# postmarketOS 98 Hacker News commenters recommended postmarketOS and 39 criticized it, November 2025 to November 2026. It was recommended in 12 of 13 months; owners who said how long report a median of 0 years (3 owners). It meets the Hacker Approved badge rule. **Verdict:** A free, Alpine-based Linux for phones that revives old devices and gives full user control, but hardware support is patchy and few phones are daily-driver ready. ## Why people recommend it - Revives old phones cheaply (4 comments): "it's better in many ways (specs; your wallet; the environment) to just rescue an older Android phone and install postmarketOS on it" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50199833)) "they're probably fine if you just want to turn your old phone into a palmtop-class device" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=46934003)) "You can get true linux phone 10x cheaper by buying something that supports PostmarketOS" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48078997)) - Full user control, open source (3 comments): "aligned with these goals: free open source software, empowering users to control their own devices." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47943227)) "You'd have full root access, sideloading etc and none of that corporate control" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47368785)) "Very happy to see PostmarketOS take an uncompromising stance and also providing justification for it." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47180128)) - Active, steadily improving development (5 comments): "I highly recommend keeping an eye on postmarketOS blog." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49190372)) "postmarket is still seeing good development even if not having great hardware adapation at the moment" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49188782)) "It's only thanks to the tireless work of postmarketOS etc. that some devices boot on modern kernels." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48689862)) - Works well on some devices (3 comments): "I've always been disappointed with postmarket for its intended purpose (it's supposed to be a phone os) but as a thin client OS it is best in class." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48179989)) "It runs almost-perfectly (sans camera) out-of-the-box on most Duets, and has for a while." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49749928)) "My PinePhone runs postmarketOS and can technically run every modern Linux desktop "app"." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48904358)) ## What people warn about - Poor, incomplete hardware support (6 comments): "Even on devices where it "works", it tends to be slow, buggy, very heavy on battery and some peripherals like GPS and camera very rarely work." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49346802)) "there is not even one "Main" phone with all of the hardware feature supported." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=47093963)) "very close to run PostmarketOS well, I have hope but for now few but critical features are missing" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48864876)) - Not yet daily-driver ready (4 comments): "It's not fully usable as a daily driver yet, but with some work it can get there." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45990263)) "they're at least a target for PostmarketOS, even if that wiki doesn't actually describe something daily-driveable yet" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49667725)) "I've always been disappointed with postmarket for its intended purpose (it's supposed to be a phone os) but as a thin client OS it is best in class." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48179989)) - Slow, buggy, battery hungry (3 comments): "Even on devices where it "works", it tends to be slow, buggy, very heavy on battery and some peripherals like GPS and camera very rarely work." ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=49346802)) "Postmarketos can run the containers, however a 4k desktop environment is still a bit sluggish" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48265285)) "the on-screen keyboard doesn't open and trying to things like scaling are likely broken" ([source](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=48179226)) ## Alternatives hackers recommend - [Mobian](https://hackerapproved.com/p/mobian.md): 9 recommend - [Pocketblue](https://hackerapproved.com/p/pocketblue.md): 7 recommend ## Cite as Hacker Approved, "postmarketOS", https://hackerapproved.com/p/postmarketos/ (counts from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026).