That’s good news. I hope it’s a budget device with a plastic case, SD card, IR emitter, notification LED, and headphone jack.
And a user replaceable battery!
I’d rather have it be a bit more mid to upper range, I want a nice processor and decent cameras
I don’t have any use for a “nice processor”. I have a basic one and I don’t have any problems with it.
As for cameras, I think it’s pretty clear at this point that it’s all about the software. The Pixel was winning blind smartphone camera tests with >10 y/o sensors.
The sensor size also plays a part, the pro has a pretty large sensor for a phone.
We’re talking about the pixel 7a here, the budget model, not a “pro” anything. It doesn’t have a large sensor.
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winning blind smartphone camera tests
It’s not hard to be the best blind smartphone camera.
LOL ok
Google literally made their own processor for those results though. The tensor chips might not be as high end, but it’s not a budget phone chip.
Samsung and Apple make their own processors too…?
sam sung did, they abandoned for thier higher end models, i think thier “budgety phones” still use thier processor.
I’m not saying they couldn’t get results with another processor, but that it still wouldn’t be a “cheap” processor found in a budget device
The Pixel 7a is a budget device.
In a sense, but it’s more of a mid-budget phone. I’m thinking like $200 phones. Maybe the landscape is different than what I’m considering nowadays.
Edit: I might not be giving Motorola enough credit either lol
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e-ink screen! i adored the motorola-f3 with the led segment screen
My crackpot theory is that we’re 10 years away from e-ink displays becoming the new hot thing. The clarity of looking at something that isn’t backlit is great. If they can solve refresh rate and resolution, we’re there.
Clarity can also be achieved with a 4k panel. Once your panel gets over 600ppi it’s gonna blow an eink screen out of the water at its own game. Those phones were barely ever made only Sony even tried. Probably due to battery life, or maybe noone realized what they do to the reading experience.
Either way we’re gonna improve battery life and maybe even get microled before eink ever gets competitive with emissive screens. Someone is bound to rediscover that you never truly needed eink for comfortable reading, just a significant increase in resolution.
For people who don’t watch videos in the phone, e-ink already offer nice refresh ratios. There are also a few with dual screens.
By the way, there’s also the nxtpaper technology, which I’m pretty curious about, but I never used it to know if it’s really good for the eyes
Don’t forget when you could listen to fm radio using the headphone jack as an antenna.
I thought that was going to be the future, but it’s easier to sell music from your music store when you kill am/fm radio.
And no notch or circle in my display!
This site is a (possibly AI) content mill. The sources are all circular.
It probably isn’t Motorola.Edited, see comment for clarifications…
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47053243
GrapheneOS was contacted by one of the largest Android OEMs in June 2025 and we’re actively working with them. They’re going to be announcing our partnership in March 2026 and the phones meeting our requirements with official GrapheneOS support are scheduled for 2027.
Xiaomi, Huawei, Honor, and Vivo are all larger OEMs than Motorola.
https://grapheneos.social/@GrapheneOS/116148741815778719
We never ruled out working with Motorola, Samsung, Nothing, OnePlus, etc. We said none of their current devices meet our requirements which remains the case for all of them. Only future devices from our OEM partner can be supported and it’s going to take time to meet all of the update and security feature requirements. It’s planned for 2027 but we aren’t sure when in 2027 the devices will be launched. There’s a lot of work to get done on updates, MTE, etc. before then.
That sucks because Motorola actually is great at hardware
I would love something with a good camera (sensor & (zoom) optics).
one of the largest
The source is not this publication, the source is Motorola, as posted by a user on Reddit.
True. They are 11th or 12th so that is one of the largest.
I just meant they for the other comments just reference themselves.
Anyway, it would be neat to have more options and this isn’t the first time it has been brought up
https://www.androidauthority.com/graphene-os-major-android-oem-partnership-3606853/
This is especially good news since Motorola makes some of the few phones with a headphone jack. I just hope that whatever phone they make isn’t some nearly 7" behemoth like their current line.
At this point you HAVE to make it a 7" behemoth to get sales, but a lower-volume model with a smaller screen would be a great addition to the lineup. But I can’t imagine too many people buy them because Apple stopped making the Minis and they don’t usually stop making things that make them money. I actually loved my 13 mini. If this Motorola-GrapheneOS partnership ends up spawning a phone of that size (I do think a lot of privacy enthusiasts may also be smaller phone enthusiasts), I may finally go back to Android.
Xperia 5 still sells. Mine is a bit over 5".
Edit: ok, sells not that good. Why? Mine often gets jealous glances in public transport. Fits nicely in hand and pocket.
Xperia is massively overpriced, full of bloatware, trash software, 2 years of software updates, and they’re absolutely massive. And not just massive but like, insanely tall. Hard to believe they’re still around while LG has called it quits.
Oh, it’s only the Xperia 5 line then?
About the bloatware; rooted, removed, soon LineageOS on this one too. Same advice for phones as for PC: reinstall on a new device, factory OS is bloated with malware.
Man I remember when they made some of the best phones. Granted this was like a decade, decade and a half ago. My first Android phone was an Xperia that was still Sony Ericsson rather than Sony, and the only really noticeable things it added to AOSP were the launcher (not nearly as bad as TouchWiz at the time) and the display and sound were pretty good for a midrange phone made in the very early 2010s.
Well, I’m not even asking for a true “mini” phone at this point, because we both know that would be asking too much. I just would just be happy with something like a 5.5-5.7" phone with a resolution that isn’t insulting (looking at you Librem 5) and some halfway decent storage. If the Moto collab phone doesn’t end up being viable for me due to size or other factors, I’ll live. My current Pixel should be supported on GrapheneOS for a good while, so I can hold out. I’ve already moved to using a DAP for listening to music because I couldn’t get a decent phone with a headphone jack anymore. Maybe one of the linux phones will be viable as a daily driver by then.
I mean that IS mini. The iPhone 13 mini, considered a tiny phone by most people, had a 5.4" screen.
I of course remember thinking my 5.0" Moto G (2nd gen) was a huuuge ass slab compared to my previous phone lol
I got my Nexus One out the other day and it still booted. The screen is 3.7", it’s hilarious that it felt like a large phone at the time.
To be fair, the bezels were huge by today’s standards, and one of the main (non-Apple) competitors had a hardware keyboard below the screen. Just think how much more usable these old smaller phones would be, if we had the screen to body ratio of the Pixel 9a.
I actually don’t mind the bezel so much. If someone put out a Nexus One clone with modern hardware and an unlocked bootloader, I’d be first in line. That programmable trackball that was also an LED indicator was so cool.
Give me a Nexus S or Moto X 2013, but I’d probably be happier with a Nexus 5 for the extra screen size. But man, the Nexus S and Moto X (also the Palm Pre) were just so nice in the hand.
I’ll never forget carrying around my Galaxy Note 2 and this guy asked me if it played DVDs LOL
Most people I’ve talked to in real life have complained about how large phones are and wish there were still smaller phones available. Maybe I’m just some gravitational nexus of small phone likers, but I think there is some other factor at play other than consumer preference.
Perhaps the issue is that they sell too well and canibalize the larger phone market, which probably has higher margins, sales people at stores often also get payed a commission so they probably have an incentive to nudge people towards larger phones.
I bought my current phone, a Motorola Moto G Stylus (2025), because I of its hardware support. It has E-SIM plus a physical SIM slot, SD card support, and a headphone jack. The one downside is not having any custom firmware builds available. I’m hoping that changes in the near future.
One of my children has a similar model, and I’m not a big fan, but it does still have a headphone jack which is nice. I don’t think Motorola has any plans to unlock any of the current models, but if they change their tune that would be great.
My large hands would probably be fine with a ‘nearly 7" behemoth’ if phones would just go back to a 9:16 aspect ratio. I may even be able to appreciate a more ereader-like aspect ratio like 2:3, 3:4, or 4:5. I have just been fed up by the unnecessarily tall phones of the past decade.
That is a hard ask, the reason they are tall is because it makes them easier to hold with a single hand. And it would make them even less pocket-able.
I’d still not want a 7" device, but I also preferred the less tall/skinny ratios.
Damn, that’s surprising. Motorola has never been known for a strong update policy, and having a good update schedule is one of the key requirements for GOS. I hope they are addressing this issue.
I mean it seems like a no-brainer for OEMs. You can just turn over all your software development to a 3rd party, for free.
I think this is exactly the win-win situation from this possible partnership: Motorola makes secure hardware and firmware patches, GrapheneOS takes care of the whole software security and timely updates (they already do).
I thought the same initially, but Lenovo also owns the ‘Think’ line of products which have historically been targeted at business customers and known for security. Whilst neither of the ThinkPhones currently meet GrapheneOS requirements, Motorola has been improving in that regard (according to GrapheneOS). Motorola also recently released a phone with 7 years of security updates, which is unusual for them.
Motorola, although it is now owned by Lenovo, is still headquartered in the US. North America continues to be one of its primary markets, and it’s the next biggest company there by market share after Apple, Samsung and Google. Micay is based in Canada AFAIK. Altogether it makes a lot of sense to me that Motorola would be the company to reach out, as opposed to another Chinese brand headquartered on the other side of the world with zero market share or presence in North America, or one with any prior reputation for security.
Yes, I agree with you. Motorola does seem to be the most likely collaborator. If they can fix the update schedule, make it affordable and release a phone that’s easily available world wide, it would be better than what the Pixels offer.
That’s on the cheap models. The higher end stuff comes with 4 years of updates
Is that thumbnail ai generated?
The logos look weird.You didn’t know that GrapheneOS is diversifying by also deciding to start manufacturing footballs (soccer for our American friends)?
Where can i get a football that the NSA cant crack?
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oh i see.
It’s possible they are updating the logo in light of the partnership?
nope, i checked Wikipedia
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Fucking finally. The only reason I couldn’t get my hands on GrapheneOS is due to having to buy a Pixel which, wherever I look, would be around $400-$500 for something that they themselves admit would likely only get around 7 years of support.
I can’t spend that kind of money right now. I need something below $300 and if possible, below $200.
Honestly, $400-$500 for 7 years of support is a killer deal. 5 years ago the only manufacturer to give a meaningful amount of support was Apple, everyone else was up to 2, even for flagships.
But I completely understand your situation, especially if you’re trying to be fiscally responsible and NOT get your phone on a payment plan of some sort. The 7 years of support means you might be able to find a 2 year old Pixel for below 300 though? Unless they don’t depreciate fast enough for that.
everyone else was up to 2, even for flagships.
Not Huawei
They also did 1-2 for a long time.
They provided 4 years long before Samsung and others did. Even before Pixels did
Ah, I suppose. My benchmark here is Apple which did it long before Huawei which is why it’s so perplexing to me that it took this long for the Android world to catch up. Apple’s not perfect, but basically everyone lagged behind them in this. The 2014 iPhone 6 got 4 years of updates, the 2015 6s got 7 and subsequent phones seem to be getting 5-7 depending on Tim Cook’s mood (they do claim hardware incompatibility when they sunset an older model, but who the hell really knows)
Looking at the P50 which I believe is the flagship for Huawei (excluding the Mate which is just larger) in 2021, that still only got 2.
Bruh Android devices used to only get 2 to 3 years of support at most not that many years ago. 7 years is a MAJOR improvement.
Touche
for something that they themselves admit would likely only get around 7 years of support.
Do you know of an android device with longer support than 7 years? The norm is 3 years.
Honestly thought they’d partner up with fairphone since both companies share a similar view in longevity for the end user. Hope Motorola does the same
GrapheneOS devs have been very clear about Fairphone not caring the slightest about security. They are the last OEM in the world they’d choose.
Can we get a grapheneOS lite for fairphone? I care about sideloading apps and removing gapps, not about state actors
In the absence of GrapheneOS, you could just flash LineageOS without GApps, right?
I wish they would support the fairphone.
I suppose it would be a good candidate for that.
Same it feels like they’d make a really good match
nothing is confirmed here, chill with the high-fives
Well dang! I was thinking it would be someone else, but that’ll do.
Hello Moto
yay! i have a motorola phone hopefully i will be able to install grapheneOS on it some day. though for some stupid government/banking apps i’ll probably need a secondary, crappier phone with the usual spyware on it. i really hope that they make grapheneOS available for already purchased Motorola phones.
edit: from what i see it looks like it’s probably gonna be for newer devices, and that is very sad, as i’m only gonna buy a new phone in like 3 to 4 years. Anyway, at least motorola has pretty good hardware and ok prices. Wait, do newer motorola phones come with a headphone jack? my Moto G55 has a headphone jack.
https://keepandroidopen.org/ <- offtopic with the post, but i’m just leaving this here in case someone hasn’t seen it.
My 2021 Moto edge does not have a head phone jack.
My Motorola phone was released in 2024 and has a headphone jack, so maybe it’s just some of their models that don’t have them. I just looked up a more recent 2025 model (Moto G 5G) and it also has a 3.5mm jack, so it looks like Motorola will keep having headphone jacks, hopefully this is the case as I don’t like having to charge my headphones.
It is dependent on the region
US models don’t have headphone jacks
This is potentially very good news. Image GrapheneOS on a base model Motorola.
