A few months ago I talked to a friend about phone apps and she wanted me to show her the apps I use on my phone. Since I use a degoogled phone the choice of apps I use is a bit different than a phone with stock Android OS or IOS. I thought I might share why I do use a phone like that, how I use it and what the difference is to a "normal" phone. Most people could benefit from some of the choices here, especially Android users, since all the apps are available on any Android phone. Two common complaintes I hear are that using an OS with no Google Apps like that is "complicated" and "inconvenient". I wholeheartedly disagree with both points and would actually argue that is more convenient in some regards. The only "complicated" part is installing the OS, and even that is relatively easy, you can just follow an install video and nothing can basically go wrong. The inconvenience argument is even weirder. Many of the Free and Open Source apps (that I will show you) are even more convenient than their proprietary counterparts. You are also free to install anything by Google if you wish (although that obviously defeats the point).

Which phone do I use?

I use a Google Pixel 6a with Graphene OS. Google Pixel phones are the best phones to use if you want to completely be independent of the Google infrastructure. Yes, I am aware of that irony. Graphene OS is an Android based operating system that is strong on privacy and security. You can decide which applications to use instead of having anything preinstalled. It is a very nice feeling to install an OS and have almost nothing on it - it immediately gives you the feeling that you, the user, are in control of your device, as it is supposed to be.

Why do I use a phone like that?

I don't like to be the product. I don't want to hand over my data to big companies that I loathe. I hate surveillance capitalism. I believe that companies such as Google, Meta, Spotify, etc. are at fault for the enshittification of the internet, which should be a useful tool for the people, not an endless profit machine for a handful of tech-bros and exploitative businesses. I want to minimize using their services (although, as you will see, I am not perfect in that regard).
I am pro-technology. I like the benefits technology provides to my life. I like the internet. I don't want to use no phone. I enjoy having a "multitool" with me at all times. I like to be able to enjoy entertainment on it. I do understand why people use an older phone or no phone at all, and I appreciate these reasons. It is just not for me.

Which apps do I use?

I get my apps from either from F-Droid or Aurora Store. Aurora Store is a spoofed Google Play Store. F-Droid has many repositories for apps that are not available on the Google Play Store. There is a native Graphene OS Store which I haven't tried myself yet.

In the top row I have:

• "Simple Calendar"
• "Simple Gallery"
• "Simple File Manager"
• "Simple Music Player"

I actually don't recommend using them, since they have been sadly bought by an Adware company. I am using old versions of these apps pre-acqusition. As you can guess, they are lightweight apps that simply do what their names suggest.

In the second row I have:

• "Revolt"

Revolt is a Discord clone. I barely use it. The users I have seen on that app are often annoying and arrogant, as is often the case sadly in the FOSS community. I do like to follow the project though, since it's pretty sophisticated.

• "RedReader"

RedReader is an app to browse Reddit.

• "KurobaEx-fdroid"

KurobaEx-fdroid is my app to browse imageboards, in my case Lainchan and 4chan. You can access various other imageboards with it. Great app.

• "Magic Earth"

This is an alternative to Google Maps that I can strongly recommend. I was looking for a good alternative for a while, this one is just as good.

In the third row I have:

• "Tubular"

This is a YouTube app that is forked from NewPipe. It is completely ad-free, you can turn off your phone screen and have a video running in the background, it automatically skips sponsored segments (NordVPN ads, etc) via SponsorBlock, it respects your privacy. I use this a lot and can't recommend it enough.

• "Notes"

Well, uh, it's notes.

• "K-9 Mail"

Great Mail app, I use this for business mails.

• "ProtonMail"

This is my private E-Mail provider. ProtonMail is a swiss-based E-Mail company with a focus on privacy. The free plan is more than good enough for me.

In the fourth row I have:

• "WhatsApp"

I say this with much discomfort, lamentably I have recently decided to install WhatsApp. I couldn't avoid it since for business reasons, some customers are only available via this app and for my business I often need to exchange pictures and files. I use it as little as possible.

• "Session"

Very underrated messaging application. I believe that this will be more popular in the next few years. In an ideal world everyone would use this.

• "Nekogram X"

A telegram fork with a few more setting options. Again, a very uncomfortable app. This is not much better than WhatsApp, and arguably even worse from a privacy standpoint. Somehow has a reputation as a "secure" app, which is absolutely not true. Many contacts I have are only reachable via this.

• "Signal"

Awesome messaging app, and also very popular in my friend circle, which makes me happy.

In the fifth row I have:

• "Seeker"

An application for Soulseek, a P2P file sharing app. I use this to download music, you can find almost everything on there. Download it locally and play it back from your storage. No reason for me to use Spotify, which doesn't even have a lot of music I want to hear. Also you can find everything better quality than Spotify. Fuck Spotify!

• "Neo Store"

The same as F-Droid with another skin. I installed this because I like the way it updates apps better.

• "Aurora Store"

Spoofed Google Play client, I barely use it.

• "Obtainium"

Directly downloads apps from their source, currently my favorite way to download and update apps.

In the sixth row I have:

• "Dialer"

The stock Graphene OS dialer.

• "Simple SMS"

It's SMS. Same developer from the "Simple" apps in the top row.

• "Settings"

Yup.

• "Vanadium"

Browser. This browser comes with Graphene OS, with hardened privacy and security.

• "Libre Camera"

The best FOSS camera I was able to find. It is a bit slow. No camera app comes close to how good the stock Google Camera App is, this is probably the biggest cut back by using Graphene OS for me.

In the top row I have:

• "Aegis"

Two factor authentication app.

• "Fedilab"

You can access the Fediverse through this app, I for example can use my Mastodon account via this app. I am not using this enough admittetly, I am a big fan of the concept of the Fediverse!

• "VLC"

Video player. Unlike it's iteration on PC, on the phone it's meh. I haven't bothered trying many others yet, there's probably better ones out there.

• "Calculator"

Stock Calculator App.

In the second row I have:

• "Termux"

Terminal for Android. Pretty powerful tool, though I haven't used this much apart from using yt-dlp with it.

• "OSMDashboard"

Another Google Maps alternative I haven't yet tried out.

• "Clock"

Stock clock.

• "Nitter"

This is to read Twitter posts without using Twitter, to not need an account and for privacy reasons.

In the third row I have:

• "NewPipe"

This is the original app that Tubular is a fork of. Since it is the original, it has earlier updates than Tubular so sometimes I use this (right now as I am writing this it is one of these times actually).

• "Libretube"

Another ad-free YouTube app.

• "Clipious"

Again another YouTube app, this one uses Invidious. I simply like to stay up-to-date with these.

• "Grayjay"

This app is very powerful, you can access many websites with this, including YouTube. I will probably switch to this as my main app in the future, for now I am used to Tubular and NewPipe.

In the fourth row I have:

• "Xtra"

Ad-free Twitch player.

• "KeePassDX"

Password manager.

• "QR and barcode scanner"

Another obvious thing.

• "Tunerly"

Guitar tuning app.

In the fifth row I have:

• "ZArchiver"

I used this once to unzip something. I think it didn't properly work. I think I just forgot to uninstall this.

• "PlantNet"

I love this app, although it is one of the few proprietary ones on my list. Amazing to identify any plant, this is so much fun when you're just going for a walk.

• "Voyager"

App to use Lemmy, the Fediverse version of Reddit. I don't use it much because I can't stand the people there.

• "Librera FD"

PDF/EPUB Viewer.

With these choices of apps I have a balance of convenience and privacy that fits me personally. As I previously mentioned, I am not perfect and any individual needs to evulate themselves how much of convenience they are ready to give up. I constantly keep on looking out for new and interesting things, so this list will change over time, I may edit it in the future.