Hi,
Every now and then I glance at the forum to see if I can figure out when or if there will ever be an OTA upgrade for my Murena FairPhone 5. I can’t. It’s not that I am desperate, it’s just that the majority of compatible phones are on U Community, and as a Murena user, (T Official), I am starting to feel like I’ve been forgotten.
What’s happening?
For the sake of distinction and avoiding misunderstandings, an OTA update is a regular update your phone gets via the updater within the same Android version including those important security updates etc.
What you are waiting for is an OTA upgrade to a newer Android version via the updater, which has to be prepared with extra effort and testing by the development team per individual device and per single upgrade step, and thus takes extra time.
You can follow proceedings here …
You can manually install the U (or now A14) community build … /e/OS community FP5 download
You are absolutely right, I meant upgrade and not update.
I had previously seen the OTA Related Information which says, “To be planned”. This is why I started this thread because, “To be planned”, literally means that it is not planned yet but will be planned at some unidentified time in the future. Once it is planned I presume there will be a target date. Again, I’m not desperate or complaining, just wondering what’s happening because it all seems very vague.
In developing you usually set certain tasks to be tackled, depending on when you are to finish that task, you don’t start a different one. But from a pool of tasks you pick one you know you should do next.
Hope that makes sense for you and why it is how it is.
Probably not. From what is visible in the history of the weekly development and testing updates, the status of OTA upgrades could go from To be planned to Under development to Under Testing without an ETA. The ETA would then be added later when nearing completion.
Software development is not an exact science date-wise or deadline-wise. Development is finished when it’s finished. In my opinion any ETA is just being given out to the public because people outside of the development demand an ETA and feel better when they get one. It’s up to differing levels of luck then whether any ETA can be met, or not.
Every project with a deliverable I have been involved in has a timeline, even at the start, and it might go from a target year, to a target quarter to a target month to a target day as the project evolves. Yes there are concurrent projects, personnel and dependencies to factor in but that’s part and parcel of the project.
However, that’s not really what I’m commenting on. Again, not complaining but rather commenting on the vagueness of the information coming out of e/os with regard to the OTA upgrade for FP5.
Absolutely! Feeling good is what keeps the customer coming back. Feeling bad is what turns them away.
Indeed. Well this one is “to be planned”.
When we get these requests I wonder why the users choose stable then imply that they want “current”.
Hi there! I´ve read quiet a bit in the forum, but I couldn´t find a clear answer to a bunch of questions. I hope someone can help and educate me about it…:
According to the FAQ it is possible to side load an OTA image. Is this recommended or supported on the Fairphone 5?
If this is the case, would it be possible to update my FP5 from Android 13 3.0.1-t20250606498724-official-FP5 to the latest Android 14 OTA release, which can be found in the manifest Builds – Django REST framework ?
At the moment, it shows e-3.0.2-a14-20250627504416-official-FP5.zip.
Can the sideload also be done with a full community release from /e/OS stable FP5 download (if the security patch level is higher than the currently installed one)?
My current patch level is: 5th of April 2025 (Android Security Update) & 5th of June 2025 (Vendor patch level). According to FP5 install instructions, the latest patch level for 3.0.2-a14 is 1st of June, so this shouldn´t brick the device, if I understand the instructions correctly.
If this is a rather stupid idea in general and there´s a high chance to brick the phone, I rather wait for the official OTA release.
Thanks in advance for your support!
It is not a documented method. It is fine for those with sufficient knowledge.
We have a convention to use Update for update of /e/OS version and Upgrade for Upgrade of Android version.
OTA Upgrades are offered for official builds but no upgrade package has been prepared yet for fp5.
So the OTA_PACKAGE linked is an Update package but it is unknown to me the result of applying this a-14 update over T, my expectation is that the update would likely fail with an error message, idk.
My preferred method to upgrade FP5, having dynamic partitions, is by the regular Fastboot ROM.
Typo ?? You ask community and link official Install images. “Install only” Fastboot ROMs are identified here with leading IMG- – no sideload of any IMG-filename.zip.
However a community IMG-filename.zip could be used to fresh install, full format data, with change of Android version to a14. The community builds cannot be locked.
We do not know exactly how far the community an official builds diverge. It is not recommended to change official to community without format data.
Is this a locked or unlocked phone, FairphoneOS or /e/OS ?? Vendor in advance of Android ?? … idk or perhaps Vendor June 2024 ??
Edit ater 24 hours. This thew me at first sight, Vendor June 25 would have to be a different phone from the one we spoke of above. This must be in error.
Please check this thread (answered) Install /e/ on FP5 with newer Security Patches