Two years after the Fairphone 4 and following the release of some audio products like the Fairbuds XL, the Dutch company is back with a new repairable phone: the Fairphone 5. It looks and feels a lot like the Fairphone 4, but it adds choice upgrades across the board, making it the most modular and also most modern-looking repairable phone from the company yet.
The design is largely unchanged compared to the Fairphone 4, but the improvements that the company did make go a long way: The teardrop notch and the LCD screen is finally gone, with an ordinary punch-hole selfie and an OLED taking its place. Otherwise, you’re looking at an aluminum frame, a triangular camera array, and a removable back cover. Here, the company brought back its signature translucent back cover next to two black and blue variants. The dimensions and weight has been reduced ever-so-slightly compared to the predecessor.
While I do care about the headphone jack, I am mostly bitter about the manufacturers deciding for me that I don’t need it. I’d heavily trade off 10% reduction in thickness for a user-replaceable battery and a headphone jack, but it was decided for me that a thinner phone is a big improvement.
Flip phones are making a comeback.
Maybe thicc phones will come back next?
Well, you can have a DIY version that feels like the real thing, but with more features. All you need is a fairly modern phone of your choice, a strong glue and a brick. You may want to paint it in beige just for the heck of it afterwards.
Please. Yes.
Removed by mod
They did decide for me by the point that a once obvious feature to include in a phone is discarded in all but a very slight number of niche phones where I’d have to compromise on a bunch of other features in return for something that used to be almost mandatory feature at once point.
Removed by mod
Requiring a headphone jack in 2023 rules out most “flagship” phones. If you’re looking for a mid-range then your odds are better. But if you want a phone with better camera array, then you’re leaving mid-range territory and chances are that you’d have to compromise on either the headphone jack or your camera quality. That’s about what I meant by “compromise” - the requirement for a headphone jack significantly limits your choices.