I was hesitant for a long time, but I’m not using the Murena Fairphone 6 here in the states. I see a lot of people hesitant about it, will it work for X or Y, etc. Suprisingly there are very very few things that haven’t worked for me, it’s mostly a fork of LineageOS with microG.
Still, I wanted to open a forum for folks who are ready to leave Google thanks to them killing off installing your own apps, maybe my experience will help those who are questioning if they should or not
hows the Banking apps though?
most banks block unsupported OS’s
This was a big worry for me switching over. I can say that I’ve set up 3 separate (large) banks and all three have functioned without a hitch. I think microG is doing a lot of lifting, it basically manages that attestation
Have you found an alternative use for the Fairphone Moments switch? Did /e/OS include anything to set that up?
Nothing too exciting, it’s a killswitch which disables mic and camera
I’m mostly in the States, but i travel to Asia, will it work there? I’m on fi.
This unfortunately I can’t answer as I haven’t traveled since I got it, but if fi works I would assume it would still work there. From what I understand that’s more about the antenna in the phone and the coverage, and the antenna works with the standard T-Mobile network
I am a T-Mobile user, so does it work on the T-Mobile network? I can’t remember if Google Fi is a T-Mobile MVNO at this point or not. Though to be fair, if I was to get that device, I would be putting LineageOS on it because I honestly hate EOS with their iOS-like design and the fact that it has the Micro-G services on it.
I have mint. The fairphone 4 works with it. I would expect 6 would be fine.
From what I understand, yes it will. Fi is a T-Mobile MVNO and they explicitly say they run on all T-Mobile MVNOs
Cool, thanks
I have no desire to stay on Google, but also have a lot of use cases to migrate before I can cut loose. Shared calendars, email accounts (should be able to sync with FairEmail as I work on migrating accounts), maps (OSM address search never works for me), Fi carrier, maybe others. Was the LineageOS transition a big change? How often do you need to troubleshoot for app installation, carrier configuration, etc?
I have many of the same issues, and was able to work through it. Their /e/OS comes bundled with microG, and Google Services replacement. Because of this, I was able to install:
Google Calendar Gmail Google Maps Google Fi (Fi is my carrier, but I’m looking for a new one)
Installing apps was as simple as downloading the relevant Google app from the “App Lounge”, which is a Play Store equivalent. The only Google thing I couldn’t do was enable my Google Calendar for my work account, because they require a YubiKey, and there’s something there blocking it, but they claim to be working on it for the next major release of microG.
There was a bit of fear when I set it up that I wouldn’t be able to set up Fi, the first login attempt to my google account failed, but the second one passed perfectly fine.
How about messengers?
Specifically Signal and Threema.
Are they still working as expected?
This is the biggest fear I have. Messaging is essential, but often seems to rely on google services for real time message push.
I am currently using a vanilla LineageOS with basic Google Services and Apps installed because of this fear.Well how is it?
Good and bad, but mostly good. It’s a solid phone, it does pretty much everything I could ask for. I was really nervous when I tried to activate it (I’m still on Google Fi, for now until I decide on a good carrier), and it activated without a hitch. The /e/OS App Lounge has pretty much every app, at least there aren’t any I haven’t found.
Setup was like setting up a phone back in the gingerbread days. Completely green field, figuring out what apps I liked and what I didn’t, there was definitely no guided “this is your phone”, more of a “Okay here you are, go make it your own now” vibe, like original Android.
No wallet, and I haven’t been able to get my Samsung watch to work with it, but there’s hope on the horizon there. For me, these are worth it to leave Google behind.
It doesn’t have every bell and whistle, I’d say it’s nothing fancy. It’s a solid phone. It has a good camera, battery, screen, but nothing amazing. I’d say it’s very… fair.
Are you able yo use banking apps?
How about websites do they all pretty much work?
Update: I installed 3 separate (large) banking apps and all worked without a hitch, absolutely no problems
Haven’t run into any sites that don’t work, but I did install Firefox with ublock like my last phone, and so haven’t used the built-in browser much. FF handles everything perfectly, and no ads.
Haven’t tried banking apps, I’ll download a couple tonight and try them out and report back
From my initial research for my own Samsung watch, I think you’ll probably be required to use the Samsung app to connect your watch as Samsung uses a non-standard bluetooth encryption which requires their specific app to connect correctly. I tried many times with gadgetbridge to no luck.
That’s what I’m finding too, I tried with the Samsung app but it gets stuck at "Accept T&C"s page, which microG doesn’t have implemented. There’s a bounty out for that that I’m going to be contributing for
How’s the camera?
So far I haven’t had any issues, I’ll let their specs speak more for me: https://www.fairphone.com/en/2025/08/07/lets-talk-fairphone-gen-6-cameras/
I’ll say as an average photo taker mostly taking photos on vacations, it’s been a solid camera. Never felt that the resolution or quality is bad. Maybe you’d notice if you really really cared and wanted to come from iPhone? This question is tricky for me because it’s subjective. For me, I’m happy with it.
