If one has a Pixel 6a, and the Pixel 9 is about to release, when is a good time to consider an upgrade? My thinking is that it would be good to trade in while the phone is still relatively valuable. I would most likely be interested in the Pixel 8a, but open to other versions.
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For me, personally, when GrapheneOS is available.
That being said I already bought one. Haven’t received it yet but when I do, I will wait and use it only when GOS is available.
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I’m currently using a Pixel 6 and I’m thinking about upgrading when the Pixel 11 releases. But also then I might just get a 10 or 10a (if that is still a thing then) but that all depends on price and features/drawbacks (of first non-samsung chip vs. second gen) of the phones at that time.
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if there are any security improvements to phone’s hardware, as far as I know Pixel 9 doesn’t have any other than AI that exclusive to Google OS on Pixel.
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When your device is about to reach EOL and doesn’t receive updates from GrapheneOS.
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Your phone failing or having hardware issues.
Or you feel general hardware upgrades like 16GB RAM in Pixel 9 Pro are necessary for your workflow.
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This site shows how long each pixel is supported for. Get a new one sometime before the end of support, obviously it’s best for the environment and your wallet if you wait until the support window is up before upgrading.
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I will use my Pixel 6a until the Pixel 10 comes out with a new SoC manufactured by TSMC instead of Samsung because SoCs made by Samsung are just awful.
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Honestly, I would reccommend keeping the phone until its near EOL unless there is a feature on a new version that is a must have for your use case.
If you to do it this way, hopefully you use the 2nd hand market and are not just trading in your phone to your carrier.
Pixel 6a stops getting guaranteed Feature Updates July 2025 and security updates July 2027. Source
HOWEVER, I need to find my source for this so take it with a grain of salt, I saw a GrapheneOS dev claim that since Google only keeps one mainline version of Android up to date for the currently supported Pixel devices, the chances of these phones getting feature updates up until the security update cutoff is relatively high
Pixel 6a owners will receive all updates until July 2027. It’s less work for Google to just give you full updates than to just provide security updates.
Of course, a lot depends on your budget and priorities.
Theoretically, switching from the 6a model to the 8 line would make sense, assisted by the current price reductions due to the new generation.
why?
quote from GrapheneOS
“8th generation Pixels also bring support for the incredibly powerful hardware memory tagging security feature as part of moving to new ARMv9 CPU cores. GrapheneOS uses hardware memory tagging by default to protect the base OS and known compatible user installed apps against exploitation, with the option to use it for all apps and opt-out on a case-by-case basis for the few incompatible with it.”
Now about the 9 model and whether it’s worth upgrading from 6a or upgrading from 8 to 9.
Asked the team at GrapheneOS and they responded swiftly.
Hope they don’t add any AI enshitification.
I still have issues with banking apps on GOS, hope devs soon start adding Graphene’s attestations.
Was anyone ever successful in making a bank App Maker adopt that?
Maybe the following website is useful:
https://pixel-pricing.netlify.app/
It shows actual prices for new and used Pixel phones and takes into account how long the devices get updates.
Unfortunately it is in German …
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I’ll add a bit of information to enhance this point, GrapheneOS and SimpleX have already discussed this, I think it’s worth pointing out.
Read the whole thread to understand.
I only consider an update, when I have good reasons to do so, to keep my lifestyle somewhat environmental friendly. And trade-in value is (usually) not a good reason, not even economically-wise. So basically only when something unrepairably broke, got too slow to be bearable or is EOL. Depending on your threat model it might make sense to update earlier than that, if a new significant security feature gets released, for example MTE on Pixels 8 or newer.
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I will add more useful arguments from an expert who was involved in the development of GrapheneOS.
GrapheneOS on 8th gen Pixels is ideal due to hardware memory tagging.
Consent-based data extraction (FFS) is not in the scope of what we’re trying to defend against beyond shipping our secure duress PIN/password implementation to replace insecure approaches via apps. Data users can backup is inherently obtainable with consent, which is nearly all.
Within the past 24 hours, there has been an attack on GrapheneOS across social media platforms misrepresenting consent-based data extraction as GrapheneOS being compromised/penetrated. The person doing it is pretending to be multiple people and falsely claiming we covered it up.
GrapheneOS is the only OS having success defending against these attacks. We could do more with a successful hardware partnership such as having encrypted memory with a per-boot key instead of relying on our kernel memory zeroing combined with auto-reboot and fastboot zeroing.
The expectation is always that people will have to buy a device to run GrapheneOS, as the project’s goal is having robust and secure devices that we work on (especially considering some features are hardware-dependent), rather than broad device support of horrible secured devices.
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Are they involved in the development? I thought @matchboxbananasynergy was a community moderator and not a dev for the project?
development - развитие
DeepL suggested this translation as one of the options, I should have been more specific.
In Russian, development also means participating in the progress of the product as such, it can be a wide range of positions (from PR to design or technical development)
Wait until pixel 10