How Fairphone Built the Ethical, Repairable Fairphone Gen 6+

Fairphone Gen 6+ Puts Repairability Ahead of Convention

Fairphone Gen 6+ arrives in the US market with a philosophy that sounds almost antique: buy this phone, break it, fix it yourself, and keep using it for years. The Dutch company’s newest device costs $650, and it's built around a simple promise that every owner should be able to open it up with one included screwdriver and replace the parts that wear out or crack. It's not for upgraders. But it is for people who are tired of throwing away a $1,000 slab of glass because the charging port gave up, so they can't just watch another device die in their hands.

Fairphone CTO Chandler Hatton told Ars that the company’s goal is to provide a compelling mobile experience while enabling the user to “fully own” their device. That ownership extends to the physical hardware, not just the software. You can swap out a dozen different parts with nothing but the single T5 Torx screwdriver that ships in the box, and you don't need heat guns, adhesive strips, or any prayer that you won't crack the OLED mid-repair. Anyone can do it. It's that simple. But the real punch is this: the design philosophy treats your phone as something you can fix, not something you're renting from a corporation. So the screwdriver isn't a gimmick, it's a promise, and the phone's modular architecture means a broken speaker or a dying battery won't force you into a costly upgrade cycle. No heat guns, no adhesive strips, no praying that you don't crack the OLED during a screen swap. That's the whole point.

We're doing something that was long thought to be nearly impossible, delivering high-performing modular smartphones that can last for a very long time, and that's a shift we've been chasing for years. But Hatton says it plainly. It's real. So don't expect this to be a passing trend.

Inside the Modular Design

Open the Fairphone Gen 6+ and you will not find the metal spaghetti that characterizes most modern smartphones. The design starts with two T5 Torx screws exposed on the back panel. Remove those, slide the cover off, and the internals are laid out with a clarity that is almost shocking in 2026. The battery stares you in the face. The camera modules lift out. The USB-C port is right there.

Flip the standard smartphone playbook upside down. Most devices get assembled once in a factory, sealed with glue and awkward screws, and they're never meant to be cracked open by the buyer. The Fairphone skips that entirely. Components pop off with a spudger or even a fingernail, thanks to flat board-to-board cable connectors that hold everything in place without any permanent adhesive or fuss. So it's a design philosophy that treats repair as a right, not an afterthought. And that's it.

There is a trade-off, of course. The modular approach makes the phone a millimeter or two thicker than most glued-together devices. The Fairphone Gen 6+ is mostly plastic rather than the aluminum and glass that dominates the flagship market. But it manages to feel solid thanks to an internal metal frame, and the company has run tests specifically to ensure the device does not become progressively less sturdy as owners tinker with it.

“When we’re in our product development cycle, we introduce tests that are specifically dedicated to disassembly and reassembly,” said Hatton. “So we’re looking in part at the robustness.”

Those tests include scenarios that involve human error. Robots work the assembly line, but people servicing their own phones are less predictable. What happens when someone over-tightens screws? Does it warp the casing? Damage nearby components? These are the questions Fairphone engineers ask during development.

Hatton says it takes her 15 minutes to fully disassemble a Fairphone Gen 6+, but she helped design it, so her familiarity with every screw, clip, and ribbon cable gives her an obvious head start over someone like me. A novice shouldn't take much longer. After spending just a few minutes with Fairphone's documentation, I removed every user-serviceable component in about 20 minutes, and the process felt intuitive rather than intimidating. Everything went back together without issue. No new gaps. No wobble. And that's the real test.

What About the Screen and Battery?

The only glass on the device covers the 6.31-inch 1116 x 2484 OLED display. This is the most challenging component to swap, but even that is not too bad. The screen is held in place with a handful of screws and has a generously long ribbon cable, which makes replacement far less frustrating than on typical smartphones. The OLED offers sufficient resolution and great colors. Peak brightness hits 1,300 nits, which is legible outdoors but harder to see than displays on phones that cost a few hundred dollars more.

Battery replacement is straightforward once the back panel is off. A few more screws and the battery is free. Quick swapping is not the goal here. Longevity is. “We know that after about three years, it will be wise to replace your battery with a new one,” said Hatton. “Batteries aren’t meant to last forever, but your phone on the whole can last a lot longer than a battery.”

Features That Survived the Cut

The Fairphone Gen 6+ keeps its microSD slot and a physical SIM card tray, and that's a deliberate choice rooted in what people actually want from their devices. These features cost money and complicate supply chains, which is why most other manufacturers have quietly dropped them years ago. Fairphone sees them differently, though. They're part of the ownership proposition, a way of saying you control the hardware, not the other way around. But there's still no headphone jack. It's a sore spot for a small yet vocal group of enthusiasts, the kind who show up in every forum thread and comment section whenever the company teases a new model, asking for it again and again. So that's the trade-off. You can't have everything.

It’s genuinely difficult to fit a headphone jack into a modern phone, Hatton admitted. The component itself is relatively large, but that’s only half the story. Where does it go? You can’t just slap it on the back of the device, after all. And it has to connect to the right internal parts, which demands precise engineering and careful placement inside a crowded chassis. Then there’s the Fairphone twist. It also has to be repairable, which adds another layer of complexity to the whole design process. So yeah, it’s quite the puzzle. But they’re working on it.

Water resistance is another compromise. Most premium phones carry an IP6X rating, meaning they can survive full submersion. The Fairphone Gen 6+ is rated IP55, which handles splashes but not swimming pools. Hatton notes that a higher IP rating is possible with a repairable design, but it requires either a larger form factor or significantly higher costs. “We assess the whole landscape and say, ‘Hey, the customer doesn’t want a phone that’s a brick,’” she said. “They also don’t want a phone that’s incredibly expensive.”

The Specs That Matter

Fairphone's Gen 6+ echoes the Gen 6 that launched in Europe last year, though a few notable changes set it apart, and the differences matter more than the familiar silhouette suggests. It's got a slightly upgraded Snapdragon chip and more memory than its predecessor, which sounds modest until you consider the timing. So the company pushed RAM up to 12 gigabytes, a bold move at a time when soaring memory costs have driven prices higher across the entire industry, squeezing margins and forcing rivals to rethink their own specs. But here's the kicker: twelve gigs, right now, that's a real statement. It's a gamble.

We decided to increase the RAM to 12 gigabytes," said Hatton. It's a bold move. This is something that I think is a little bit unique, given the current circumstances in the consumer electronics industry, where memory costs have spiked and competitors are trimming specs to protect their margins. So we did it because it really highlights the longevity value we want our customers to get when they buy the Gen 6+. That's the whole point. They're not just buying a phone for today; they're buying one for years down the line, and we can't compromise on that.

This puts Fairphone in an interesting position. Google has caught criticism for regressing from 16GB to 12GB of RAM in its latest Pixel phones, which start at $900. Samsung is sticking with 12GB in its $2,000 foldables. Those phones set aside a lot of memory for AI services that not everyone uses. The Fairphone runs the Gemini app like all Google-certified Android devices, but the company has not created any on-device AI services of its own.

Hatton said they haven't rushed into AI features without first grasping the real use scenario and what customers actually want. People are curious about their data. They're keen to understand how it's used and to keep control over their privacy. So we see that interest clearly.

Software Support Through 2033

Fairphone's record speaks for itself. The Fairphone 3, which hit the market back in 2019, only just reached its end-of-life a few weeks ago, and that shows how the company sticks with its hardware long after most rivals have moved on. So the Gen 6+ will keep getting software updates and replacement parts all the way through 2033. That's a long runway. But it's not infinite, and the real ceiling comes from forces Fairphone can't control, like Qualcomm eventually pulling the plug on the underlying firmware, which in turn makes any further updates technically impossible. Seven or eight years, then, is the functional limit for any smartphone, no matter how good the intentions are. It's a hard stop.

Fairphone's commitment means every replacement part stays in stock for the entire support window. So if you crack your screen in 2031, you can still order a new one, and if your battery degrades, a replacement is available right then, no matter how many years have passed since you first bought the phone. That's a real promise. But they track a key performance indicator: every person who buys a Fairphone uses it for at least five years. It's that simple.

“Our goal is that every single person that purchases a Fairphone uses it for at least five years, and we track that as a KPI,” said Hatton.

Who Is This Phone For?

At $650, the Fairphone Gen 6+ looks like a reasonable deal in 2026. It packs a solid mid-range Snapdragon chip, ample storage with a microSD slot, and 12GB of RAM that's still flagship territory. But the utilitarian design has a certain appeal, even if the volume buttons sit too low and the power button's fingerprint sensor is hard to locate by feel, which frustrates more than it delights during everyday use. The modular design allows for accessory back panels that swap out with just two screws. That's a clever trick. You get a finger loop back, a card holder, and a lanyard option, so it's easy to tailor the phone to your habits without buying a new device.

The phone runs a minimally customized build of Android 16 with almost no bundled software outside the standard Google apps. One of the few customizations is called Moments, a distraction-limiting overlay that hides most apps behind a minimalist UI. A brightly colored side switch toggles it. If digital well-being is not your thing, the switch can be remapped. Using it as a flashlight toggle works nicely.

But this is not a phone for everyone. If you want the thinnest device with the brightest display and the most advanced camera system, look elsewhere. If you want a phone that you can drop in a pool without worry, this is not it. The Fairphone Gen 6+ is for people who value the ability to fix their own hardware more than the latest features. It is for people who are tired of paying hundreds of dollars for a screen replacement when they could do it themselves in 20 minutes with a screwdriver that came in the box.

Planned obsolescence creates a real incentive to push people toward new devices, Hatton explained, since manufacturers can keep the upgrade cycle spinning and the revenue flowing if they can convince you that your current gadget is somehow no longer good enough. It's a smart business model. But that's not our proposition. We simply don't operate that way, and we've built our entire approach around a different set of values, one where durability and longevity aren't just marketing buzzwords but the actual foundation of what we offer to customers.

The proposition is simpler. Buy this phone. Take it apart. Put it back together. Keep it for a decade. That is what ownership means.