I use magic earth for maps. It lacks in a lot of ways but is a usable map and navigation system. I like the nav and some of the features bit has (safety alerts, reported police) but the map detail kind of sucks. You zoom in and not every street name is shown. But try it and see if it works for you.

Battery life will be better, and by how much depends on your setup and usage. For instance, I have play services installed, which does eat some battery. But I also turn off location, Bluetooth, mic, camera and sometimes WiFi. I only turn services on when I want to use them. That saves battery. So expect good battery life, but don’t expect any miracles.

I have tried on several occasions to like GrapheneOS. But every time I install it on my Pixel 7, basic functionality breaks. Things like receiving regular phone calls, as in people calling my number using a normal phone. GrapheneOS will sometimes not even ring and immediately display a notification saying “Missed call”. If my phone cannot be used as a … phone, what good is is?

As with most others I use a different launcher but I switched user accounts to try it out for you and you can theme those icons and then pick a single colour, a trio of colours or choose wallpaper to colour the icons in other colours other than black and white.

I use open camera which has always been fine for my needs and doesnt include any meta data with the saved images.

Battery life has been absolutely fine for me but I never used the stock ROM for comparison.

Sandboxed stuff I’ve used has always worked as is expected but I dont use a lot of apps tbh

I use organic maps but again I very rarely use maps and it can be a bit odd in the way it works but still it has got me where I’ve been going each time.

I think it is great and wouldn’t want to switch back here is a page that lists all bank app compatability as that is a common concern for people.

Hope some of this helps :)

Batter was better. Like by a lot. It became normal when I installed the google play sandbox.

I’ve tried all the other map apps, and while they work great for navigation, there’s no replacement for reviews on Google Maps. So it’s the one Google service I still use.

If you need Google Play services I recommend installing them on a separate profile using Shelter. It’s really easy to do. I use that profile for Google Maps and a few other items the require Play services.

Looking to degoogle myself too. For the maps, Here we go is a german brand. I know it’s not foss but being german, they have to follow GDPR which, I guess, is better than google anyways.

• You can change the default app icons easily. The Accrescent store that can be downloaded from the gOS store even have some icon packs that are FOSS.
• You can download the Pixel Camera from the App Store. I would keep it without Network access and remove the meta data with ExitEraser depending of where I am posting those pictures.
• Battery seems the same but you won’t have access to Adaptive Charging (when your phone is plugged in it tries to keep your phone without reaching 100% to improve battery life).
• You won’t be able to tap cards with your phone unless your bank app provides it. Google Wallet doesn’t and won’t work.
• I wasn’t able to get Android Auto to work at all.
• You will need to be used to apps not working properly and testing the compatibility modes, specially if they use the location services.

Ironic since you have to buy a Google phone to use that OS.

For what it’s worth, is there a way to still connect to my vehicle, at least for music? I’m running Sync 3.

1. Can’t change the default icons on the default launcher. I think custom launchers may be able to.
2. I use Open Camera whose quality I would say is fine for my purposes (no kind of professional photography, just taking pics for record-keeping, to show people things, etc)
3. Battery life is way better than stock Android IME. It makes sense cause stock GrapheneOS is so debloated and isn’t running all these spyware services in the background.
4. You go to the app called “App Store” (preinstalled), download Google Play, then you use it like a normal Google Play app. Very user-friendly.

Been exclusively using GrapheneOS for ages, never had any problems. It’s very easy to install (especially now they have a WebUSB installer) and even easier to use.

You can change the icons with a different launcher. Try Lawnchair.

I think it’s pretty good, although I did install the isolated GCam but I wouldn’t with another chance.

I hear battery is better but I can’t confirm.

I haven’t used the sandboxed services other than the isolated GCam but that worked great.

I’ve used Graphene for years now and I’ve loved it!

Try Magic Earth for a maps app.

Hi friend!

• One of the best things abiut GrapheneOS is being able to easily restrict network access for apps. So for a camera app, you can use anything you want, even Google Camera, and just turn off network access so there is no way for Google to spy. The suggestion of OpenCamera is also good. It has a lot of power and options.

• Battery life should be just as good, more or less.

• Sandboxed play services basically means that GrapheneOS gives it fewer permissions on your phone. Normally it has a very privileged position in the OS and is fairly imvasive.

• Its user profiles are very powerful and I highky recommend using them. I recommend not installing samdboxed google play services on yiur main (owner) profile. If you do end up needing google play services for an app, it is better to put it in a separate profile.

If it is helpful, I think of Degoogling as being mostly about replacing services. Graphene is a good atep, but definitely do a checklist of Google services that you use and slowly replace them and take control over your digital spaces. I would recommend dealing with your email as a top priority. Buying a domain (use a common/safe tld) so that you own your address (e.g. [email protected]) will mean no company can ever prevent you from sending or receiving emails on a whim. Using something like fastmail to receive and send emails via your domain will be the easiest first step.

So many people say to isolate google play services in another profile, but I have not seen anything quantifying the amount of attack surface reduction or what benefit this gives in terms of anonymity or security. Google play services includes Firebase Cloud Messaging (FCM) which is what enables most apps to give timely notifications. There are alternatives like ntfy, but they require some understanding of how to set them up, and tinkering.

Finally, multiple profiles is useful for the most security conscious but for the typical user I do not believe its very useful. One thing I noticed is notifications are not consisently reliable, so setting up a “Facebook” profile does isolate you from the app but then you may miss notifications. You also have to type your password for every profile switch.

-I haven’t found a way to change the default app icons, but it doesn’t bother me that much with all the other apps I end up having.

-the camera app is plenty good for general use. I don’t use it for social media or anything, I use mine for work for taking pics of machinery and I use it to take pics of my kids and stuff and it’s plenty good for that. I can’t say how much tinkering it let’s you do, someone else will have to give more detail

-Battery life is plenty good for me. I have a pixel 6, and I go to bed with it at like 45-60% most days. I’m sure the newer phones are a bit better, but can’t say for sure

-I wish I could give more detail on the sandboxed apps, I use a few apps that use google play services and they work well, bit idk how it works behind the scenes

-honestly it just works like your phones OS should, it’s really quite good

• I also try to use organic maps when I can, but it is still missing things, I use google maps in my browser, but that’s getting worse and worse