I've been looking into GrapheneOS as a longtime Pixel user who is thinking of becoming a bit more security conscious. But, looking around at its current state RE: RCS and camera apps, I think it makes the most sense to stick with stock Android.
I also have a really niche feature I rely on daily (letting me "wifi call" from one sim over the data line of the other sim), and it's really hard to tell if GrapheneOS supports it.
If I can grab my old pixel that's stored in a box at my parents' house on another continent I might give it a try, but GrapheneOS really doesn't seem ready to be a daily driver.
What's the issue with RCS and camera apps? RCS works (from what i've heard) and you get the same image quality as on stock if you install the pixel camera app.
Not sure about that other feature you mentioned, but you can always revert back to stock if you don't like GOS. Restoring a backup is easier than it's ever been nowadays :-).
My understanding was that you have to install google messages to get RCS to work and on google's end it gets finicky about device ids. I read a couple blogs where people found RCS to be really unstable on GrapheneOS even with a couple workarounds.
If I'm going to have to install a bunch of google products onto my phone anyways, I don't buy the benefits as much.
I also had a recent experience being shaken down by a border guard entering Australia, and if he'd asked to go through my phone, explaining that I'm running a weird privacy focused OS he's never seen before seems like it would be a great way to increase my chances of spending a night in airport jail and being put on the next flight to North America. I don't really have anything to hide and appearing like I have things to hide could seriously inconvenience my life. Barring a tourist from entering a country has a very low bar of evidence.
Edit: Also the backup restoration is a bit more of a mess for me right now for the same reason I need the dual sim feature. I've got an American esim that's difficult to reactivate without being in America.
> I don't really have anything to hide
While I understand your position, I cannot help myself from posting this response with the hope that more people will consider their own "I have nothing to hide" positions. See https://moxie.org/2013/06/12/we-should-all-have-something-to...
edit: Linking to original HN discussion about this article - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=5869394
RCS is unstable on iOS, too,
for the same reasons SMS has always been unstable.
It’s the nature of the protocol, unfortunately.
Maybe I should've specified: I have seen many anecdotes of RCS being substantially more unreliable on GrapheneOS than it is on stock Android.
Yeah I use rcs and you can use the pixel camera app if you want??
Rcs had a bug that was fixed recently though