt this one will be.
You can thank the President for that. ahem tariff* ahem*
I would not recommend Murena for U.S. customers. I attempted buying a FP4 from them, and they put $6000 in charges to my credit card. Their message-only customer service was terrible and tried to blame me. Had to get my bank involved.
Thank you, this is huge!
I was very, sad to miss out on the entire Fairphone 5 generation, but I gave up and bought a Pixel 8 when they announced the 5 wont be coming any time soon.
Finally I can get a phone that's worth buying (and earbuds as I see they carry the fairbuds now)
you can get them in the US.
Worth noting buying a second hand phone is still better in every aspect and sadly 2nd hand Samsung from 3 years ago is still better and cheaper. Though Fairphone is getting closer with each release!
I posted this elsewhere but the tech specs for the Fairphone 6 say the following:
USB-C 2.0 (OTG capable) can be used to connect USB Sticks/SD-Cards/Audio Amplifier/Network-adapters directly
I was really looking forward to use this with a pair of display glasses, like the XREAL One Pro, but this seems like the Fairphone 6 might not support display output? That's sad. Especially since the Fairphone 5 had this in their tech specs:
USB-C 3.0 (OTG capable) can be used to connect USB Sticks/SD-Cards/display (also Android™ desktop mode)/Camera/Audio Amplifier/Network-adapters directly
But maybe it was not used enough?
When I read that, it decided me on the phone. I was almost completely certain my FP4 replacement would be the FP6, but the USB downgrade makes it a no-go for me.
Too bad, because I love the easy repairability.
Yeah that is a shame honestly...
main camera, AI-powered low-light magic
Can I turn it off? Can I? I just want my photos, the real ones, however bad they are. I don’t want them to be half generated.
Just to be clear, unless you're shooting RAW you never have your "real" photos. Every phone/camera performs massive amounts of post processing, including using ml models.
AI is only a buzzword for something that has been the norm for a while.
Is there any chance this is the same HDR technology that has been around for at least 10 years, but using latest marketing buzzwords?
Also, working a bit on developing my photos from RAW over last years taught me how we actually expect a lot of magic from a regular camera. The brain does a lot of work and low/high light compensation, color balance, etc... are required to some extend. Of course sometimes it becomes a bit absurd : most smartphone pictures seems oversaturated, with clear blue skies and I one took a photo of a blue-ish mountain because (I think) some classifier thought it was part of the sky.
Yeah, it's most likely just doing some "AI" (ML) denoising. Nothing to do with GenAI
happy cake day!!
Thank you!
Compared to the Fairphone 5 it has some improvements but also a few downsides:
Pro:
Con:
My conclusion: Overall the improvements are ok, however just releasing the Fairphone 5 with a newer SoC might have been the better/more cost effective choice. Sacrificing display resolution for 120 Hz feels also quite wrong. 600€ is very pricy for a phone like this. Cutting some premium features away like the 120 Hz display or a bit of RAM and storage (that you can extend anyway with an SD card) might have saved enough to get the launch price down to somewhere near 500€ which would make it accessible for a wider audience.
Downgrade to USB 2
What the fuck?
USB 2? What a stupid choice that appears to be. Did they have any reasoning behind that?
The transfer speed over USB on mine probably doesn't even pass USB 2 speeds anyway and I've had flagship phones in the past that were even slower over a cable. I guess if that's still the case then there's probably a good engineering argument to reduce complexity.
Why does The Fairphone (Gen. 6) use USB-2?
In order to make the device more affordable, we explored how we could best balance our spec choices with the least possible impact on user experience. Going from USB-3 to USB-2 was one of them.
https://support.fairphone.com/hc/en-us/articles/24463093338898-The-Fairphone-Gen-6-FAQ
Use for all your old usb 2 ables lol
The extra RAM and storage probably increased the price much more than the screen upgrade.
Regarding resolution, I've been using my S21 Ultra at FHD quality (2400x1080) since I got it and it has a significantly large screen. I don't see a point in higher resolutions but I definitely appreciate higher refresh rates. Makes it feel smoother and more responsive.
I also found out a few other things that have changed:
IMHO this is kind of a downgrade in repairability as you now need custom tools (not everyone has a T5 screwdriver at home). Moving the volume buttons to the other side is also kind of weird and unexpected as most (non Apple) phones have them on the right...
If the 10hz reading implementation is good I may consider upgrading my fp4. A better camera would be nice too but if they get the power saving if that screen right then I'm interested...
Otherwise my fp4 has everything thing I need a phone to be
Was really hoping to see a Fairphone 6a. Similar to the Google Pixel Series. Just a cheap version of it. I really don't need 120Hz, OLED or "No Bezels" all i want is big battery and a headphone jack that is all.
tbh 600$ is a series pricing.
For real, though, what is it?
A time of flight sensor for autofocus
Ok but what about a headphone jack ?
Doesn't seem to have one.
But to be honest, most headphone jacks on these slim phones suck and even a cheap USB-c to audio jack dongle is better than the average phone headphone jack.
The devices from Fiio show that it is still possibile to create a good quality Android device with a good headphone jack, but we might need thicker phones. I just use dongles or audio players
I respect your opinion, but I lived through 90s computing and think dongles died the death they deserve and these phone manufacturers can go to hell for bringing them back or thinking that bluetooth audio is good enough.
Additionally most of the droids I have bought that have a jack are the perfect thickness in my mind. Weighted enough to stay in my hand and take a couple dozen drops without accident. Plus the headphone jack is used as an antenna and provides radio capabilities so I can listen to local news instead of whatever the tech industry wants to feed me. Which is a nice option.
A thicker phone would be great. All these manufacturers forgot at some point we actually need to hold these things with a human hand.
Having said that my fp4 is actually a pretty good thickness. They just screwed that up by rounding the the edge so much seemingly to reduce contact grip.
Yeah I find a fairphone 3 to be powerful enough so I might just keep repairing it.
I love the idea but the price is too high for the chip given that this is designed to be a longevity phone. A chip like the 7s Gen 3 would make the phone sluggish after a couple of years with how unoptimised todays apps are.
The Gorilla Glass 7i and IP55 water resistance are also concerning given that budget Samsung, Xiaomi, etc phones beat this.
However having components of the phone being easily replacable is a great thing.
I think it's important to remember that the price is higher because they pay their factory workers a living wage and use a combination of recycled and fair materials.
It looks expensive because other phones are cheap, and other phones are cheap because they are exploiting people to make them.
Yeah wow, the problem with the phone that tries to compete with unethical big business is that unethical big entity is cheaper. Who would have thought
Why "removed by mod"? It does make them look stupid. statement of fact.
meow
a few things i like:
Fairphone is probably going to be my new phone when I upgrade.
love fairphone but i cant go bacl from graphene os. its so nice not having google attacjed to everything.
I wish I could ditch stock android but my business bank app refuses to run on e/os and I assume I'd have the same problem with graphene.
e/os was otherwise soo much better, and the increase in performance and battery life was huge.
I assume I'd have the same problem with graphene.
There's a list of bank apps that work in Grapheme. You can check for yours here
https://privsec.dev/posts/android/banking-applications-compatibility-with-grapheneos/
If you want something not Google, I used to have Ubuntu Touch on a Fairphone before Australia's 3G network was switched off. It would have to be an older Fairphone however.
Is it me or did they get slightly more vague on their marketing materials, wrt the environmental impact ( at least compared to fp5 ) ?
Also the battery seems a bit harder to replace, as you now need a screwdriver. It does appear to be more flush, so it may be due to size constraints.
Edit: and there's "more" replaceable parts because the back is split in two. That split might prove better for durability tho, because pulling the back on their older phones felt like it would break every time.
I don't mind having a few screws to remove every few years when I need to replace my battery.
Although there is another thing, I'm not sure but I wonder if it has any impact. My FP3 has made a few very bad falls and nothing ever broke. I wonder if its "bad" integrity makes it very good at dissipating the fall's energy.
dang, I just bought FP5.
It's not a single bit worse than before the announcement.
thanks for your sacrifice
Think of it as a generous donation 😉
3.5mm Jack or - sadly - GTFO
They have adapters. But yeah, would be nice to have a slot directly integrated.
Or two USB C ports, I don't really mind using a USB to audio jack converter but it would be nice to be able to easily charge and listen to wired headphones at the same time
Can anyone recommend this? Is the camera any good?
Basically nobody has this in hand yet. Its lighter (193g) and shorter (156mm) than the previous ones which is nice. Harder glass surface (Corning 7i) so less scratches. Its still thick tho at 9.6mm but i dont mind that. If gsmarena is correct, then they didnt include video output over USBC for some fucking dumb reason this time. Ridiculous.
I was thinking: Online-people have been asking for thicker iPhones and MacBooks in favour of battery for a while now. So I suppose this is that + repairability. I think we as a community could highlight that a bit tbh
Good question. I was just reading the article about it on The Verge, which mentions:
On the back, you’ll find a 50MP main camera and a 13MP ultrawide camera, while the front has a 32MP hole-punch camera for selfies and video calls. That’s a significant step down from the Fairphone 5, which used 50MP sensors on all three of its cameras.
No mention of camera quality, though, as it's basically a press release post and not a hands-on or review. I wish this would be available in the US for a fair price.
Haven't had an FP6 in my hands yet, but I've been using FP since the Fairphone 2, am currently using the FP4 and besides the ethics in sourcing their materials and manufacturing (which they genuinely attempt to provide, and while there is no ethical consumption in capitalism, there are still degrees of fucked-upness.), I do enjoy the repairability, longevity and long-term support. They are also decently supported by de-googled-android and even pure Linux phone operating systems, if you want to experiment there, and come without a lot of bloat that nowadays is ubiquitous with most smartphones.
You can also look at the MKBHD 2024 smartphone camera comparison test with the FP5. I would suggest taking the test yourself if that is still possible.
I would guess that the camera will be comparable. (Everything below if FP5 assuming about the same performance with the FP6)
For me, daylight pics were after all of the pixels but before anything else. I like the more neutral not supremely over-saturated over-sharpened/smoothed pictures that many phones take nowadays.
For me, it was middle of the pack for dimly lit photos.
For the overall ELO with everyone, FP5 was on the mid-lower end (of a comparison of all flagships + pixel A series), but perfectly usable for people who aren't doing social media as a job.
Honestly, this might be the first fairphone which I would classify as good enough for daily use.
I bought an oled phone for 200€ a few years back. What I'd really want is that every smartphone sold in the EU is open, with open drivers and OS with root access if you want to. And some investments by the EU to support open smartphone OS.
What a shithole civilization.
If I didn't miss it, no wireless charging again... Some one told me they refuse to do it because it wastes electricity. To which I'd say, even just turning on a car probably uses magnitudes more energy than charging my phone wirelessly. I don't want to mess up the USB C port if I don't have to, thanks.
It's a Fairphone... If you manage to destroy the port somehow, you can just replace it in 2 minutes with a screwdriver.
Yeah, the wireless charging is a no-go for me as well. I understand that it costs licensing and wastes energy. But the environmental impact of all the useless/lost cables is also a point,especially when you get your energy fully renewable/self produced. And in a lot of areas (airline lounges,etc.) it has become widely adopted/the norm.
They could easily have offered a "swap" battery that has a little less capacity but includes wireless charging - give people a fucking choice.
It's also less waste if one of your charging methods breaks, as you can just swap over to the other method and might even find ordering replacement parts unnecessary.
Though ideally I'd also like to see more than one USB-C port for even more redundancy.
I agree wireless charging would be nice. But for a small company I don't think they can do it "easily". It's 150 people team and how many phones do they even sell? I imagine it's not enough yet to support all that.
I'm sad that the battery swap requires a screwdriver, but it's really fine. As long as it's not glued in I don't care honestly.
The modular back is cool, specs look nice, lighter and smaller than my FP5 is a great thing, cuz this thing is heavy and the battery is mid.
It looks cool! Good direction I think. Of course I want a headphone jack, but I am learning to live without
My 3 greatest wishes are:
Replaceable battery
Replaceable usb charging port
120 watt cahrging
I'd love one and have checked back each year after their first model, but they still don't sell to Australia - and I'm not going to buy something I can't get direct parts and services for, and would need to go through third parties for.
If their model is a successful business I honestly thought they would have expanded beyond shipping/supporting only Europe by now, its been a decade since their first model. Maybe they're still not a very big player / modest success?
There's at least two limitations that they've mentioned before with shipping outside of Europe.
First is they need extra certifications (e.g. FCC ones for selling to the USA), which are expensive and basically redundant. Probably not worth the business cost to do it and maintain it.
Second is they do carbon neutral shipping, which is hard to do when you have to cross an ocean. I know in Canada our national postal service can do carbon neutral for packages, but figuring that out for every country and the international legs of the shipping is a lot of work.
Part of the cost of being ethical is being at a disadvantage with capitalism, so while they're doing pretty alright they aren't going to grow like big tech did.
How well do these connect to Canadian cell phone towers?
It appears to have support for the 4G and 5G bands that Rogers, Bell and Telus use
But the last time I was looking at Fairphone, they didn't sell to Canada directly.
They don't. You have to get them from a place that imports like PDA Plaza out of Quebec (I've used them before).
To me, that's a dealbreaker, because you lose the benefit of getting replacement parts easily.
OTG compatible is a rare feature, I have an endoscope camera that uses OTG, but not a compatible phone.
Also, no mention of a headphone jack.
I wish we could get this in Canada
This is nice for Europe I guess, and I want to like the fairphone, but unfortunately it's not viable for me.
Besides basic phone features and the ability to run Android apps I have 3 requirements, 2 of which the fairphone fails at. I need it to be usable in the US on my phone carrier. I need to be able to use Google Pay or another mobile payment alternative (that's accepted in most stores). Finally it needs to have at least a 48 hour battery life.
Fairphone unfortunately doesn't work in the US with most carriers, and the one that kills not only it but all the de-googled phones, it doesn't support mobile payment of any kind. I've done a ton of research trying to find some kind of fix for that second point because I'd gladly use something like GrapheneOS if I could, but every time the answer I come to is it's just not possible.
For whatever it's worth I have been using a Fairphone 5 in the US for over a year on T-Mobile.
That too has to to with the fact that all of that is an impenetrable black box. Google gets access, but if your oso isn't Google, amor is rooted, they won't allow you access "for security"
Never mind that the banking web version works fine in any OS including Linux, no safety issues there (nor should there be any) but the app? Yeah, Google only and it's all because of security. Uh huh...
That's certainly part of it, but I'd use any mobile payment app, not just Googles one, but there's basically zero competition there. Some banks apparently had their own mobile payment support briefly, but it seems like just about every single one of them has removed that feature and replaced it with a wrapper around Google Pay.
I've been using the fairphone 4 in the us for almost three years.
Don't worry, it fails in Europe too. I ended up giving away my FP4, because it fails to do even basic stuff like make a call after 3G was switched off in my country.
Worst phone I ever had, with quite a margin. And the only one I ever kept for under 2 years and the only one I replaced while it was still physically ok.
No headphone jack means I won't even consider it, very sad to see it's still the case.
Fairphone has really gone off the deep end. 6 phone models in what? less than 12 years? That's what they call dedication to sustainability? Really? They used to say the most sustainable phone is your old phone, assuming you can continue to use it. Yet - my Fairphone 1, still in good working order hardware-wise, I had to "scrap" because no more SW updates. When my FP2 hardware (charging port) eventually failed, they no longer sold the relevant spare parts.
What good are exchangeable parts, if they are removed from the shop around the time that a well-treated phone might need them?
Looks like they hit the nail strong and sharp on this one. I am still using my 2019 Nokia which does not look like it's going bust anytime soon. Too bad, I would have loved to use the FF6
no jack, no deal
Who is jack?
Jack will never come back, too much space to apeace a fraction of the total users.
i'll do my own phone with (black) jack and hookers then
They don't have Auto in Screen Refresh Rare but shouldn't it be there if they LTPO display?
Think I'm getting it, my Redmi Note 8 is aging and I'm pretty sure the current batch of custom ROMs is basically the last apart from the fact that the kernel is no longer supported, and Xiaomi is closing the doors on custom ROMs more and more it seems. Yeah, the new FP isn't perfect but it seems good enough to pull the trigger, and while the Pixels seemed like a good alternative in some aspects, Google recently made it very clear where they see Android's future, and it's not more open.
This looks pretty good. The main issue with Fairphone for me is the price. FP 5 is still about 2x as expensive as Pixel 8. I got my Pixel 8a on promotion for ~250 euros. FP 5 still costs over 500. I never paid more than 300 euros for a phone and I'm not planning to.
Fair wages and sustainable practices cost more than sweatshop labor
Pixel is build by Foxxcon. Foxxcon has 3.5 stars on Glassdoor. From what I found Fairphone is build by TCL which has 3.2 stars on Glassdoor.
It's all still made in Asia. It's really hard to monitor conditions there and it's pretty much impossible to monitor conditions at every step of the supply chain. I understand paying extra for a more sustainable phone (repairable, longer support) but paying double for a vague promise of being more "fair"? Thanks by no thanks. Pixel has 8 years of support now so the difference in sustainability is minimal.
Fairphone has been a really disappointing experiment in so-called sustainable tech over the years. They keep making new phones instead of continuing to support the old ones, which might be greenwashing. (Whereas if you got a legacy Framework 13, it's still user-repairable and upgradable.) If they wanted to make a non-upgradable device, maybe it would have been wise to make it high-end to futureproof to work until 4G gets phased out. Fairphone still is not making their products available in the U.S., and Murena is a borderline scam company and I am genuinely shocked Fairphone works with them.
And I've heard their logic with the headphone jack, but I do think AUX is the lesser of two evils as removing it will just lead to more e-waste with broken bluetooth headphones that rarely last as long as good wired ones. Fairphone's own bluetooth accessories have gotten negative reviews for their lower build quality, so Fairbuds are likely not the solution to the headphone jack problem.
For the simple fact that non-Europeans can buy them directly off the website, I would sooner recommend feature phones from Sunbeam as it also has user-replaceable batteries and you can send it in for repairs. Or just any phone used.
I've had to swap a lot more cabled headphones out due to cable damage than bluetooth headphones, but i also only use overear headphones, which have enough battery storage for days. Also, there are also overear headsets that are dual-useable with headphone jack or bluetooth (no noise cancelling with jack tho). Also, the issue with the replacement of headphones lies with the producers of headphones w/o changeable power source, not with the phone.
And regarding availability in the US: i have the suspicion that the average european will be much more inclined to pay the 2-300$ upmark in price just for greener tech than the average american. i'm sure that they would love to sell more phones, but it's not ecological or economical to ship them onto a continent where 80-90% of people would either compare specs only and cannot afford to go for a more sustainable phone or - a predominantly USA thing - who revel in the fact that their choice is not ecological.
One plus did the same thing. Now they're no different then all the expensive brands out there.
I know people complain about big phones, but as a 6'5" guy i LOVE my big screens, and i think i'd struggle with a 6.3" screen. I have a 22U i plan to use for another year or two, and would go larger if i could.
I'd jump immediately if it had a stylus.
I dont understand Fairphone, flashy hardware with poor software security and awful sustainability (they stop selling parts quickly).
No they don't they still sell parts for the Fairphone 2 that's 10 years old.
Use Calyx OS and re-lock the bootloader.
they stop selling parts quickly
The new EU regulations should force them to keep parts available.
If they were serious about security they would partner with the GraphineOS team
they stop selling parts quickly
That's weird. If they stopped making parts how did I get a replacement battery for my fairphone 3?
I really respect Fairphone and I'm a happy owner of the Fairphone 5, but I find a bit puzzling for a company that suggests its customer should keep their phone for more than the 2.5 years average to release a new model just 2 years after the previous one.
Just my two cents, but they shoul've focused on developing either a tablet or a smartwatch to fill a gap in other markets before announcing yet another smartphone.
New people enter the market all the time.
That update is for those that don't already have a Fairphone, presumably.
That said, I agree with your overall point. They should offer tablets and watches if they can.
I keep reading this complaint every time FairPhone releases a new model, and it's nonsense. The millions of people who didn't buy a FairPhone 5 in the last 2 years are not going to buy a 2 year old model when they need a new phone in 2 months.
You bought a FairPhone 5 or 4 in the last 4 years? Keep it and don't buy a FairPhone 6, you don't need it.
You didn't buy a FairPhone and your current phone is dying? Then you have a modern FairPhone and don't need to decide between a FairPhone with old specs or an up-to-date phone that is not repairable.
You don't have to buy a new fair phone just because you bought the last one.
It's doubtful that someone buying a new phone now would want to buy the fair phone from 2+ years ago.
If they didn't buy a previous fairphone, you're going to miss all the people who wanted to try it but didn't want a 5 year old phone tech. I imagine most people replace around 3-5 years due to battery degradation, people dropping their phones, or lack of updates
Fuck these guys... Seriously. I bought a phone off of them hyped at the idea of the ethics. It didn't work on arrival. Over 3 months later and not one single reply to my helpdesk request (other than the Automated acknowledgement of receipt).
Unbelievably bad user experience, I went from hyped at the concept of reducing my production of electronic waste to beyond disappointed at a brutally bad user experience.
Then to make matters worse, it is difficult to source spare parts for the fairphone 4 (according to a friend of mine who owns one that he bought a while ago)... Like is that not the entire point of the phone, reduced consumption of new phones by supporting repairs. If you're going to stop producing the spares at least release the patents then.. if you really believe in the promoted ideals that you spout... Which they clearly do not.
It turns out that it's just another money hungry company hell bent on burning the planet down to see a line go up, as far as I'm concerned. All gaff to sell shite phones at higher prices.
Do not buy.
The to make matters worse, they’ve already stopped producing spare parts for the fairphone 4
Your comment made me laugh! There’s no need to criticize the company if you’re having a bad day or don’t like it. It only takes a minute to check their website for spare parts. Most likely, it’s your local shop that’s out of stock, not Fairphone itself.
https://shop.fairphone.com/shop/category/spare-parts-4?category=4&filters=33
All I needed to know was when they released their BT earbuds just when the jack port got removed to figure out where their priorities are.
Of course they're gonna offer BT earbuds if there's no audio jack? Or did you want them included or something? A lot of people here are way angrier than justified.
Yep same here. Also they're not capable of installing grapheneos which is kind of a deal breaker for me.
They are easily repairable and you don't have to throw them away if the battery goes bad (just replace it).
How is that a bad thing? About 90% of other brands you can throw them away if the battery goes bad or they break.
The to make matters worse, they’ve already stopped producing spare parts for the fairphone 4
What's this then?
What do you mean with stopped producing spare parts for FP4? They are still widely available
In terms of fp4 replacement parts, I am only quoting a friend of mine, I haven't personally looked into that; though I was ready to believe it after my experience.
What are you talking about? I exchanged multiple mails per day when I had a problem.
Also as others have mentioned, the parts are still available on their website.
In terms of fp4 replacement parts, I am only quoting a friend of mine, I haven't personally looked into that; though I was ready to believe it after my experience.
In terms of your good customer service experience... I mean, good? I'm glad your experience was better than mine? Mine has been the worst customer experience I've ever had with a company and I genuinely went in to this with a high opinion of them.
I don't know what more to add here, we had different experiences, I'm sharing mine... You're sharing yours? Different things are different to each other...
Your experience being different to mine doesn't prove my experience never happened.
Doesn’t this thing just run android and Google App Store? What a waste of decent hardware.
You can purchase the /e/os version. But it is more expensive
I installed it myself on my FP5 (bought with Android in a shop) using the online installer, which was pretty easy and obviously free of charge.
E/os is just android.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki//e/_(operating_system)
I do see that Ubuntu touch is an option though.
It’s shameful that most phones run one of two operating systems. There’s not enough competition. I’m still pissed about WebOS and Windows Phone being abandoned. I am hopeful though that web-based apps might make it possible for another OS to enter the market successfully at some point.
It is an android, which is moving towards an ai for everything trajectory which might be a privacy nightmare, I wonder if the next step of the fairphone journey is to break from android
They cooperate with Murena, so /e/OS is officially supported and you can buy new devices with /e/OS installed. I am running /e/OS on my Fairphone 5 and it works great.
They also seem to have given developer devices to the PostmarketOS folks, so that they hit the ground running with a working FP6 port already. I'm not sure exactly what is going on behind the scenes between Fairphone and PostmarketOS here - maybe @z3ntu@fosstodon.org can fill us in.
Wasn't even aware of Murena, will def have a look, thanks for sharing all that info!
600 euros? That's like 700 USD
Remind me again, wasn't like 80% of the American population on the verge of poverty and homelessness if a 500 USD emergency happened?
Who's benefiting from this?
Who in the US is buying midrange or flagship phones without a loan?
I did.
did it because I was tired of having every conversation I had popup as an ad. the "fair" part was simply a bonus.
I also refuse to use a pixel because I don't trust any firmware written by Google to not have some kind of backdoor in.
You can literally buy an excellent phone that will last you for 3-4 years for less that 400 USD, hell I'd say it's even better for the environment to buy used or refurbished phones and save even more money
Ooo they sell these in the US?
you can get them from resellers.
No
They are hardly even in the US market. Only via Murena with their e/OS/.
Can we get it for 100 bucks max?
They are aware that people can't afford to waste money on luxuries, no?
Maybe you could start a competitor that produces a similar spec phone for $100?
650€ is way too expensive for an unknown phone brand with an unknown OS installed on it smh. i'd love to buy one but considering you can get a samsung for less than 500€
What are you talking about this phone is established, this is their 6th one... and the bootloader is unlocked.
You know the price is naturally higher when materials are ethically sourced, right? That's kinda how it works..
No earphone jack again. That's a bit sad. Even though I mainly use BLT earbuds, I still sometimes wish I could use my wired headphones. It's just a small inconvenience
I had a phone without before, that one came with a simple cheap passive adapter for USB-C to 3.5mm headset. You lose out on using headphones while charging, but other than that I was never really inconvenienced...
After having a phone without a 3.5mm port or a microSD card slot, the top 2 features I want on a phone are a 3.5mm port and a microSD card slot.
Shame Sony discontinued their Xperia 5 series, even if they were also excessively priced.
I disagree about this being a good solution. USB-C is not meant to take the strain of being used as an audio port when being used in the go so there is risk of damaging the port while a headphone jack is more stable and allows the plug to rotate. Plus I don't want to have a dingle I can forget when in a rush.
You also have to remember to have that adapter with you
You can find adapters that can charge while still having a 3.5mm back
I have a tablet that came with a C to 3.5 adapter and it worked well enough for a bit but soon enough it was only intermittently allowing the headphone connection to work, with a message about the port being dirty or something. Yet I could go right from unplugging that and putting the charger in and it worked fine.
There's just no substitute for a dedicated port, especially when it barely takes up any room
It's really a small inconvenience, but using an adapter would mean I'd be prone to misplace it when I use my headphones on anything else, so it hardly makes anything better
That means the audio still goes through another DAC, lowering the sound quality, compared to an analog 3.5 jack. Also, who wants to further risk wearing out\vreaking their charge port, jack inputs almost seem like they can't break.
Not having a headphone jack is just a slap in the face from a company whose whole image is supposed to be longevity and eco-friendly.
No one has been using aux cable mobile headphones for the past 10 years. Headphone jack is e-waste at this point. bluetooth audio is great and if you really want to be a boomer you can use the usb C headphones.
I was just hoping a phone like fairphone would give me the option to buy a small module or something to let me do it.
Yes, yes there's adapters .... yes, yes, you don't need to use it ... I understand. I just want it.
You'd ultimately be sacrificing battery size for that Aux jack you hardly use. For most that's not worth it
"Modularity" but still no headphone jack, couldn't I just have a backplate with a big bump on it to accommodate a 3.5mm jack?
Big? The headphone jack is not large enough to protrude from a cell phone chassis. Any company telling you they can't fit it is just lying to sell you BT headphones.
I never use wired headphones even though I have a jack in my phone. But I have never bought a phone without a jack and probably never will.
Ipersonally think it's user hostile to remove the jack and also goes directly agains the green profile Fairphone wants to have.
Honestly feels criminal with how bloated companies have made these phones yet they cheap out on a headphone jack.
You have these usb-c to mini jack adapters. They are like 5 to 10eu. They are small enough to keep them attached to your jack headphone. It works perfectly for me.
I think it is better to view the usb-c plug as 'one protocol to rule them all'. If you do so, it makes quite some sense.
Every adapter I had was broken after a year or less. I imagine if you keep them attached to your phone, they'll break even faster. Do these adapters exist with a 90° angle which might help preventing broken cables?
Not really in the spirit of reducing waste.
I've never had one of those actually work...
Probably not a popular thing to say on here, but I think you’ve lost the battle for the earphone jack. It probably just requires way too much real estate to be practical on a modern day cell phone.
It absolutely does not require too much space. And you can still buy phones with headphone jacks, just not any of the (ironically) higher end models because OEMs know they can push their first party bluetooth headphones to these customers.
It absolutely does not. That's just the stupid propaganda companies distribute to make people buy wireless earbuds.
Exactly this, that's a lot of space taken up to connect what 4 analog wires?
That's insanity when a AUX to Usb-C converter does the job
For the amount of space a earphone jack takes it really doesn't make sense for them to include it, when you can just use a cheap adaptor cable
"For the amount of space it takes to include a second speaker or second camera it doesn't really make sense when you can just plug in an external one"
You sound like an idiot.
I can buy a phone from HMD that's more repairable, more modular, and has sustainable features.
Fairphone has been a busted flush since they ditched the headphone jack. It's just the most obvious sign amongst many they started making landfill phones.
just make the phone larger and fill the empty space with battery
Honestly, I don't really get the people who complain about the lack of 3.5mm jack on a smartphone. If you're looking for quality you're more likely to get better quality out quality USB-C headphones than quality 3.5mm headphones due to the USB-C headphones picking up less noise and having its own DAC (which is probably better than the phone DAC that 3.5mm would use).
EDIT: I would've been surprised if this take wasn't controversial. But I guess it's a good example how the fediverse is not a leftist echo chamber. You have a loud minority complaining about not being able to use a century old technology that the vast majority in the mobile space has moved away from and any compromise on what you want is unacceptable. That's about as conservative as you can get.
What about the simplicity?
You are completely and utterly wrong. I'm pretty sure that a $700 phone's dac is better than what you can find on a $5 dongle from god knows where. Also, by design there should be no "noise" or "interference" causing issues with the internal dac. If there is, you bought an extremely shitty device.