zeech

GrapheneOS is focused on being as secure as possible. When you put root access into the equation, all the security protections are irrelevant if apps are able to bypass them at will.

It's really not that hard to do, just antithetical to the purpose of the OS.

The name for that is letterboxing. The Tor Browser (and the Mullvad browser, based on the Tor one, and Firefox as of v. 67 with an about:config flag) all support it.

There are also add-ons that perform the same basic function with some added customisability [0].

[0] https://addons.mozilla.org/en-US/firefox/addon/canvasblocker...

GrapheneOS only supports Pixels due to their having superior security features [0]. Calyx supports Pixels as well as some newer Motos and the Fairphone 4 and 5 [1]. Lineage supports tons of devices [2].

LineageOS is the only one of the three that supports older hardware, but I'd recommend getting a previous-gen Pixel for the seven-year (at least) support cycle.

[0] https://grapheneos.org/faq#supported-devices

[1] https://calyxos.org/docs/guide/device-support/

[2] https://wiki.lineageos.org/devices/

From https://calyxos.org/news/2025/06/11/android-16-plans/ -

> Google did not publish any device-specific source code for supported, modern Pixel devices.

> In previous years, Google released full device trees alongside new Android versions. This allowed developers to build and boot AOSP on Pixel hardware relatively easily.

> With Android 16, only the platform/framework code has been released. The device trees are missing, at least for now.

> This means AOSP 16 cannot currently be built or run on any recent Pixel device easily just using official source. It’s unclear whether this is a delay or a policy change. Either way, it seriously disrupts custom ROM development and our porting efforts.

Discussion at https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=43969827

Ooh thanks for the rec, I hadn't heard of Knalpot before.