GrapheneOS Finally Ready To Break Free From Pixels 35
GrapheneOS, the privacy-focused Android fork once exclusive to Google Pixels, is partnering with a major Android OEM to bring its hardened, de-Googled OS to Snapdragon-powered flagship phones. Android Authority reports: Until now, GrapheneOS has been available only on Pixel phones, making Google's flagships popular among privacy enthusiasts, journalists, and, as a Spanish police report suggested earlier this year, even organized crime groups in Catalonia. But that Pixel exclusivity may end by 2026 or 2027. GrapheneOS revealed in a Reddit thread that it has been working with a "major Android OEM" since June 2025 to enable official support for "future versions of their existing models." These devices will reportedly use flagship Snapdragon chips, a notable shift from Google's in-house Tensor processors.
The project explained that only Pixels have met its strict security and update requirements so far. However, the new partnership suggests that another OEM is finally matching those standards. GrapheneOS also hinted that the mysterious partner's devices will be "priced similarly to Pixels" and available globally as part of the brand's standard lineup.
The project explained that only Pixels have met its strict security and update requirements so far. However, the new partnership suggests that another OEM is finally matching those standards. GrapheneOS also hinted that the mysterious partner's devices will be "priced similarly to Pixels" and available globally as part of the brand's standard lineup.
Awesome! (Score:2, Interesting)
Now if only I hadn't found GrapheneOS unusable for my workflows...
Re:Awesome! (Score:5, Funny)
What “workflows” can you possibly have on a phone?
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What âoeworkflowsâ can you possibly have on a phone?
This makes you sound unaware that a phone is a general purpose computer with more power than any of us had just a couple of decades ago.
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What "workflows" can you possibly have on a phone?
This makes you sound unaware that a phone is a general purpose computer with more power than any of us had just a couple of decades ago.
Yes, that is true, but the grandparent perhaps was referring to the fact that the user interface on phones is excruciatingly bad for anything other than entertainment and communication. Sure, you might be able to use it in a pinch to do actual work, but for general-purpose productivity, a modern phone would be left in the dust compared even to a laptop from 25 years ago. CPU and memory in a device are not the only factors for productivity. In fact, I'd argue for general use (e.g., writing, spreadsheets, l
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Yes, that is true, but the grandparent perhaps was referring to the fact that the user interface on phones is excruciatingly bad for anything other than entertainment and communication.
Yeah, sure, it only has ten times as many pixels as machines I was doing work on decades ago.
I'd argue for general use (e.g., writing, spreadsheets, light computations), screen size and keyboard will be the primary factors driving productivity.
A larger screen and keyboard can be attached to any non-crippled phone.
A lot of people are doing everything on phones and tablets now. And many of those phones have nearly tablet-sized displays.
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Yeah and what "work" are you doing on this pocket computer?
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This makes you sound unaware that a phone is a general purpose computer with more power than any of us had just a couple of decades ago.
It makes you sound unaware that most of that power is used to serve you adds while you click on the screen to before buying a token to skip the level of a boring game you never wanted to play in the first place.
But on a more serious note, it doesn't matter if it's a damn quantum supercomputer. Workflows imply interaction. Beyond scanning a QR code phones are useless for most tasks regardless of how big their processors are. The pocket computer was relegated to a simple calendar as well for the same reason.
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Beyond scanning a QR code phones are useless for most tasks regardless of how big their processors are.
This is silly. You can run whatever you want on a phone, and while more pixels and more real estate are better (he saw himself type on his 42.5" 4k TV) you can still do a lot with a small screen. Work is done with phones every day. It's of course absolutely true that most people are mostly consuming content with their phones rather than creating it, but that doesn't negate actual uses like CRM and data collection which are completely viable on a small-screen device.
Having all that processing power on the ph
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You can run whatever you want on a phone
Of course you can.
But we don't. That's just the simple fact of it. My point is more powerful than a computer I used to draft my thesis and simulate the EM emission from the radio cavity in it. But I don't do that. Not only is the software not available, but actually using the interface in that way would likely drive me to beat myself to death with my own coffee tamp.
You can talk about the hardware capabilities of a phone all you want, the very real reality is virtually no one other than an Instagram influen
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FFs man 99.9% of people get an email on their phone and say "oh I should reply to that!" and walk over to their computer.
https://www.abc4.com/gtu/ameri... [abc4.com]
Fingers crossed they'll make small ones too (Score:2)
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For balance... I'm always looking for something huge that isn't a flagship Pro Ultra XL Plus megabucks model, because I'm old and the bigger the screen the more easily I can read it.
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Two weeks ago, the battery started swelling again, so I just broke down and bought a Pixel 9. Awesome phone, aaaand I kinda hate it. Too big. Too heavy. Way too damned slippery (I hate putting cases on my phones).
What I really want is something the size of the old OnePlus X. That was a great ph
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To be fair, being a paranoid schizophrenic at least to a some degree is something of a given in that extreme end of "protecting privacy" space. Normal people don't go quite as far as building a phone OS with as strict rules for privacy as Graphene. As at least some of those rules make phone borderline unusable for things most people use their phones for. This really isn't a phone you can give to anyone other than a very privacy conscious power user who knows and wants to fuck around with settings to make th
Re: To recap (Score:1)
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You appear to be confusing security and privacy.
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Don't think you've ever used GOS (Score:2)
GrapheneOS is my daily driver. Some falsehoods that you're spreading:
As at least some of those rules make phone borderline unusable for things most people use their phones for.
Such as? I have the phone working with my banking applications, Android Auto compatibility is solid, and all of my apps run without issue. No more tap-to-pay, tho, but I just pull out my credit cards for that.
This really isn't a phone you can give to anyone other than a very privacy conscious power user who knows and wants to fuck around with settings to make things work
I've found that there's pretty much a 1:1 correspondence between being security conscious and having more technical acumen than a boomer-noob. I'd be amazed if you could find anyone in their potential audience (e.g., security concerne
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For those who wonder why small time privacy conscious OS projects never make it big, this user explains it very well with his attitude.
And like I mention above, this sort of cult mentality is unfortunately pretty much a necessity to handle a project this big while being as much under fire as you get when you build something like this. It's an inherently cultish endeavor that requires a very specific psychological profile, as you need to constantly reject attacks from the outside while building and building
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Interesting that instead of responding to their points, you move to attack the person. Makes it seem like maybe your points are weak and you have nothing left.
FWIW, I started using Graphene a while back and have found it largely perfectly usable as well. Nothing they said is wrong, nearly everything I could use on an "accepted" android version works. Banking apps, games that used play protect (and whatever Google uses now) still work. Wallet works though cries about the OS but I don't use NFC, so for me, it
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All I did was use your emotional write up as an example of an excellent average data point of an observable pattern in this and many other similar projects.
I even explain why this pattern exists, and why it's probably necessary for it to exist. I even take your own observation as to why this specific thing is entirely unsuitable for larger audience, and note that extreme disagreeability (in psychometric terms) such as you express is not just normal, but unfortunately required in such projects. "Fuck you, I
Re:To recap (Score:5, Informative)
famous for spreading false information and attacking other open source projects
your statement prompted me to look at graphene more closely, in particular at your claims of misinformation spread and attacking other open source projects. i've found that those claims are not really substantiated. they're based on other online claims that have all been debunked, a judicial process against the lead author that was turned down in court and then withdrawn and some aspects of his personality and communication style that seem to me greatly exaggerated besides irrelevant. so unless you could provide new facts i would conclude that it's you who are spreading misinformation, and very ironically this could actually be interpreted as an attack on an open source project. this might be unintentional in which case i would suggest a bit of research and fact checking before making such bold claims.
So to recap
to recap, i'm considering a replacement for my pixel, an otherwise excellent piece of hardware, not because i want to become a drug dealer (my dealings with that are pretty modest and i don't need a phone for them), but mainly because i'm getting sick both with google's increasing shenanigans and the eu's concerning totalitarian drift. since this is a medium term project i was looking at the potential of linux phones, but i find now that graphene is a quite promising alternative, at least as a transition, so thanks for the hint.
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gee (Score:2)
I had it on good authority that this wasn't possible because only pixel phones have certain security features. Snort
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It was always arbitrary to claim they couldn't do a more secure OS without those specific features, since most of their security features do not require the not-that-Pixel-specific features they claimed were necessary. Since their OS is not 100% secure since none are, they were always able to achieve their goal of increasing security without those features.
pixel was first with 3+ years of security updates (Score:2)
Google leading the pack (ARM TrustZone plus discrete RISCv5 security silicon running an open OS, first consumer device with functional ARMv9 memory tagging) with adding exotic hardware security features is jus
Good (Score:2)
Positive Step, Thank you (Score:2)
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Im a skeptic (Score:2)
There is too much money to be in data collection and harvesting for ad profiling purposes for me to trust these deals. How sad is it that all the promise of the internet and AI is being debased to drive consumerism?