In a final bow, Fairphone will update its Fairphone 2 for the last time next March, more than seven years after it launched in late 2015. Quite a feat and good practice in generalizing.
After seven years of software tracking, Fairphone has made the decision to end support for its Fairphone 2, released in late 2015. The brand is planning a final update next March for a truly durable smartphone.
The consequences for users.
In a blog post, the manufacturer explains that its model has far exceeded its “initially expects to offer three to five years of software support“, good that “in an ideal world, we could support our devices indefinitely“. Many versions of Android will have been officially known: it was launched with Android 5.1 Lollipop and is currently under Android 10.
Fairphone indicates to publish in March 2023 “one last update of the Fairphone 2 for Android 10“. In theory, the smartphone will work normally, but if there is a bug later, it will no longer be fixed. This mainly leads to the end of security patches: the phone will become less and less secure over time. Some applications may stop working. work gradually on the Fairphone 2: banking applications, video streaming, gaming, etc. However, this cannot be accurately predicted, other applications may work for years without problems.
Fairphone 2 users still have some solutions, but they are reserved for the most experienced. They can install an alternate version of Android, such as /e/OS or LineageOS. Which potentially benefits from a higher version of Android.
To extend the life of its smartphones, one of Fairphone’s promises is to have spare parts available several years after the launch of its models. The brand claims that “some replacement parts are no longer available for purchase, such as the bottom module, which is only available for devices still under warranty».
Longer Update Support: The Trend of 2023
What is expected of the smartphones that will be launched in 2023 is a greater support for updates, adding up the years. A technological trend that we saw in 2022 and that should continue this year.
The durability of smartphones is an increasingly important argument and manufacturers are working on it in terms of the duration of updates. Samsung already offers four years, OnePlus has lined up, as has Oppo more recently.
While OEMs are rolling out their Android 13-based frontends to their latest smartphones, other third-party Android ROMs are up and running. This is the case of LineageOS that reaches its twentieth version, based on Android 13. What…
read more
To follow us, we invite you to download our application for Android and iOS. You can read our articles, archives and watch our latest YouTube videos.