Phones LineageOS 15.1 is officially supported on

LineageOS is the successor to Cyanogenmod – a Google-free, freedom technology alternative to stock Android that isn’t infected with Google Play Services (Google’s surveillance services).

I have a Nexus 5 (hammerhead) from several years ago that I installed LineageOS 14.1 on and it works flawlessly. In fact, thanks to its freedom and the mind-blowingly awesome Termux, I now have a basic Linux setup on it running Node.js, Go, and my Web+ blogging setup that uses Hugo, rsync, and DAT. It’s awesome that LineageOS enables people to keep using their older handsets beyond the couple of years that some manufacturers deem an acceptable period for supporting their products with updates (hey, landfills are cheap and the Earth is boundless, right?… Right?!)

Anyway… I do want to try LineageOS on a modern 64-bit device not least because I have a feeling the segmentation faults I’m getting while trying to run DAT on it might be due to it being 32-bit. So I found myself sifting through the list of downloads and installation instructions for all officially-supported handsets as it’s not grouped by version. I had to go through the whole thing, but there’s no reason anyone else should have to as I compiled the list of handsets that LineageOS 15.1 is currently supported on and you can find it, below.

If you already have an older handset that no longer receives operating system updates, you should seriously consider extending its life, ditching Google’s spyware, and improving your security using LineageOS (and the F-Droid freedom software catalogue). Version 14.1 is stable and runs flawlessly on older hardware. If you’re on the market for a new handset to run LineageOS on, however, I hope the following list helps you identify potential candidates easily.

The list should be considered current as of the time of this post but I will not be maintaining it. (Pull requests are welcome.)

Discounting the Google devices (because even though the bar on ethics is set pretty darn low in the industry, I’ll be damned if I give that particular surveillance capitalist any more money), the newest/best-equipped models appear to be the Samsung Galaxy S9 and S9 plus, the OnePlus 5T, and the LeEco LePro 3. I’ll either pick one of those three up or wait a little to see how things shape up with LineageOS support on the new Project Treble-based phones.