Ask HN: What feature phone do you use and recommend?

I too recently looked for a dumbphone, open source and privacy-oriented, with a way to communicate using an open standard messenger protocol (XMPP, Matrix) and CalDAV support – so basically either a web browser or a good app store, with decent battery life. I could not find anything, at all, and gave up.<p>Imo the variety is lousy. There are countless models to choose from, but they all pretty much work the same, come with vendor lock-in, uninstallable apps, integrated Google services and all of that.

I use the cheap new motorola models, currently motorola 2020 model e,<p>Motorola usually has a model they market as the &quot;best cheap android&quot; phone, usually runs for about $100-$200 dollars. They arent very repairable in design, but is doable as tutorials are offered online, authorized repair shops can fix the phones but it costs about the value of a new device. Parts can be purchased relativly cheaply online if you are up for the challenge of fixing it yourself.

I recently bought an LG Classic Flip. The phone itself was $30, plus about another $30 to start the prepaid plan through Tracfone. I use it for testing phone routing at work.<p>When I got it, the guy at the store said that prepaid isn&#x27;t the same as it used to be before smartphones were everywhere. Instead of paying for X number of minutes that carry over, you get X minutes for Y days. Luckily, though, it&#x27;s still pretty cheap. I just refilled for 90 days of unlimited phone calls for about $20.

I have tried several feature phones:<p>* Alcatel Go Flip [1] * Nokia 3310 3G [2] * Samsung Rugby 4 [3]<p>I like the durability of the Samsung phone, but had to replace it because it lacked 4G support.<p>I tried the Nokia phone for a short time, I believe there is a version that supports 4G, but I could not find one in the United States. I switched to the Alcatel phone because of its support of 4G on T-mobile.<p>Both the Nokia and Alcatel try to hard to be smartphone-lite, they have web browsers, e-mail, video players, etc. I believe both the Nokia and the Alcatel use KaiOS, which is a fork of Firefox OS, and is buggy and slow. For example, searching my contact list takes 20 seconds to load, and if I start to type a letter to find someone, it often displays the wrong character (12 key typing, 2 = abc, 3 = def, etc.) and breaks the scrolling &#x2F; list of names.<p>There are a few that I have been watching, beware they are still in development &#x2F; crowdfunded.<p>* Mudita Pure - $335 (e-ink screen, 4G, Polish company) [4] * Punkt MP02 - $350 (supports Signal encryption, 4G, Swiss company) [5] * WiPhone - $140 (Wifi &#x2F; VoIP only, not true cellular phone) [6]<p>[1] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.t-mobile.com&#x2F;support&#x2F;public-files&#x2F;images&#x2F;alcatel&#x2F;go-flip&#x2F;manuals&#x2F;Alcatel-GO-Flip_User-Manual_English.pdf" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.t-mobile.com&#x2F;support&#x2F;public-files&#x2F;images&#x2F;alcatel...</a><p>[2] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;liliputing.com&#x2F;2017&#x2F;02&#x2F;nokia-3310-gets-reimagined-2017-not-every-phone-needs-smart.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;liliputing.com&#x2F;2017&#x2F;02&#x2F;nokia-3310-gets-reimagined-20...</a><p>[3] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.samsung.com&#x2F;us&#x2F;mobile&#x2F;phones&#x2F;all-other-phones&#x2F;samsung-rugby-4-at-t-flip-phone-sm-b780azkaatt&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.samsung.com&#x2F;us&#x2F;mobile&#x2F;phones&#x2F;all-other-phones&#x2F;sa...</a><p>[4] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;mudita.com&#x2F;products&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;mudita.com&#x2F;products&#x2F;</a><p>[5] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.punkt.ch&#x2F;en&#x2F;products&#x2F;" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.punkt.ch&#x2F;en&#x2F;products&#x2F;</a><p>[6] <a href="https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.wiphone.io&#x2F;index.html" rel="nofollow">https:&#x2F;&#x2F;www.wiphone.io&#x2F;index.html</a>

Just clarifying in case someone else isn&#x27;t sure either - by &quot;feature phone&quot;, you mean NOT a smartphone, right? Like those old-school flip phones? (e.g. Motorola Razr or something?)