Please write the 3 phone brands (in order please) which you think they bring the least number of third-party apps.
Notes:
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1- PrivacyGuides recommends Google Pixel. But it is not selling on my country. I can not bring it from other countries because it will not have warrant.
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2- We also don’t have fair-phone and nothing-phone (i can not bring it from another country).
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3- we only have: general-mobile, huawei, samsung, asus, tcl, htc, xiaomi, vivo, infinix, oneplus.
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4- please dont recomend custom ROM. Its technically difficult for me. Also I will recommend the device to my friend (they don’t have even an idead what is custom-rom)
You might want to take a look at Universal Android Debloater it may help, but not necessarily meet all your requirements.
This is very sound advise.
Motorola it’s a good one.
Keep it with smartphones like you would with every other computer: reinstall the preinstalled OS. Meaning in Android: a model that supports custom rom.
Btw, Samsung has probably the most, hum, custom vendor rom on their phones.
Latest samsung models are quite locked down (at least I dont see any custom ROM for them on xda) talking about high end ones
What difficulties do you encounter with the custom ROM stuff?
If you get a oneplus, they are very forgiving of things you could do to brick a phone.
A recent oneplus and installing a custom ROM (LineageOS + MicroG) would be fairly doable for a larger audience than just the “nerd” or “hacker”.
If people know what you struggle with particularly, they can help better.
To get rid of google completely, a custom ROM or other technical things are necessary, but debloating using a standard tool is a good first step and is better than what you will have from the off.
That depends on the model. Plenty of newer OnePlus phones use mediatech processors with little to no custom ROM support.
A fact I found after buying a new OnePlus phone without doing any research because I was in a desperate situation.
Ah I see, is bootloader unlocking etc still available? (A more techy person could still go hard on privacy implementations)
I’m using nothing myself but the op said its unavailable in their country. I also noted that now lots of ROMs come preloaded with GAPPS whereas you had to load separately in the past.
It’s common but phones like the 10R don’t have any support for unlocking bootloaders
Ah that’s fair. I think I had the 9 or maybe 7
This is a bit of a pickle. Apart from Google, I think only Motorola and Nokia have stock-ish android. But they don’t have stellar software upgrade promises. Oh and Sony makes some very good phones with clean android
OnePlus offers mostly stock android too
It used to but oxygen OS is pretty far from stock now.
You mean other than forced Facebook and shit?
Amazon and Facebook app managers come preinstalled as System apps on so many android phones.
It’s a real pain in the ass, for sure.
In some cases adb can’t uninstall them, so even worse
I had a Galaxy Note 10 die on me after just a little over 2 years (such a shitty fucking phone) and then, swearing I would never pay so much for a phone again, switched to a Motorola Edge 30. It cost less than a third of the Samsung, and it even came without the bloating bullshit. Highly recommend it.
There is a German manufacturer called GigaSet which does stock. I am rather happy with their GS5 phone and they even have a senior option if you want a not as smart smartphone for a parent.
I had no idea Gigaset manufactured cell phones. I have a set of their DECT home phones, and they are amazing. Have had them for over 6 years now.
My Sony xz2c does have bloats installed, namely amazon and facebook. Don’t know what the state they’re in now tho.
it will not have warrant.
No warrant will refund our privacy.
Its technically difficult for me. Also I will recommend the device to my friend (they don’t have even an idead what is custom-rom)
You think we were born knowing it?
Nokia ? I have an XR20. Doubles as a GPS etc on the front of my bicycle, its great, has a headphone jack and SD expansion.
I am not that familair with their lineup though there is an XR21 I think? And a bunch of other models.
I’ve read on several websites that Nokia comes with pretty much stock Android.
Motorola as well. Either way, stock android is very intertwined with Google bullshittery, making a degoogled ROM like DivestOS or GrapheneOS necessary for proper privacy from google. A privacy respecting ROM won’t fix relience on google apps though.
you can’t have both privacy and total convenience
If nothing works out; look into Android Debug Bridge (ADB) and use these package names to remove all the google bloat. Perhaps it’s a bit too involved, but AFAIK this is the easiest way to gain a semblance of privacy on your phone. I don’t screw about with custom roms either.
LMK if you do try to use it, I can provide some guidance if you need.
On Xiaomi it’s very easy to remove whatever you want without rooting. Here’s a 3:30 min video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3_rqhoMpr_Y
Here is an alternative Piped link(s):
https://www.piped.video/watch?v=3_rqhoMpr_Y
Piped is a privacy-respecting open-source alternative frontend to YouTube.
I’m open-source; check me out at GitHub.
Pixel phones from Google are the cleanest.
Edit: the cleanest you can get out of the box
Pixel phones ship the entire Google garbase.
Anyway, OP said can’t get a Pixel phone.
I appreciate OP has requirements. But as this discussion reaches a wider audience, it is absolutely necessary to indicate that pixel phones are the cleanest out of the box phone experience you can get. For all of the people who are not OP who are reading this.
The absolute cleanest experience is a pixel phone loaded with grapheneos, which isn’t hard to install - they have a website that does it all for you.
The cleanest out of the box would be a brand shipping AOSP or something closest to it. Maybe Nokia, I’m not sure.
Pixel phones do not ship third party apps other than Google apps.
If you want to install pure AOSP, the only pure AOSP builds I’m aware of are for Pixel phones. And you can install them here, clean without any Google proprietary stuff, just AOSP pure and simple.
From the docs:
https://source.android.com/docs/setup/test/flash#device-requirements
Pixel 2 and newer DragonBoard RB3 (also known as db845c) HiKey 960 HiKeyThat’s not “out of the box”.
It’s as close as you can get.
Then you should edit your original comment to reflect this.
it is absolutely necessary to indicate that pixel phones are the cleanest out of the box phone experience you can get.
No they’re not. Have you actually bought a newer Pixel and used it without a custom ROM? They are loaded with extra Google applications and features now. It’s a very different experience to several years ago when everyone referred to Pixels as “stock” Android. Motorola phones have a more “stock” experience than Pixels now.
Motorola phones: asop + google + Motorola
Pixel phones: asop + google
Asop flashing pixel only: asop
How is the risk surface lower on a Motorola phone?
That’s not true, though. Motorola phones do not contain all the same Google features and applications as Pixels and the way in which their first-party applications are embedded in the OS is less significant than the way in which Google embeds theirs.
EDIT: Your risk surface question is also a strawman and shifting the goalposts. Neither myself nor OP made was making an argument about risk surface.
I see we are talking about very different things when we talk about bloat.
If Google play has super control of the phone I consider that bloat and a huge risk surface.
If Google play has super control of the phone
You are describing basically all phones, including Pixels. If you want to flash AOSP or some custom ROM, fine, but that’s not an “out of the box” experience as you originally claimed.
You have three options:-
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Use a tool like Universal Android Debloater to disable (but not completely remove) them.
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See if you can get Nokia or Motorola phones. These have mostly vanilla Android.
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Get a Xiaomi or OnePlus phone with a custom ROM pre-installed.
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Pixel and GOS , very easy to install. Warranty blaha. Oneplus usually have a lot of lineage support. Spend and afternoon on YouTube , XDA forum and learn.
All of your brand’s listed are bloated. Samsung is really bad though.
