In a world full of glued-together gadgets designed for obsolescence, the Fairphone 6 earns a well-deserved 10 out of 10 on our repairability scale.
I think Fairphone would say that they want you to keep using the FP4 forever, replacing individual parts as they fail. Their goal is the reduce waste in the smartphone industry, that's why they make it so easy to maintain your device. Maybe eventually the main processor on your FP4 will be too slow to keep up with even those light apps. At that point, you come back to Fairphone and buy whatever the latest one is.
And as Sunshine said, continually releasing new generations of phones keeps them enticing to the vast majority of smartphone consumers that don't already use a Fairphone. I'm literally looking at this new one and considering if that will be my next smartphone when my Pixel 7's battery starts to turn. Seems like a pretty good deal to me, tbh. Might finally rip me from Google's grasp.
FP4 will be too slow to keep up with even those light apps
That's true however android is not very well optimized for older hardware. It would be cool to see fairphone become large enough that they can order better deals with cpu manufacturers in bulk to have more powerful chips while largely contributing to an efficient linux mobile distro.
When considering new customers or those who, for example, have irreparably damaged their Fairphone, it's important to recognize that selling a three-year-old device as new may not be appealing to them. Additionally, many people today rely on their phones as their primary computer and therefore require the performance necessary to handle a variety of tasks.
I am not dissing the phone, if I was in the market it would be a no-brainer, I am just interested in what a new phone could give me and when should I plan to switch.
Android 16 is coming out with desktop mode soon. At that point I'll have to pony up for a new one because my current device doesn't support display port alt mode. And my laptop is on its last legs.