Much much better than my last Fairphone (which was the Fairphone 2).

I switched from an iPhone this time. I'm also enjoying that Android is a bit more programmable without rooting it - running a full Unix distribution in Termux, scripting it with Tasker to run Python scripts on events etc. Actual Firefox.

I honestly don't care much about processor speed, if it can run a browser, messaging and banking apps I'm fine. But I need to be able to take family pictures which are good enough quality for occasional full page prints.

I've always been disappointed with these kind of niche devices in the past, where the cameras were barely of the level of 2 year old sub-$200 phones, especially in capture speed and low light performance. You can't ask kids to reenact something in better lighting if you missed it the first time.

Search found (view HTML or click "More about our materials") on https://shop.fairphone.com/fairphone-5

> In addition, we account for 100% of the cobalt used in the battery by buying cobalt credits, which support the improvement of working conditions for artisanal cobalt miners in the DRC.

Presumably that's what the map signifies. Good to know/in case anyone else was curious.

Related discussion 10 years ago, only one I could find on HN https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5813730

Added: https://www.faircobaltalliance.org/supply-chain-wide-collabo... and presumably what the improvement mention above is about https://www.faircobaltalliance.org/approach/professionalizin... ?

I bought a Framework laptop for the same reason and I successfully managed to upgrade it, not repair it!

Is there a phone that allows me to upgrade over time and not only fix it?

Nowadays that's plainly not true anymore because chips hardly get faster year-to-year, but also my 2012 phone lasted 5 years before software support started to get mediocre for Android 4.4 (the hardware was still fast enough and the battery you could still replace in 20 seconds). I've only ever bought new phones for software support reasons (scheduled obsolescence) or because the GPS chip broke after they stopped supporting rooting and so I couldn't get it repaired (out of warranty) without forfeiting that.

What phones do you buy that you feel they're unusably slow after only 3 years?!

Generally, a battery swap and a factory wipe would bring most people's phones back to an acceptable performance.

it's really crazy how wasteful we're being with electronics in general. my old work laptop became unusable with windows 10, just extremely sluggish for even simple tasks. putting linux on it, its working great again (in fact writing this comment on it right now.) I wish we could put more focus on performance in the more mainstream products, but at least there's FOSS for people like me. can't wait until i can put an alpine linux on my phone someday.

I am just hoping now that I cling to this FP3 until frame.work gets bold enough to expand into phones as well.

Either you don't get any updates and at one point you can't use any app because it's outdated.

Or you get all updates and at one point you can't use any apps, because your phone became unbearably slow.

They want it this way because then they can sell more SoCs because users end up upgrading more often, and device manufacturers (besides Fairphone) don't complain because their interests are aligned.

On the Apple side you see devices getting support for much longer as Apple designs and maintains it's SoCs in-house, and at least to a degree value device longevity because that keeps second-hand prices relatively high, and that aligns somewhat with Apples interests.

Not quite 10 years, but we've seen feature updates for just under 7 years with the iPhone 6s (released 2015), and it's still receiving security updates and bug fixes.

Why is this not a problem with laptops?

I am typing this from a phone that I am already considering replacing for this very same reason although it does everything well and I looks brand new (rubber case, screen protection, etc.).

I understand phones are harder to upgrade because space is very limited but the e-waste we're generating (and the money impact) seems something that needs to be addressed.

My point is that with reasonable apps old phones work just fine. Just don't install crap apps or facebook or something like that, stick to well working apps. Use a phone as a phone, not as your universal computing interface and you should be OK for a long time.

Sounds limiting. Nowadays there are plenty of phones that can handle reasonable workloads at a reasonable price. Especially if you don't care about the camera.

I am aware more and more people only use smart phones and don't own a general computer any longer, but that is a really sad development. A smart phone will usually not encourage experimentation and getting into general computing. It is a dumbed down device.

Yes, one should be able to use a phone for computing, but generally that's not available out of the box and it takes effort to make it somewhat OK to use it for computing.

I used a motorola moto g (the one with 1 GB of RAM!) from 2015 until last year.

I imagine if this is something that lots of people want, it will result in more alternatives, but also raised prices. So it might not save money, but it might well result in less waste.

Slightly disappointed it hasn't happened yet.

Even at 5 years I only ever felt like I was upgrading because it was 'time', not out of a direct need.

I can only imagine a person getting 3 years out of a phone if they are buying junk.

I feel it's a temporary problem like PC's, where eventually they will plateau on performance and a 10YO potato will (eventually) be able to play 99% of "high end" games in some capacity, similar to how a Steam Deck can play most games (even most AAA) without special accomadations. But I imagine there will be at least 5-6 more years of moore's law before it falls off (like it did on PC around... 2015-6?)

----

could also just be a low end phone. My Asus ROG 5 lasted 2.5 ish years before it literally died (sent it in for repairs to the motherboard based on online symptoms, for 3 weeks. paid $100 for shipping... died 2 months later) and instead of buying a brand new phone I just purchased the same model for half the price I bought it at launch. Still chews through pretty much every game despite being 3 years old.

Fairphone looks mighty tempting with a replaceable battery as the only annoyance I have with my current phone (Pixel 6) is the battery is starting to lose steam.

I use it watch youtube videos, browse the web (probably not the fastest but fast enough), use Google Maps, take pictures, listen to music. Basic phone usage you know.

I suppose its somewhat of a privilege to use a modern phone only as a phone, but there's a certain smug peace of mind to be had - as well as security.

I'm also tempted to politely ask you to get off my lawn in the off-chance you are wondering about my demographic.

Turning off app updates would have the same impact if you're right about the increasing memory requirements.

Are you not able to use your bank's mobile or desktop website in your phone's browser? I don't think I've ever installed a banking app. I also use a credit union though, maybe they're less incentivized to force people onto their apps.

Customer support has requested that I use the mobile app, and that usually allows the transfer.

But I've been using devices with 4GB-6GB of memory for the past 8 years almost, and they don't feel that bad to use. My phone still has 6GB of memory and does all I want it to just fine.

(before someone mentions it, I know that my atari didn't have wifi, couldn't play full HD videos, etc, and that it was harder to develop software for it, but still, something's off IMHO)

I did upgrade a few weeks ago because the iPhone 15 cameras are amazing and I care a lot about that but I honestly had zero performance reasons to upgrade. I’ve never had an issue with a 5-6 year old phone and I always keep my old phone as a backup specifically for banking.

Somehow, I thought 4+2 GiB of ram would suffice.

Many phones are essentially abandoned by the manufacturer and don't receive any security updates not too long after release, which might just be an issue: https://source.android.com/docs/security/bulletin/2023-12-01

Not only that, but many apps won't run on the older versions of the OS either, due to the API level deprecation in Android: https://support.google.com/googleplay/android-developer/answ...

In other words, you don't really get much of a choice, unless you are buying a flagship device and not everyone will be able to do that. The same goes for the comparatively expensive iPhone devices, the cost also being a factor there for many.

To be fair my first smart phone was a Nokia Lumia 720, that thing did some damage to anything it hit.

Some people just seems to smash phones left and right and claim that they're just using them normally. I think it's just how some people interact with the world. Put an iPhone in a case and they aren't that brittle, I dropped mine plenty of times.

(Motorola Sapphire was my first, 1G, and I still have it somewhere. Powering it up would probably break several laws at this point. The SIM was an entire credit-card size also...)

https://hackaday.com/2017/01/16/shmoocon-2017-dig-out-your-o...

My only problem is replacing an iPhone battery is now $99.

I.e. Iphone 15 surely not. But iphone 5 for sure yes. Where is the cutoff?

I’m choosing iphones because they’re recognizable and have a predictable release schedule. Let’s disregard ios vs android angle if possible.

1. No wireless charging. Switching to this phone would require a big change in my household's ecosystem (sorry to use a big word for a small thing, but I can't think of a better one). We have $10 wireless charging discs all over the place, and it's nice to be able to charge whenever we set our phones down. I don't want to take a step backward.

2. The Verge's review suggests the camera is OK but not great. I've been taking Pixel photos for years, and my phone is always the one people ask to use for group shots at social events. I don't want to fuss with taking a picture ten times just to get the lighting right, and the Pixel almost always meets the bar on the first shot. It sucks that a consumption device like a phone has this one critical input feature, and that there is still so much of a computational photography gap between certain brands and the rest, but that's how it is, and it prevents me from seriously considering any of them. (This isn't unique to Pixel; I hear Apple does well in this area, too.)

3. Just a nit: why is the case 40 euros? I expect to pay a premium for the phone because of the specific compromises in the design and the resulting low volumes. But this is just another run-of-the-mill TPU case that I expect I'd have to routinely replace every couple years. I don't use screen protectors, but I have an even more allergic reaction to the 33-euro price of the one for sale. I know there are aftermarket options, but I'm already taking a risk of poor part/accessory availability in the future because it's a niche product, so I don't know whether they'll still be available when I need them years from now.

By the way, I do own a Framework laptop (11th-gen CPU), and I like it a lot. I plan to swap out the motherboard next year. Unlike the Fairphone, the Framework didn't impose cost and performance compromises right out of the gate. I support sustainability, but there's only so far I'm willing to go.

2. Totally agree with that, if camera is fundamental for you maybe not the right choice.

3. They also take compromises to have an ethical production, try to guarantee there is no exploitation as much as they could, from the extraction of mineral, manufacturing ... (they didn't do it for all, but they are advancing as far as they could, also with all existing certifications for that, so it's normal that is expensive. So our choice to value that things, if we could afford it, or not.

The percentage value looks bad but how much is that in absolute terms? Using the figures from the article, wireless charging uses 6.75 Wh more per full charge. Assuming you charge that much every day, that's 2.46 kWh per year, or 42 cents at average US electricity prices[1]. I think that's a price worth paying for the convenience.

[1] https://www.bls.gov/regions/midwest/data/averageenergyprices...

Maybe it is negligible, but I suspect that in the grand scheme of things, the whole "fair trade" thing is negligible too, it didn't stop the company from building on that. At least, it sends a good message.

One giant caveat though: wireless charging could wear out the battery faster due to the heat generated. But fast charging over cable is also bad for the battery, and that’s becoming increasingly common. At least wireless is always slow charging

Electricity can be solar, meaning that it could be close enough to zero environmental impact - think 20 years from now when we’ve got our crap together when it comes to sustainable energy..

Edit: a point below comments on increased battery wear which I fully agree with.

Wear on the phone side of the port should be considered too.

As for wear on the phone side, the good thing of having a Fairphone is that it is easily replaceable. But USB-C ports are also designed to be more robust than the cable. So unless there is a defect, it should last the life of the phone.

How on earth does someone get through one a year? Are you using it as a rope? Copper isn't cheap but should last decades, not one lousy year.

Apple cables are notoriously fragile, though.

Sure, but compared to everything else we use, smartphones use almost no energy. The one I'm typing this on has a battery capacity of 12 wh; if you have a resistive electric water heater, standing in a hot shower during the winter for an extra second would offset half of that.

My phone's battery is 4385 mAh @3.7V, or 0.016 kWh, and my power costs $0.1252/kWh, or about $0.002 per phone charge. Based on some super surface-level estimates from googling, a typical shower is about 2 gallon/min, and the cost to heat water is about $0.01-0.02 per gallon, meaning for me it's actually about 4 seconds of hot water per phone charge.

Lots of sibling replies pointing out that the absolute energy loss is negligible and reasonable price for the convenience.

That’s fine.

But there’s a bigger point. This convenience is being used as a justification for sticking with big brand phones. Which maybe tips the balance on the reasonableness, and, more broadly, raises the general issue of how much buying for convenience is a slippery slope. Maybe just charge with a cable?

Conversely, the rather slow charge rate of wireless helps extend battery life quite a lot. This is why I never use fast charging, avoid wired charging in general, and limit my battery to 85% max charge. It's been three or four years and my battery is still at ~80% health.

Which is worse, wasting a small amount of power or trashing your phone's battery in a year or two? One has significantly higher monetary and environmental costs.

Besides all that, wired charging is not nearly as efficient as you think. The charge circuitry in your phone is optimistically 80-90%. The wall adapter can be anywhere from 50 to 90%, and scales pretty closely to how much you paid for it. Efficiency also goes down with faster charge rates.

I design switching converters and lithium charge circuits for my job. They're pretty great, but not nearly as good as you'd think.

The costs of wireless are on top of all of the costs of wired. You're not getting away from battery management just because you're using the air as a very inefficient cable.

Wireless charging isn't a silver bullet either. It generates tons of waste heat, which is also bad for batteries. I'm also not sure why you're so against wired charging, especially since you have to go out of your way and pay a premium for fast charge capable chargers. If you buy a bog standard 5W/10W charger, you're not fast charging. If you plug your phone into your computer, you're likely getting slow charging (0.5A to 1A).

I use an extremely old wireless charging stand that doesn't even hit 500mA. It gets warm, but not hot. It takes all damn night to charge which suits me just fine.

That said, I agree with you, which is why I've explicitly disabled fast wireless charging. The heat is almost as bad as excessive charge current. Though both heat and excessive current together is much worse than either individually. Which is exactly what you get with super fast charging modes, and why I disable those modes.

Generally, phones ship with at least a 20W charger these days. It's fine, probably.

Really my whole deal here is that my phone has a non-replacable battery. Paying someone to crack it open and replace the battery would cost a lot more than I'm willing to pay. My goal is to preserve the battery for as long as I can so I don't have to trash the whole phone.

Ultimately, this is a decision made for myself based on my own professional experience with lithium batteries and associated electronics. I definitely wouldn't recommend everyone do everything I'm doing; it is a bit excessive. But that's just how I like to do things.

If you're on the road and using your laptop's USB-C charger to charge your phone then it'll easily supply enough power for the fastest charge mode of any phone.

I don't know about other Android phones, but Google's Pixel line of phones will do a slow charge overnight and time the top off to be in line with your morning alarm. So, my thought is that effort is being made here to extend battery life by specifically not fast charging overnight.

I bought a Huawei P30 Pro in early 2019, never took care of preserving the battery, always used fast charging (which is very fast in that phone, 40 W). 4 years later, the battery is still going strong (now the phone belongs to my wife).

On the other hand, I bought a Pixel 6 Pro in early 2021. From the beginning, I saw that the battery barely lasted a day of heavy usage, so I was more careful (trying to never get below 20%, deactivating 5G, etc.), plus the phone charges slower (around 20 W, I think) and has built-in charge planning to charge slower overnight. Even with all that, two years later, the battery is absolute crap. If I'm going to use the phone frequently (e.g. when travelling) I need an external battery to last though the day.

The energy waste is a shame, but the convenience factor is mighty high, not to mention the wear and tear on your USB-C port is non-existent. Maybe one point for less USB cable waste and tossing perfectly good phones just because their USB ports are damaged?

The concern about wireless inefficiency is very well-placed, however, in the case of electric cars. EVs will become an enormous consumer of electricity in the near future, so small changes now can have a big cumulative effect. "Charge your car as conveniently as your phone" would be an effective marketing tagline, so to that extent I agree that phones set a bad example for needless energy consumption in the name of convenience.

(edit: oops, bunch of other commenters made the same point while I was writing mine)

I don't think so. For one, with EVs you are paying pretty directly for the charge and nearly 50% extra for the hassle of not plugging in the cable seems excessive. For a charging station it would probably be more profitable to hire someone to plug your car in instead of going wireless, even disregarding the setup cost.

But, more importantly, fast wireless charging generates heat. This is fine for the miniscule amount of energy in phones, but would probably pose a serious problem with the wattage involved in changing EVs. We're currently at the point of having charging cables with integrated cooling, the inefficiency of wireless would likely either cook the car or limit the speed too much to be viable ("charge your car as conveniently as your phone, in a meager three days!").

That's also the main reason I'm not interested in wireless charging. A wire works fine, and it seems pretty obvious to me that wireless can never be as efficient. But I never had exact support for this belief, so thank you for that.

> Totally agree with that, if camera is fundamental for you maybe not the right choice.

With their modular approach, it would be nice if you could buy a better camera for it. I know that suggestion has been around since Fairphone 2, so I guess there must be a good reason why they're not doing that.

But if Fairphone was popular enough, I bet there would be a massive aftermarket for such upgrades.

On the other hand, it seems that wireless charging is also the reason why many modern phones have these stupidly fragile glass backs. So your whole phone gets more vulnerable.

TBH some wired chargers are only 60 percent efficient in converting AC to DC. Then you'll also have energy losses inside the phone converting 5vdc to 3.7vdc for the lithium battery.

But, what? this is ~7 watts per charge completely full charge?

One could do the following and offset those 7 watts with a lot more to spare:

Add another layer of insulation.

Add a heat pump.

Add solar panels to your roof.

Stop mining Bitcoin.

Not to mention all the previous generations of phones that had it.

Oh well.

The only thing that make it drain faster is if I use a lot the GPS but that is usually when I am travelling in a vehicule and in those rare cases it is plugged and charging while operating.

I think you have a social media addiction issue if you have to charge your phone several times a day.

Do you use battery saver mode? I actually try not to fully charge my phone, but keep it between 30%-70%, which puts less strain on it, and battery saver kicks on at 50%.

I'm shocked we have come to this as a society. If you don't accept any compromises, just admit that you don't really care and move on.

The whole idea of smartphone cameras is that nobody is editing RAWs. I have issues with the GP comment but wanting a high quality camera is not one of them. Taking decent-to-great smartphone photos, whether inane or artistic, is a staple of modern life. (Although it sounds more like a status thing in their case, like they don't want someone else in their social group to be the go-to photographer? Maybe it was just not worded clearly.)w

People preferring this phone's photos is just evidence that it actually takes better snapshots, rather than me being biased about my own tech choices. Wrangling a bunch of parents and children for a photo is hard enough. I like knowing that the camera won't be yet another reason why we need to wrangle everyone twice rather than just once.

(Fully agreed on the RAW thing. Photography for me isn't a hobby; it's just a way for the family to remember what everyone looked like last Thanksgiving, preferably not with someone's face silhouetted by poor lighting.)

I just bought a new phone. I didn't feel good about my fairphone experience.

For what it's worth, I don't know of any systemic problems / higher than usual error rates with the Fairphone 3 main board. You got unlucky.

Consider giving them another shot sometime!

And their support tells you to pretty much f-off without are purchase receipt, even if you want to buy the part. It's garbage.

That said, one reason for the Fairphone price is the "fair to the people labouring for the parts of the phone" part. I'm unhappy with the camera quality, but honestly knowing that the premium I pay means fairer working conditions is for me an important element. I prefer to pay the small social enterprise establishing a new kind of supply chain and developing a modular phone, rather than the Samsung CEOs and stockholders.

It's probably not as suitable for phones what with changes to antenna requirements and such though.

However, I do want to point out that when such unfortunate things happen, perhaps the remaining parts that still works could be helpful to other fairphone users?

I was hoping for more upgrades to be available over time, but that was never the case. Instead, two new models appeared with a year interval and the 4 didn't even get any upgrades. Worse even, the 3.5mm jack was removed, following the trend of getting customers to buy headphones with a limited life time due to their battery. The promise of being the responsible choice for the planet is fading away.

I also faced issues when it came to repairing my device. After only 3 months the USB-C port died, impossible to charge it and once out of battery, I couldn't get my data from it. I contacted the support and they offered me two solutions: I send in the phone, it will get fixed but wiped clean or I order the part online and they reimburse me (they couldn't just send it from the repair center...). I chose the latter as I didn't want to loose my data and felt it was the more ecologically responsible choice, especially since the phone is so repairable. Well, the part was not available on their store, checked every retailer in Europe and third party parts don't exist. I was stuck with a brick for 4 months. The irony is that if I had an iPhone or Galaxy, I could get it fixed the same day at the phone repair shop around the corner...

I appreciate all the efforts Fairphone put in setting up more responsible supply chains. But in my opinion they still failed on their sustainability promise. The devices aren't well supported, it's difficult to repair them and they quickly fall behind due to the lack of upgrades (that also goes with the main board not being replaceable). New devices follow the disastrous trends of other brands with a new model each year and removing the headphone jack. Sure, they are a business and need to make money, but not by going against their own values.

Another friend got rid of her FP2 this spring in favor of a FP4, but only because some apps she uses got really unusable. Otherwise she would've stayed.

IMO it's a fairly good platform and I'm looking forward to how it evolves in the future. Hopefully they will introduce a smaller phone at one point.

I think batteries are the main consumable of a phone. It seems to me there should be an after-market of smaller batteries, and a set of universal power adapters (like you get with power supplies), and shims to fit it securely within the phone.

But I haven't seen this, so either people prefer to upgrade (demand) or manufacturers successfully made it too hard (supply).

Out of context, this sounds so wrong.

Oh, actually, I guess I do know why an opaque part of a thousand dollar phone is made out of incredibly fragile glass, but I’ve made it two years without cutting myself too terribly badly and I’m not planning on replacing it while it still works.

(Obviously, the front glass is broken too but that’s utterly unremarkable for an apple product).

The options are basically just plastic or glass. At least with the current phones it's now possible to replace this glass if it breaks.

Really nothing is forbidding them to release nice plastic phones.

The only reason they won’t is that they want this shiny aspect in their App Store because the consumer will hide this under a mandatory case if they intend to keep it for years.

Well It’s a shame thinking of all those nice things we could have if we actually decided to break corporate monopolies. But now we are stuck between stupid glass phones without default applications and Google spy phones.

Of course I don't have a wireless charger but hey, progress.

I'd rather have a sturdy phone that doesn't require a separate case. In fact, the replaceable body of my old Fairphone 2 is a much better idea.

2 years later, she broke back and screen. Mine while all scratched up is still intact. Went underwater at least 5 times. Number of falls on concrete, tiles, etc.

That's parent's point, don't use glass panels on the back of a phone.

I put half of the blame on reviewers promoting the idea that glass is "premium" and letting phone makers get away with this design choice.

Apple largely have the competence and the marketing power to make everyone believe that their premium plastic is amazing. In fact, they managed to make us believe that for glass which must be one of the cheapest materials on earth to produce.

> You tossed it onto a tile floor

You seem to have intentionally omitted some pretty important information there.

Which doesn't surprise me. I've dropped case-less phones on concrete and asphalt many times with only minor scratching to the frame. But I've also seen people drop phones onto decent-pile carpets and break their screens. It's hard to predict what will happen.

to get serious for a moment though, id like to go against the anti-glass grain by pointing out that supposedly, successive generations of Corning Gorilla Glass get stronger by some multiple each time, yet we see phone screens smashing with the same regularity because manufacturers are just using thinner panes each time (probably chasing thinner phones more so than some kind of planned obsolescence conspiracy, although both explanations are credible). so we end up with a tradeoff between thickness, durability and glass backs, but that beats having to rule out durable phones with glass backs entirely from being able to exist

my iPhone 4 battery went up in smoke after owning it for 1.5 years.

my iPhone 6 plus developed touch disease after 2 years, the replacement developed touch disease after a week, and the second replacement began exhibiting mild symptoms after a couple months, the nand failed after another 2 years. (applecare replacements mind you.) plus I wasn't a huge fan of apple trying to sweep the issue under the rug until it gained nationwide attention.

I think you mean a trade off.