The best Linux phones you can buy right now
tuxphones.com
tuxphones.com
> there is a lot of choice of mobile Linux devices right now, although their level of maturity does not often allow them to be used as a reliable replacement of commercial solutions. Think of them as beta devices for a new ecosystem, or playgrounds for the future mobile Linux environments.
Their #1 choice, Pinephone, is an incredible project. But still under development, not ready as a daily driver for normies. I assume this means all their other choices are even less stable.
Looking forward to the day when Linux phones are indeed daily driver ready.
Indeed - we mention it briefly at many points, these are just for enthusiasts!
The variety and quality of the ports has become, thankfully, better in the last months - I've heard of people using the PinePhone as a daily driver, but mostly as a "dumb" phone with a browser. Waydroid makes using IM apps slightly easier, but still has a long way to go
The main bottleneck for most is battery life, which is still far inferior to Android's under many points. But e.g. dual-booting devices is slowly becoming feasible, and allows to switch between an Android phone and a tiny Linux computer within minutes, filling at least a small part of this gap.
Also: tl;dr since the post is long, usability-wise the OnePlus/Poco are the only ones on the list with "flagship-like" speed, others are a compromise between open (sometimes laptop-like) linuxy hardware and a modern mobile device.
Yes please please please put these disclosures at the top. Find some way to celebrate it even. Pinephone is an incredible project from a development standpoint and because of its potential to someday be a consumer phone.
But it is still YEARS away from being a daily driver. You are not helping anyone by implying the phone is ready for a daily driver. And unless I'm misunderstanding your audience, 99% of people who read this will say "oh neat, Linux phone, I'll try that".
I did that with Pinephone. I'm reasonable with copy pasting command line stuff, but overall I wanted a phone that works as a daily driver. I resold my Pinephone within 24 hours on eBay.
Pinephone is NOT ready as a daily driver. That is the exception rather than the rule, anyone who says they can use it as a daily driver in my experience means as a feature phone (makes calls, sends texts). I highly doubt any of the other options on your list are better.
Here's my situation. I WANT there to be open source options for phones. And I'm fine that the option doesn't exist today, that's okay, I can wait. But to get where I need it to be, Linux phones need tons more development, developers, enthusiasts, and enthusiasm.
People like me coming in and potentially buying one and then saying "oh it sucks" does NOT help the cause. It kills enthusiasm.
Please help stir up enthusiasm in the right place. Help non-enthusiasts get excited too and understand their role. Maybe include a paragraph for "people excited about linux phones who aren't linux wizards", and tell them that this exciting phone option is in the works for them, baking in the oven, you can even smell it -- and it will be ready in a year or two, which is sooooooo cool.
What about the title "The best phones for Linux wizards to mess around with"?
I would also disclose in the article which phones you've actually tested and how you tested them. One might presume that you've simply read online about all these options.
Hat tip to HN for being the type of place I can talk to the author of this article :)
> I would also disclose in the article which phones you've actually tested and how you tested them. One might presume that you've simply read online about all these options.
We are currently in three at TP, and all of these choices (except the very last 2 places) are phones that either of us owns, or that someone I directly know develops personally on, in which case I contacted their Linux port authors to understand better the degree of support.
> That is the exception rather than the rule, anyone who says they can use it as a daily driver in my experience means as a feature phone (makes calls, sends texts).
Agreed. I have just tried to make the disclosures much clearer (big scary banner), let me know if it looks better for you.
- R.
What's still missing for me hardware-wise is only the battery. Software-wise, the largest missing feature is IM (WhatsApp/Signal/etc). I hope to bridge all IM over Matrix/XMPP whatever, which I can then access on mobile linux. And since the PinePhone is comparable to your usual smartphone in terms of size, carrying around an additional power banks seems to be worth it for me.
Don't get me wrong: I'd not _recommend_ it. But I am willing to give up some UX for running this OS.
Also, devices that are extremely customizable/configurable and NOT locked-down or artificially restricted to a subset of what is technically feasible.