A month in, and the conversation around the Fairphone (Gen. 6+) is only getting louder. When we set out to improve on the Fairphone (Gen. 6), we wanted to deliver future-ready performance paired with industry-leading repairability and ethical sourcing. And from what we're hearing and seeing, it's safe to say the new Fairphone is a success!

From top-tier scores from repair experts to glowing reviews from the tech press across Europe and beyond, here is a round-up of what people are saying about the Fairphone (Gen. 6+).

Let's take a look at the reviews

"The most repairable, ethical phone gets faster. With noticeable improvements in processor speed, daily fluid performance, and display brightness, Fairphone proves you don't need to choose between your values and a modern smartphone experience."

— The Guardian

"It puts best tech practice in your pocket—without compromise. Fairphone has refined its design language into something sleek, durable, and genuinely premium, setting a benchmark for responsible consumer electronics."

— Wallpaper*

"A perfect score for smartphone repairability. iFixit awarded the device a flawless 10/10 once again, highlighting the clever internal layout, standard screw types, and easily swappable battery and display modules."

— The Verge

"It eliminates repair bill fears entirely. If you drop your phone or the battery degrades after three years, you order a spare part and fix it yourself in under ten minutes with a simple screwdriver."

— Forbes

"The Fairphone (Gen. 6+) is the Goldilocks of Android phones—getting the balance between sustainability, modularity, and real-world everyday performance just right."

— ZDNet

"A phone designed to be repaired that actually feels like a modern flagship. It no longer feels like a niche compromise for environmentalists; it feels like the sensible way all electronics ought to be built."

— Fast Company

"The Android phone we need. Even if high upfront component costs make price competition tough, the long software support lifespan and ethical supply chain standards set a standard the entire industry should follow."

— Android Authority

"The Fairphone (Gen. 6+) is a modular gem with a decent camera system and a bright, bold screen. Between the zero-glue architecture and accessible modules, this should be your go-to business phone if you value true hardware longevity and low total cost of ownership."

— ITPro

"Faster, more repairable, ethical Android tech done right. Upgraded internals and guaranteed long-term software updates ensure this device stays in your pocket for years, not months."

— Brit Brief

"Like comparing a $5 Walmart steak to a steak from a local ranch... the perceived high price is dividing fans, but when you factor in fair wages, recycled cobalt, and eight years of software support, I know where I stand."

— TechRadar

"Fairphone Gen 6+ im Test: Mehr Leistung für das reparierbare Smartphone. Das modular aufgebaute Handy überzeugt im Ersteindruck mit spürbar schnellerer Performance, einem verbesserten Display und gewohnt einfacher Reparierbarkeit."

— Allround-PC

"Nachhaltig und gut: Das Fairphone zeigt, dass langlebige Technik, faire Lieferketten und ein modernes Smartphone-Erlebnis absolut kein Widerspruch sein müssen."

— Stadt-Bremerhaven

"Le smartphone modulable qui combat l'obsolescence programmée tout en offrant des performances très convaincantes au quotidien, un écran lumineux et une autonomie solide."

— Orange Tech

"Un smartphone performant associé à un engagement éthique inégalé. Remplacer soi-même sa batterie ou son écran devient une simple formalité à la portée de tous."

— POSITIVR

"Nog altijd fair, met iets meer phone. De Nederlandse Fairphone Gen 6+ combineert duurzaamheid met een welkome prestatie-upgrade, een scherper scherm en een fijnere camera-ervaring."

— Tweakers

Whether you're looking for software support backed long into the future, industry-leading repairability with affordable spare parts that don't break the bank, or just a great phone that treats people and the planet with respect, the Fairphone (Gen. 6+) is for you. Switch to Fairphone. Switch to better.

Discover the new Fairphone (Gen. 6+) today.

Here's a recap of what Fairphone Chief Impact and Operating Officer Monique Lempers discussed at this year's UN Private Sector Forum  and the UN Global Compact Leaders Summit, where she spoke about why we need to bring human rights to the core of corporate strategy and the need for implementing living wages across supply chains as soon as possible.

Ending poverty wages and dangerous mining conditions in consumer tech isn't an idealistic dream. It is actionable right now. By adding just $1.05 to the cost of a smartphone, Fairphone pays factory workers a true living wage and directly funds safe, ethical mineral extraction. If a company of our scale can transform global supply chains, multi-billion-dollar tech giants have zero excuses not to follow lead.

Ethical tech isn't a margin problem; it's a priority problem. Here is the blueprint we built to prove it.

Bridging the Living Wage Gap

Electronics factory workers routinely earn a base pay of just $16–$17 per day, forcing 16-hour shifts to survive. WageIndicator benchmarks show a decent living wage requires $23 a day. Fairphone's Living Wage Bonus Program bridges this gap directly on the line:

- Micro-Investment: Adding just $1.05 per Fairphone (and under $0.55 per accessory) covers the wage gap.

- Collective Fairness: Because assembly lines are shared, our bonus payments are split equally among all lower-paid workers in the facility—whether they touched a Fairphone or not.

- Proven Impact: In 2025, we distributed $215,000 across five facilities, lifting 1,650 workers to living wages and pushing our lifetime payout past $1.25 million.

Ethical Sourcing Beyond Direct Line-of-Sight

Smartphones require over 60 raw materials. Where complex upstream supply chains become opaque, we deploy innovative mass-balance credit systems to fund direct, safety-first transformation on the ground.

The Blueprint is Open. Scale It With Us.

Real transformation requires moving beyond basic compliance and PR promises. Fairphone has proven that a fairer business model is viable today. And our credit schemes are open-source. If multi-billion-dollar competitors duplicate our living wage bonus and adopt our mineral credit model, millions of factory workers and artisanal miners can be lifted out of poverty overnight.

Explore our full supply chain data in our latest Impact Report , or partner with us via the Fair Cobalt Alliance and Fairmined Credits .

At Fairphone, we’ve always believed that you should have full ownership over your tech, from the hardware in your hands to the software running on your screen. That’s why we’re excited to introduce the Fairphone Gallery app, a clean, fast, privacy-conscious media viewer designed to put you back in control of your memories. Here is a look behind the scenes at why we built it, how we collaborated with the open-source community, and what it means for your privacy.

Built with the community, for the community

The Fairphone community has been requesting a local gallery app for some time now. Many of you don't view cloud-heavy applications as simple galleries but rather as cloud backup tools. Instead, the need of the hour was a straightforward space dedicated strictly to local media.

Rather than building an app completely from scratch behind closed doors, we turned to the open-source ecosystem. We partnered with a local developer to white-label and build upon an existing open-source gallery app.

By taking a lightweight, active codebase and tailoring it to our brand, we were able to focus on core usability. This collaborative approach lets us integrate ongoing community fixes and updates over time, keeping software maintenance lean and sustainable.

We also took a hard look at transparency and security during development:

- Stripped-down permissions: We removed every unnecessary permission requirement. The app only asks for photo and video access. Nothing else.

- No unneeded features: To protect your data security, we removed bloated, complex encryption sub-features (like legacy vaults) to keep the app focused, fast, and secure.

Simple, Essential Functionality

Designed to be lightweight and easy to navigate, the app gives you the tools you need without the bloat:

- Timeline & Albums: Easily toggle between a daily or monthly chronological timeline grid and an intuitive Albums view.

- Built-In Essentials: Enjoy direct media actions like basic photo editing (crop, rotate, filters, and markup), customizable light and dark themes, fast media search, and an easy favorites list.

- Flexibility: If you use cloud backup services alongside local media, you can use both together or choose to run the Fairphone Gallery app exclusively.

Privacy by Design: Your Photos Stay Yours

Your personal memories belong to you, not an external server. The Fairphone Gallery app operates entirely on your physical device:

- Zero data collection: The app requires no user account, collects zero analytics, and never uploads your photos, videos, or metadata to cloud databases.

- Minimal storage footprint: It acts purely as a local viewer, meaning it doesn't duplicate your files or create hidden background copies that eat up your storage.

- Direct storage management: What you see is directly what's on your device or microSD card. When you delete a photo in the app, it's removed straight from your storage.

And the best part?

It’s compatible with all Fairphones since Fairphone 4

Whether you’re capturing photos on the brand-new Fairphone (Gen. 6+) or keeping one of our OG Fairphones going strong, our new app offers a clutter-free, privacy-first way to view and organize your photos and videos. Alright, let’s get to it.

If you're setting up a new Fairphone (Gen. 6) or Fairphone (Gen. 6+), the app downloads automatically in the background during initial setup. For Fairphone 4 and 5 owners, you can download the Fairphone Gallery App on the Google Play Store .

It’s a scary time to be a tech CEO.

For the past year, we have all felt the squeeze caused by the unprecedented demand and severe supply shortages for semiconductor memory, thanks to the onslaught of AI and its computing demands. And when major players shifted focus to high-bandwidth server-grade DRAM, the market got starved of everyday computer and server memory like regular DDR5 RAM. Prices soared overnight, bills of materials massively inflated, and financial forecasting became a (literal) nightmare.

At Fairphone, we have always refused to accept the status quo.

Across the tech industry, the response to this memory chip supercycle was to cut back on specs, remove features, or quietly raise prices to shield their profit margins. The consensus among industry insiders was that offering higher performance during a global chip shortage was simply impossible without passing hefty costs onto consumers. And while others might paint this as a sad but inevitable reality, it’s something I could never accept. And while things were tense initially (I wasn’t kidding about the nightmares), my time at Fairphone had taught me to have faith. Faith that the team would find another way, a better way.

I wasn’t disappointed.

That’s how, on August 18, 2026, we launched our most powerful device yet.

Introducing the Fairphone (Gen. 6+)

Packed with 12GB of DDR5 RAM and an upgraded Snapdragon 7s Gen 4 processor, the Fairphone (Gen. 6+) delivers up to 24% faster app loading and switching, alongside a 20% boost in multitasking allocation*. In short, that means smoother multitasking, a faster performance, and an overall better, more fluid user experience.

So how did we do it?

How did we deliver higher specs during one of the worst component shortages in recent memory?

The value of treating everyone fairly

When component supplies tighten, the biggest tech giants usually rely on sheer scale to secure parts, while smaller brands are pushed to the back of the line.

For years, Fairphone has built deep, multi-year relationships with our component suppliers and manufacturing partners. We don't view suppliers as transactional vendors to squeeze for razor-thin margins; we treat them as long-term collaborators. We treat them fairly, just like everyone else who works for us and works with us.

Of course, beyond steady commercial contracts, Fairphone also offers suppliers something increasingly rare in modern business: a mission they genuinely want to be associated with. Major component suppliers want to demonstrate that their hardware powers sustainable, pro-worker, and repairable technology. By offering a clear, responsible mission, Fairphone retains a vital seat at the table even when global supply chains lock up. Simply put, treating people fairly across the supply chain pays off in the long run.

It’s all about giving you more

Standard corporate strategy dictates that every new phone release requires an expensive physical redesign. Millions are spent on cosmetic changes, slightly altered camera bumps, or thinner frames. These are costs that are ultimately passed on to the buyer with no real value addition. As far as I am concerned, that’s not innovation. It makes zero sense.

Instead, we went the other way. Something I like to call our Plus philosophy.

Rather than forcing unnecessary cosmetic flourishes, the new Fairphone was built on the award-winning design of the Fairphone (Gen. 6). Reusing the exact modular chassis achieved two crucial things:

We’re maximizing modular longevity: Our 12 user-replaceable parts remain completely compatible and affordable, allowing users to swap modules using just a single screwdriver.

We’re innovating where it matters: By boosting the device to 12GB of DDR5 RAM and the Snapdragon 7s Gen 4 processor, the Fairphone (Gen. 6+) gives you a little more oomph and a lot more staying power. That, backed by our industry-leading warranty of up to five years and software support till 2033, truly helps us deliver on Fairphone’s promise as the one that lasts.

Style that makes a statement

That’s not to say we didn’t give the new Fairphone a distinctive cosmetic flourish of its own. While the exclusive new Cobalt Blue colorway is quite the style statement, it’s a lot more than that.

The new color pays homage to Fairphone’s origins as a conflict mineral awareness campaign. As our co-founder and head of product, Miquel, pointed out in our AMA session during the launch, the very first mine that Fairphone founder Bas Van Abel visited on a site visit in the DRC was a cobalt mine, bringing back mineral samples to show the team back in Amsterdam.

It also stands as a testament to our continued commitment to fairly sourced raw materials, honoring our investment in safer working conditions in artisanal mines alongside partners like the Fair Cobalt Alliance.

It’s not just talk. Even with more power under the hood, the Fairphone (Gen. 6+) is just as fair as its predecessor. It contains 51% fair or recycled materials (by total weight), it’s assembled under fair working conditions, and it maintains 100% e-waste neutrality. Its carbon footprint tag is also relatively low, clocking approximately 30 kg CO₂e over three years of use. That’s roughly half of the average smartphone.

Of course, we’ve designed it to last way beyond three years.

And further too.

As the Right-to-Repair movement gains historic legislative momentum in North America, we are officially bringing this fair tech philosophy across the Atlantic by launching the Fairphone (Gen. 6+) alongside the Fairbuds and Fairbuds XL in the US.

We’re raising the bar… again.

The tech industry wants consumers to believe that shortages, rising prices, and degraded hardware specs are inevitable. RAMageddon proved that when companies prioritize short-term profit margins, the consumer always pays the price.

At Fairphone, we’ve demonstrated that even in the middle of a global supply crisis, you can deliver premium specs, fair working conditions, and long-lasting design without asking users to compromise.

Whether you need extra multitasking headroom for work or raw power for everyday use, the latest generation of sustainable tech is here.

The Fairphone (Gen. 6+). It’s everything you love about the Fairphone. Plus more.

And I couldn’t be prouder.

Discover it now on our webshop.

* These figures reflect internal laboratory testing using SmartViser diagnostic tools, under conditions designed to approximate real-world use. Actual performance may vary depending on factors such as device configuration, network conditions, and usage patterns.

For nearly 16 years, our mission has been simple: to prove that a smartphone can be made differently. We’ve focused on creating technology that works well, lasts longer, and is made with genuine care for the people and materials behind it. Last year, we brought that vision to life with the Fairphone (Gen. 6), our clearest expression yet of what a responsible phone should be.

But we also listened to your feedback. You asked for more performance, more memory, and more personalization. Today, we are answering that call.

Today, we launch the Fairphone (Gen. 6+).

It is the Fairphone you already know, but better where it matters most.

Fairphone products are assembled under fairer working conditions in fairer factories and mines.

We talk about this a lot. And it’s something we’re very proud of. But what exactly do we mean by fairer working conditions?

The electronics industry relies on millions of factory workers and miners who frequently face exploitative, unsafe conditions that are hazardous to both their mental and physical health. And for all their effort, they get paid poverty wages. One of our core missions at Fairphone has always been to challenge this inequitable system and change the status quo.

Through our "Fair to People" strategy, people behind our products benefit equitably, prioritizing safe working environments, better wages, and more worker representation. In 2025 alone, 11,084 people experienced fairer working conditions across Fairphone's supply chain. Here is a closer look at how we are making a tangible difference.

Closing the Living Wage Gap

A living wage is a basic human right, yet the broader tech industry repeatedly fails to guarantee one. At Fairphone, we believe that a fair product must pay a fair income. Through our groundbreaking Living Wage Bonus program , Fairphone pays the difference for every hour spent on its production line to guarantee a 100% living wage. In 2025, we distributed $215,000 in living wage bonuses, directly closing the pay gap for 1,650 workers across five supplier factories. This brings our grand total to over $1.25 million paid out to factory workers since the program began in 2019.

Ensuring Zero Exposure and Safer Factories

No one should have to trade their long-term health for a paycheck. Last year alone, nearly 9000 workers experienced healthier and safer working conditions while working on Fairphone devices. We actively guide our suppliers on ways to improve hazard prevention and fire preparedness, successfully helping one particular supplier achieve the rigorous ISO45001 health and safety certification in 2025.

Furthermore, as a signatory of the Towards Zero Exposure (TZE) program, we became the first company to entirely eliminate all Clean Electronics Production Network (CEPN) round two priority chemicals in our final assemblies.

Amplifying the Worker's Voice

True empowerment requires democratic representation. We actively bring worker perspectives into factory management to ensure employees can safely speak up about their conditions. Fairphone has been providing comprehensive training on effective grievance channels for management and worker representatives at its final smartphone assembly supplier for some time now. By listening directly to worker feedback, we help guide targeted factory investments, such as renovating worker dormitories and building a new nursery room to foster a more inclusive workplace.

Beyond the Factory: Miners and E-Waste Collectors

Our commitment to fairness extends to the very beginning and end of a product's lifecycle. Upstream, we support artisanal and small-scale miners in regions like the Democratic Republic of Congo by purchasing cobalt and copper credits. These credits help mining cooperatives improve local economic and safety conditions, such as building safe changing rooms for women workers. When it comes to e-waste, we are actively exploring partnerships to empower informal e-waste pickers, exploring pre-financing models and providing personal protective equipment to create dignified and safer jobs.

We’re now a Leading Employer in the Netherlands

In June 2026, Fairphone was recognized as a Leading Employer in the Netherlands for 2026 by the Institute of Research & Data Aggregation. This award is given to the country’s top 1% as per the organization’s independent meta-study, placing us in a prestigious club alongside KPN, Ikea, and Deutsche Telekom, among others. For us, this is a unique milestone, proving our workplace culture, now 200 employees strong across 35+ nationalities, is just as impactful as our sustainable hardware.

All of our initiatives just go to show that commercial success and ethical operations are not mutually exclusive. By putting the well-being of workers first, we are demonstrating that a fairer electronics industry is entirely within reach. Here's to making the tech industry fairer for everyone involved across the board.

Child labor is not an exception but a feature of a consumer electronics industry obsessed with reducing costs to an absolute minimum. For decades, major tech brands have demanded cheaper components and higher margins every single year. They celebrate record profits while the true price of their devices is paid by the most vulnerable people on Earth. It is unfortunately the brutal reality.

Today is the World Day Against Child Labor. Across the entire tech sector, companies will send out tough statements and social media posts condemning the practice. Yet the recent 2025 report from the International Labor Organization and UNICEF reveals a terrifying truth: the world has officially missed its goal to eliminate child labor by 2025. There are still nearly 138 million children working worldwide, most of them in sub-Saharan Africa. If we want to know why we failed, we only need to look at our own supply chains.

I recently returned from the Democratic Republic of Congo, where I saw the reality of artisanal cobalt mining with my own eyes. The DRC holds the vast majority of global cobalt reserves, and estimates suggest that tens of thousands of children work in the mines. The contrast between the beautiful smartphones we own and the red dust of the mines in Kolwezi is incredibly shocking. The work is hard, exhausting, and life-threatening. You see people, men and women, breaking the ground with basic tools to extract the minerals from the soil that power our digital world. But my biggest realization was not just the extreme hardship I saw. It was the realization that for countless families in the region, mining is their only economic means of survival.

When most major tech companies are confronted with the reality of child labor in places like Congo, their standard reaction is to hide behind paperwork. Child labor in their supply chain is even often denied. They point to corporate ethical codes of conduct and complex audit schemes. But anyone who has visited these regions knows that this is an illusion. Artisanal and industrial materials are often mixed at local trading houses before reaching a global smelter.

This strategy of corporate distancing will not save a single child. By officially banning the artisanal mining of cobalt on paper while turning a blind eye to how the supply chain actually functions, the industry simply drives these miners further into the shadows. It strips the miners of any sort of leverage, leaving them unprotected and at the mercy of an unregulated market.

At Fairphone, we choose transparency. We believe that if you make a profit from a material or mineral, you have a fundamental responsibility toward the people who pull it out of the ground. You cannot fix what you refuse to look at. Instead of banning artisanal materials, we work directly with these mining communities. Through our involvement with the Fair Cobalt Alliance, we invest in formalizing small-scale mines. We help create safer working conditions, ensure access to protective equipment, and, most importantly, work to ensure that adult miners receive a fair and stable living wage.

The solution to child labor is no mystery. It is not solved by corporate decrees from thousands of miles away. It is solved by basic economics. When adults earn enough to feed and support their families, their children do not have to work in the mines to make a living. They can go to school instead.

Our entire mission at Fairphone is to prove that this model is viable. We ruthlessly map our supply chains because full transparency is the only way to enforce real accountability. We demonstrate that it is possible to make fantastic consumer electronics without treating the people at the source as disposable commodities. Let us be honest: Fairphone is not perfect. The truth is that 100% honesty in a deeply rotten global economy is an ongoing journey. It is not a static destination, but we are fully committed to pushing the boundaries of what is possible.

We cannot wish child labor away. We cannot solve it with publicity campaigns. If the tech industry truly wants to eradicate this practice, it must fundamentally change how it values human labor. The tech industry must accept that ethical sourcing costs money and requires you to commit to solving the problem instead of ignoring it. Abandoning the most vulnerable communities is the easy way out. It is time for the tech industry to take responsibility and do the real work.

Let’s get right down to it.

The simplest argument for choosing a refurbished device over a brand new one will be the more affordable price tag. However, there is so much more savings involved, so many more costs that you help avoid. If you are currently deciding between a brand-new Fairphone (Gen. 6) or a refurbished model, we want to give you total transparency. Because at Fairphone, a refurbished phone isn't a compromise. It’s a badge of honor for a circular economy.

Refurbished doesn’t automatically mean a smaller footprint

Let’s bust a common myth right away: buying a refurbished phone doesn't magically erase the carbon emitted or the rare earth metals mined to build it. That ecological debt is already embedded into the physical hardware, thanks to the manufacturing process behind it. In fact, if a refurbished phone comes from a standard 14-day return window, it has technically been shipped around more than normal, meaning its transportation footprint is slightly higher than a new phone sent straight from the factory.

So what makes refurbished more sustainable?

Manufacturing accounts for the overwhelming majority of a smartphone's lifetime emissions. If a phone sits unused in a warehouse, gets thrown away, or is prematurely recycled, all that initial environmental damage was for nothing. By choosing a refurbished Fairphone (Gen. 6), you are ensuring that the resources already extracted are put to work over a full lifecycle while actively offsetting the demand for a brand-new phone to be manufactured.

Where do our refurbished devices come from?

While every new device requires entirely new raw material extraction, factory assembly, and linear consumption, a refurbished Fairphone (Gen. 6) is rescued from three highly efficient circular loops:

- The 14-day "cool-offs": Pristine phones returned by users who simply changed their mind. Legally, an opened box cannot be resold as "new," making this a premium steal for the eco-conscious buyer.

- The out-of-the-box DOAs (Dead on Arrival): These are units with minor initial factory glitches. Thanks to our modular design, our technicians can replace a single faulty part in minutes, saving the rest of the pristine device from the scrap heap.

- Our Reuse and Recycle Program: This is where we source devices traded in by previous users when they switch to a new device.

Fairphone versus the wider tech industry

Across the broader electronics industry, processing individual open-box returns is costly. Historically, many major corporations found it cheaper to discard or ship returns to developing countries rather than inspect and repackage them.

There is a massive legislative gap here. While strict new EU regulations, like the Ecodesign for Sustainable Products Regulation, are forcing large companies to publicly report what they destroy, an outright destruction ban currently only applies to textiles and footwear. Small electronics are not legally banned from destruction yet.

Choosing a refurbished Fairphone (Gen. 6) is a direct vote against this systemic waste. Instead of exploiting legislative loopholes, we run a regional, European refurbishment loop. We treat returns as an asset, keeping valuable electronics from being recycled prematurely.

How do we refurbish our devices

We don't believe in replacing parts just for the sake of aesthetics, because replacing perfectly functional components creates unnecessary electronic waste. For example, batteries are tested and guaranteed to hold over 80% capacity. We only swap them out if they fall below that threshold. Screens are only replaced if they have more than two scratches, and outer frames are only swapped if scuffs are deep and highly visible. Just like our new devices, a refurbished model ships with no chargers or cables to prevent e-waste. It arrives in plastic-free, recyclable packaging that often utilizes existing, used boxes with a refurbished label to eliminate printing waste.

Please Note: The internal specifications of a new and refurbished Fairphone (Gen. 6) are completely identical, with one minor exception: because refurbished phones may have been opened during tech checks, the original IP (ingress protection) water-resistance rating cannot be guaranteed.

The Fairphone difference

Refurbished tech from other brands often comes with a risky, short one-year warranty. We don't think that’s very fair. That’s why we offer the refurbished Fairphone (Gen. 6) with the exact same five-year warranty as a brand-new device. And yes, the warranty is fully transferable to a third or fourth user down the line. You also get the exact same software support longevity as a new device, with official software updates guaranteed until 2033.

On top of this, you’ll enjoy the same modular advantages of a new Fairphone device. If you drop a standard refurbished phone from another brand and crack the screen, chances are repair costs are so high it ruins your initial savings. Because our refurbished model uses the exact same modular architecture, you can buy affordable, standard spare parts from our webshop and fix it yourself in the comfort of your home.

So what’s better: Refurbished or brand new?

Ultimately, it comes down to choice. A brand-new Fairphone device is still more sustainable in the long run compared to other competitor devices and comes to you in pristine condition. Meanwhile, a refurbished device nets you all the functional advantages of a brand-new device at a more affordable cost. Same warranty, same software support, same award-winning modular design with more affordable spare parts than the competition.

Whether you choose new or refurbished, you are choosing a smartphone that is built to last, better for people, and better for the planet.

Our stock of refurbished phones depends on the supply of used products. See what’s available here. If devices are out of stock, don’t worry. Refurbishing is a continuous process for us. You can set a reminder to make sure you’re updated when units are available.

This article was originally published in June 2024 and has been updated to reflect the latest trends, data, and industry developments.

2019. 53.6 million metric tons of electronic waste generated.

2025. 65 million metric tons of electronic waste generated.

2050. 120 million metric tons of electronic waste projected.

And that's before factoring in AI. A comprehensive white paper by the Basel Action Network (BAN) warns that the explosive growth of artificial intelligence and data center infrastructure puts the figure much higher, hitting 196 million to 211 million tonnes!

These aren’t figures we should be proud of. Sooner rather than later, we are going to start drowning in our own electronic filth, unless we do something about it. The problem of electronic waste is a growing global concern driven by short product life cycles dictated by a greedy market, as well as improper disposal and recycling practices. This is an absolute tragedy, because from a pure market perspective, the estimated value of recoverable materials in global e-waste is around a staggering $91 billion. Globally, the formal recycling rate dropped to just under 22%, meaning we wasted recoverable materials worth approximately $81 billion in 2025 alone.

“More than five billion mobile phones are currently sitting unused in homes and offices globally. That’s close to four years of global smartphone sales.”

GSM Association

Responsibly collecting and recycling them into new devices would reduce the strain on already stretched supply chains. All that is not counting the environmental and human cost. Think about the health issues from hazardous materials such as the lead, mercury, and cadmium in these devices, that can leach into the soil, water and air if not treated properly. While the figures for e-waste keep growing exponentially, the amount of properly recycled e-waste seems to be stagnating. Currently, the rate at which we generate electronic waste globally is growing five times faster than the rate of recycling. Addressing the problem of e-waste requires sustainable practices, responsible recycling, extended product life cycles, and the promotion of a circular economy to minimize waste generation and maximize resource efficiency.

How Fairphone tackles the problem

In 2019, when we launched the Fairphone 4, we also introduced the concept of electronic waste neutral smartphones to the electronics industry. Today, our complete product line is 97% e-waste neutral , including the Fairphone (Gen. 6), the Fairphone (Gen. 6+), the new Fairbuds XL, the Fairbuds, and our new line of cables and chargers. By the end of 2026, we aim to make that 100%, meaning every single product available from Fairphone will be e-waste neutral. That means we collect and recycle a weight-equivalent amount of electronic waste for every device purchased. So, for example, for every Fairphone (Gen. 6+) we sell, we collect 212 grams of electronic waste for proper recycling.

From a broader perspective, our approach focuses on avoiding and reducing e-waste by promoting device longevity, implementing take-back programs, and integrating recycled materials. ​We also actively engage with users and partners to create a more sustainable and responsible product lifecycle in the electronics industry. ​One of our take-back methods involves the E-Waste Race, easily our most fun way to tackle the problem.

We sponsored Race Against Waste’s E-Waste Race in Zaanstad last year, educating more than 300 children about the world’s e-waste problem.

The E-waste Race is an innovative solution to responsibly collect electronic waste, while educating and inspiring thousands of children about the problem. In the races we sponsor, ten schools in a particular locality compete against each other to collect as much e-waste as possible over four weeks. In the process, children learn a lot about how to tackle the problem of electronic waste, and help direct resources back into the loop, making them available for new products. If a product is still working or can be repaired, they are encouraged to make sure it gets a second life. If that’s not a possibility, they are advised to collect it for proper recycling. Convincing friends and family to let go of unused gadgets at home, visits to repair cafés, campaigns in local newspapers, getting air time on local radio about the cause—all this translates into points that bring their schools closer to winning.

It was in 2023 that we first sponsored Race Against Waste’s E-waste Race  in the Netherlands’ Zaanstad region, collecting more than five tons of electronics waste in four weeks! Over the last few years, our e-waste races have become a crucial component of our overall recycling efforts, with races across the Netherlands and the UK through the course of 2026 already having amassed close to 9 tons of e-waste! Here’s to more e-waste races and less e-waste in the world.