Fairphone has released a new phone, the Fairphone 6. The series began in 2013, and there’s still nothing else quite like it, anywhere. These mobile phones are what almost all other tech is not: ethically admirable.
Fairphone strives for more sustainably sourced raw materials, for better pay and better conditions for factory workers. And on your side as the end user, the phones are modular, easily repairable. Fairphone promises its new phone will get eight years of software updates, including an eyebrow-raising seven major Android system upgrades.
The Fairphone 6 has 12 modular elements you can replace, from the battery and display to the speakers, camera, and USB port. Indeed, you can still buy replacement cameras and screens for the Fairphone 2, which was released in pre-Trump, pre-Brexit 2015. And Fairphones remain the only smartphones—ever—to be rated 10/10 for repairability by iFixit. Every model since the Fairphone 2 has achieved that score.
Sounds great, right? But there’s a big problem. It looks like hardly anyone gives a damn.
People Don’t Care Enough
Fairphone is stuck in a rut. We know this because Fairphone is not just a pioneer of smartphones you don’t feel dirty just for owning. It’s unusually transparent, too. Its own reports tell us Fairphone sales have flatlined at around 100,000 a year.
Put 100,000 phones in a room and it will seem like a heck of a lot. But, for context, Apple is estimated to have sold 37 million iPhone 16s in the series’ first weekend, before the phones were even out.
Does no one really care about sustainable tech? The answer from one analyst we talked to is kinda, yeah. “There’s really no one else who does anything kind of close to what Fairphone does from a sustainability point of view. The issue I have with Fairphone is that it's quite niche,” says Jan Stryjak, Counterpoint’s European and Sustainability research lead.
“It's still not the kind of primary driver for people when it comes to buying a phone. The number one is still very much price and brand, particularly in Europe.”
Fairphone isn’t a household name. And while the Fairphone 6 is actually cheaper than the Fairphone 5 was at launch in 2023, at £499/€599, it has masses of price competition from companies where any ethics angle can seem, at most, little more than a marketing tick box. For less cash, you could buy a more powerful and excellent Pixel 9a, for example.
The company made a concerted effort to get out of this rut in 2023, investing big in marketing and expansion. It led to a €20 million loss for that year, followed by the departure of CEO Eva Gouwens, and 2024 sales just a smidgen over 100,000, yet again.
And Fairphone’s much bigger rivals are going to be forced to apply at least a pinch of Fairphone-style seasoning to their phones going forward, thanks to the EU’s Ecodesign Directive. This came into force on June 20. It demands five-year software support and applies stronger rules on repairability.