It’s Dutch!
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Not really. It was created to de-google phones.
“GrapheneOS is a privacy and security focused mobile OS with Android app compatibility developed as a non-profit open source project. It’s focused on the research and development of privacy and security technology including substantial improvements to sandboxing, exploit mitigations and the permission model. It was founded in 2014 and was formerly known as CopperheadOS.
GrapheneOS improves the privacy and security of the OS from the bottom up.
No Google apps or services
GrapheneOS will never include either Google Play services or another implementation of Google services like microG. It’s possible to install Play services as a set of fully sandboxed apps without special privileges via our sandboxed Google Play compatibility layer.
More info here: https://grapheneos.org
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“GrapheneOS is built on the Android Open Source Project.”
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You can use LineageOS instead right now. It’s similar!
But Graphene OS is Canadian. That’s almost EU.
Also:
Or Sailfish OS. But it’s Linux based and probably weird. And I suspect banking apps wouldn’t work on it either.
Sailfish OS is used by Jolla phones (a Finnish brand which is not well known yet).
Sounds good! 
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Forgive me if the question sounds ridiculous, but is there anything wrong with banking through your phone’s browser?
I’ve been daily driving GrapheneOS for 2 years now and when I switched over from PixelOS, I didn’t even try to see if my banking apps would work. They could, for all I know. But still, in the context of removing things from my phone, I didn’t install them and I’ve been able to do all my banking transactions via the browser.
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The problem is that they use their own two factor identification apps, which are necessary to log in. If it wasn’t for that, a browser would work.
Ah, I see, makes sense. Still, might be worth a shot looking up if your particular banking apps work with GrapheneOS, apparently the list of compatible apps is continuously growing
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The Motorola smartphone brand is now owned by Lenovo. Ericsson of Sweden bought the cellular infrastructure group and the former Motorola HQ grounds and buildings in Algonquin, Illinois. All the entry signage says Ericsson. Google bought the handset business, kept the patents and sold the rest to Lenovo. So, Graphene OS on a Motorola-branded smartphone is Lenovo. The only part of Motorola that is still Motorola is the radio handset and infrastructure business: police, fire, other public safety, military, space, etc.
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BTW @Whying_Dutchman, check out this cool initiative in the Netherlands: https://www.laptoprevive.nl/
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Cool!
But it must be in our Dutch DNA: all my older machines (PCs, laptops, smartphones) as well as devices and parts from friends, family and neighbours eventually end up at my place, so I can “revive” them and give them to the “poor”: punks, students and refugees, etc.
If possible, I install Windows (only V11) - otherwise Ubuntu (but MINT makes more sense, now I think about it). I experimented with getting Hackintosh on PCs. It works, but it is a complex and long process.
Also, I migrate all older Android Smartphones to Lineageos, if possible.
Strange thing: I got only one iOS device to give away and no OSX device.
Apple fanboys seem to have not a lot of social responsibility - those arrogant b@st@rds! 
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It’s awesome that it’s in your DNA haha! I’d steer clear of flaming Apple though, (and I never thought I’d say that), in many ways they are making more sane OS choices than Microsoft these days…
Re:Linux, while there are semi-valid, semi-historical reasons Ubuntu has been Linux’s poster boy, I don’t think it’s actually a great choice. Mint or Fedora are much better options for most people.
Also, in the general context of not letting old computers die, there’s also this campaign: Find Linux Support | End of 10 So many volunteers in so many countries, very cool actually!
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I wish that MS would focus on fixing all the little quirks. And make AI optional.
I have a new Windows laptop that is great - but has an NPU. Why? For what?
I’d rather have better battery life and more GPU power (though it’s already good enough in that respect).
Stability and performance of Windows 11 is good. The UI is much better than any recent Apple UI, in my opinion.
Yeah, the next machines that are not Windows 11 compatible (even with the “trick”) will get MINT.
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I’d argue “performance” of Win11 is not great, a lot of recent gaming benchmarks give an edge to Linux, but I don’t wanna go too much into that discussion, I’ll sound like a fanboy and I’d like to think I’m not. But they’re not gonna make AI optional, if anything they’re constantly hinting at Windows eventually being an agentic OS and I wanna steer clear of that as much as possible.
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Hey, this is the free speech thread!
If you wanna talk power tools, talk power tools. If you wanna be mistaken about LINUX game performance, so be it!
I dare you
(Also, we can learn from any discussion, just like Marx said!)
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Hahahaha, nice memes! Also, I’d like to avoid derailing the discussion again. The original question was about Big 4 alternatives, particularly for geopolitical reasons, not an invitation for fanboyism 
And speaking of alternatives, the new Jolla phone looks pretty good: Jolla Phone (Sep 2026) – Jolla Shop
As @andrea-sld pointed out though, banking apps may or may not work properly on this thing 
Might wanna wait for actual reviews in Autumn when it fully comes out.
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My thread, my rules
(Well, almost, there are forum rules)
I hereby officially invite you to over communicate your fanboy nonsense about Apple and LINUX 
As long as the discussion is funny/and or gives us insights, I really don’t mind!!!
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BTW, not an Apple fanboy. I used to be, when the original iPod came out and was infinitely better than any other puny mp3 player. Then again I also got the first iPhone, which blew anything before it out of the water. In both cases though, while I loved how great they were, I got tired of the “walled garden” philosophy and have never gone back to Apple. I’ve messed around with friends’ and coworkers’ iPhones and Macbooks since, but haven’t owned one myself. My wife also has an old iPad which is “OK” I guess.
If I’m honest though, I decided I would eventually move away from Microsoft/Windows right around the time the search bar, instead of searching for files and/or installed programs, started telling me about the weather or random stocks or advertised Microsoft games. So I guess somewhere between Win8.1 and Win10, I was already so done with Windows. Only made the switch to Linux three years ago though. Again, I’d like to think I’m less of a fanboy and more of a “this OS works so much better for me and my use case, why not tell other people about it?” type of person.
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Based on my experience I see four issues with LINUX:
- Installation / support for various hardware. Installation is not as smooth as with Windows, hardware support is still weaker than with Windows.
- UI/UX. The LINUX UIs are made by nerds, not by UI/UX experts that think about “normal” users. That said, Apples UI is done by marketing people, Windows UI is made by sales people. So there is room for improvement everywhere. Step one: get rid of anything “flat”!
- Config files and use of command line. No current OS should require delving deep into config files or using a command line, no exceptions. All config should be possible with a GUI.
- Availability of apps & services. As long as there are not enough really great apps available that are on par with Apple and Windows stuff, there is a need for a bridge to Windows apps that simply works and has great performance. This is really not the case. This is also important when you - like me - have invested time & money into Windows apps.
As long as these four issues are not resolved, LINUX is no mainstream solution.
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Here’s my point of view on those matters, in order:
- Installation is not as “smooth” only if you think of it in terms of installing Linux on a laptop that came with Windows. There are laptops that come with Linux (not just the “boutique” ones, Lenovo has ones with Ubuntu or Fedora) where installation is straightforward and I’d argue if you build your own desktop PC by buying the individual components, it’s about the same as Windows: you still have to download an ISO from somewhere, flash it onto a drive and then install. Hardware support IS weaker than Windows, but increasingly getting better at a very fast rate.
- I might be biased but I prefer both KDE and GNOME, even XFCE (those are all desktop environments you can get in Linux), over Windows UI. I’d go further and say that macOS has nicer UI than Windows too. This is highly subjective though.
- Mainstream Linux distros, like Ubuntu, Fedora, Mint, Pop_OS and a few others, do everything with a GUI. Remember the story of my friend’s grandma running Linux Mint and not realizing the difference between that and Windows? That’s why.
- Not much to say here, arguably for me the biggest pain point about Linux and wider adoption. It’s sort of a negative feedback loop honestly, “app I want doesn’t work in Linux → I have to use Windows/macOS instead → company behind app less likely to make a native Linux version”.
So that’s my take on those issues. Noticed how I said “it’s better for me and my use case”? It’s not for everyone and frankly I don’t think all those points will ever be addressed completely. People like to talk about the “year of the Linux desktop”. They said it would happen when the Steam Deck came out, it didn’t happen. They said it would happen when Microsoft announced Recall, it didn’t happen. All that’s happening is a tiny, but still measurable, increase every year. Heck, if anything the Recall thing probably made Apple more customers than Linux.
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