this post was submitted on 25 Sep 2025
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Linux Phones
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The Discussion on Linux-based Phones.
Benefits:
- Hardware freedom.
- Perfect operating-system competition.
- Full utilization of specs.
- Phone lifespan raises to 10+ years.
- Less e-waste.
Linux Mobile Distros:
- Postmarket OS
- Ubuntu Touch
- Mobian
- Sailfish
- Manjaro Arm
- Pure OS
- Plasma Mobile
- LuneOS
- FuriOS
- Nemomobile
- Droidian
- Mobile NixOS
- ExpidusOS
- Maemo Leste
- Tizen
- WebOS
Linux Mobile Hardware:
- Fairphone 5
- Volla Phone
- Librem 5
- PinePhone
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Now, why not just fork AOSP a la grapheneos?
Why we always have to invent something new? Why not just take the fork in the road and go build something better from it?
Thinking modern os, not even google has been able to do it (fuchsia).
Asking the question I was wondering about too. If Google wants to kill AOSP eventually that's all fine and dandy but that doesn't stop people from forking it and continuing its development. And that way, at least, we don't end up with another Windows Phone conundrum where the OS is perfectly fine but will eventually die due to lack of app compatibility (although Windows Phone's demise was helped by some truly knuckleheaded executive decisions too to be fair).
Or, failing this, all Linux phones need a flawless Android emulation layer similar to Proton for Windows games, because I am afraid it will be a significantly steep uphill battle otherwise.
We have already tons of apps for Linux.. And soo many "apps” are already just fancy websites in a container..
FirefoxOS for phones was such a great idea
I am so sad it did mot take off, was a great concept
Someone is trying to revive FirefoxOS: https://capyloon.org/
(and it kinda survives to this day as KaiOS on feature phones).
@poVoq @Petter1 Rather someone was trying until 2023 looking at their repos.
I’ll undust my pinePhone pro and flash it on it
🤔 maybe even worth filming it for peertube
Tonns of apps for linux are made with PC UX in mind and thus completely unusable on the phone.
I disagree
I have a pinePhone pro, and I love using desktop UI Apps on it. But it is too slow and has too less battery for me to be usable
But I love high DPI on small screen without Zoom
I must confess, that I currently use an iPhone as daily driver, but to come back to the topic, I have a 12mini and my browser is set to 50% all the time.
I know most apps are just webview2 these days, but since more and more companies are forcing their consumers to use apps by either gimping their websites outright or forcing users to use 2FA based on their own app, app support is vital for any mobile platform.
I speak from experience - I kept using my Nokia Lumia 1020 Windows Phone until the bitter end, which came when the government ID app stopped being supported on my device and I had to switch to keep being able to connect to the vast majority of services (Sweden's BankID system is both a blessing and a curse this way).
But I cannot order a car on my desktop, or check my bank balance.
I don't understand why that is the case.
Do banks in your country not have net-banking? You know, when you can just login using your user account and password and then just download a pdf of your transactions report?
The likes of Razorpay (this came to mind because Steam) and other merchant payment processors can connect to this bank-provided interface for transferring money without even having to give anyone your credit/debit card information.
Can't use web ux without phone.
Oh, you mean the OTP thingy, which is probably an SMS solution (which is a pretty bad idea as is)?
Or is it that you require a smartphone to be able to open the webpage?
Neither.
emulation layer is the way to go IMO, best of all the worlds.
Absolutely 100% agree. Rosetta and Proton are great examples of how native-like emulation can be implemented to help support platform transitions.
best part is that it's also inherently a way to preserve old software, it's way easier to get ancient windows games running in proton than it is on actual native windows.
Google is becoming more and more a pain the as releasing AOSP. And they're migrating towards more and more proprietary. I think the worry here is having the work power to keep it updated and maintained.
I'm guessing the idea is that with this effort, it makes more sense to migrate to Linux phones instead.
Pretty much. Google does a lot of heavy lifting, and they have a lot more pull with companies, which is why Android works now.
It really is too bad that Google didn’t have to move Android to the Linux Foundation and make it a true community project.
IMO one of the greatest parts of a pure linux phone is that nothing is new. It runs the same apps as my desktop and works in the same way, so I don't have to learn two sets of apps. Other than stuff like call management and Phosh, the desktop environment I use that's tailored for small screens, I run all pre-existing software like systemd, wayland, firefox, nautilus, etc. IMO the biggest hurdle is hardware support, since only a few phones are able to run pure linux, and even on those few, there are still many parts of the hardware that are not supported.
I assume, part of the changes Android has, would be more ways to reduce standby battery drain, tuned to mobile phones?
And maybe their alternative for systemd is more suitable for mobile phones.
And since I irrationally favour Linux, perhaps we can come up with a
systemd-mobile, tuned for RISK and ARM based mobile-phone systems, which keeps in mind, power used by cell-radio, WiFi modules, etc.But of course, first and foremost, we need to have a standardised pre-boot system, like we have for PCs, making it much easier to manage development, without piling up plastic and Silicon paperweights.
Because we want general computation machines, not walled gardens.
Honestly, I am fine with a walled garden for a mobile phone that I don't intend to do much on.
Just that, I get to decide where the wall is made and what it is made of.
Oh, and the cracks in the wall don't lead to corporations.