> we are unfortunately not able to guarantee bootloader unlocking, as it is not feasible for us to search through thousands of devices in order to find one that is
Ohhhh, is that how it works? Maybe I should try that next time. Instead of selling broken hardware as "NOT TESTED, AS IS, PARTS MACHINE" I should sell them as "100% working!" and when someone asks, I'll tell them "sorry, it's not feasible to search through all devices and find the working ones"
I think where the analogy falls apart isn't whether or not there may be expired products on the shelves, it's whether or not the store will make a reasonable effort to make it right and either refund your money or replace the product with one that's known to be good. Most will.
Source: I ditched the techpocalypse at the end of 2024 and now happily work at a grocery store.
They… will not say that, because they get a large fine if you report them. Every store I've been too has been deeply apologetic when this has happened (a small handful of times in my entire life).
In a lot of the US it is entirely legal to sell expired food. Near me there are grocery stores that specialize in “close to expiration” food, for a discount.
Rewe in germany also has some things discounted when close to expiration as well, but it has a fat red/white label on it indicating it (usually meat products)
Swappa became a no-go for me when they started making exceptions to their rules for commercial sellers, justifying it by saying they were inherently more reliable. For example, using stock photos for multiple devices instead of the device you actually receive. All of three of these phones, based on the seller names, were those reliable sellers.
I have had good experience with Craig list seller in highly technical city, such as San Mateo, San Jose etc.
Facebook Marketplace almost all of phone for sale is locked/stolen or the person selling does not know originator (f.e. Verizon phone never unlockable, includes all reseller) and often they are too non technical to know if it was bought from google play store ("factory unlocked") Often it will not even be paid off or intentional to scam you with a phone that will work for a month until it is reported stolen and unpaid loan
Well, it has something to do with it. In the context of Pixels, carrier‐unlocked phones always allow the bootloader to be unlocked, Verizon‐locked phones never do (see, e.g., https://discuss.grapheneos.org/d/24254-no-way-to-use-my-veri...), and for other carriers it varies but often requires additional manual fiddling. To quote the GrapheneOS FAQ:
> Devices sold in partnership with specific carriers may be locked by the carrier, which will prevent installing GrapheneOS. This is primarily an issue with US carriers and isn't common elsewhere in the world. To avoid this, either don't buy a carrier device, or make sure it can be unlocked.
Is there a difference there for a Pixel? I thought those bootloaders have always been unlockable (after carrier unlocking, which should be possible after the contract is paid off).
I wonder if the person you talked to actually knew what they were talking about. Swappa explains what an unlocked device means in their FAQ and a bootloader is not mentioned.
That's sad, because one of Swappa's main selling points (and the reason they got popular) is that they started out as a marketplace for Android phones, and should specifically know about rooted / bootloader unlocked / etc. phones. Enthusiast stuff.
Their About page says:
> The inspiration for Swappa sparked when Ben had trouble finding a good source for test devices for Android development projects.
I guarantee you that most people buying used phones are more concerned if the phone will work with their existing phone plan than if they can use it as a development testbench.
Someone can be forgiven for thinking that "unlocked" means "not locked" rather than "locked but with only one lock".
I only buy used devices from online marketplaces/vendors with free returns, as it keeps the incentives aligned such that sellers don't want to hide defects (as it just increases their return rate).
If it's not a carrier locked device, what would be the reason for it not to be OEM unlockable once connected to the Internet? This is not about the device being logged into an existing user account, that would trigger FRP which is something different.
I've used eBay to buy several used Pixels for GrapheneOS, without problem.
The easy way is to search for ones for which the seller explicitly says "OEM" or "bootloader" unlockable/unlocked (or seller says it already has "grapheneos", "graphene", "calyxos", etc., installed).
For awhile, I came up with some tricks to try to get a better price by identifying ones that were bought directly from Google (rather than through a carrier, which are who has been disabling bootloader unlocking thus far), but decided it wasn't worth the effort.
Of course, you can also just buy a new one from Google.
I got scammed on Swappa about six months ago. I was buying a used Google Pixel tablet in "mint" condition. It was really used and terribly scratched up.
Swappa staff were unhelpful and only after I opened a dispute with Paypal did I get my money back.
I don't blame Swappa for a random dodgy seller, but this was an "Enterprise" seller, whom is still selling on Swappa today!
See this reddit review, which isn't mine, but is almost exactly what I dealt with.
Reading OP's post, I can't help but wonder if they bought a Verizon Pixel. This is a very very well-known gotcha. Verizon locks their bootloaders and you can't bootloader-unlock Verizon Pixels, even after they are carrier-unlocked.
Swappa is great for sellers and bad for buyers. They use a Paypal marketplace product and have no actual authority in a transaction, they just match buyers and sellers. If the phone is not as described, you'll have to pay return shipping yourself.
I had a similar experience with eBay. The problem is that “unlocked“ typically refers to being able to use it on a different carrier—not related to the bootloader.
So I bought an “unlocked” Pixel that had a locked bootloader. Returned it. Felt bad because the seller correctly classified it.
Ultimately I found an eBay seller (thegizmotrader) that explicitly lists the bootloader as unlockable.
When buying secondhand, I suggest looking for Pixels not associated with any particular carrier (as are sold by Google online store), and especially not Verizon.
Bummer of an experience. About a month ago I bought an unlocked 8a from a seller on Swappa and had no issue getting GrapheneOS (which works well!) on it.
Well never needed an unlocked bootloader specifically, but have found Swappa to be solid place to buy used gear more generally - purchased 4 used iPhones and 1 Macbook Air so far.
I've gotten used pixels off of ebay more than once and never had a problem. I feel like if it was that simple swappa.com wouldn't exist though. Maybe I've been lucky?
Same here, I bought my current smartphone, a Pixel 6, two or three years ago for 200 dollars on eBay, and it arrived in pristine condition. Super small bump on one of the frame edges, not a single scratch on the display though now there are many, of course, I'm not that careful and the phone is cheap enough not to be too upset.
I generally trust private sellers a lot more than professional ones, if you vet them well enough (check their page, check their reviews, check their other listings), the chance that you'll get a good deal on a device in the condition described. The incentive to gain a profit is a whole lot lower, a commercial seller has to make sure they're the winner in some way during a transaction, they have bills, staff and assets. A private person is often happy to just get rid of the phone, as it would usually rot in the old phone drawer, until it eventually ends up in an e-waste bin a decade later when they clean out. Getting a little money back is already a win. Surprisingly, I've never had a bad experience. I presume there's also buyer protection, but I'm hoping I never have to use it.
I've also had good experiences on eBay. Buyers can leave bad reviews for anything so good reviews are a strong indicator. (That said, there are plenty of "genuine" laptop batteries for $15 from high-scoring sellers.)
I feel like eBay put a lot of work into creating a competitive marketplace where honesty was rewarded, and it basically works well but they got an unsavory reputation anyways. Then Amazon tried to hide that complexity from the end user and buyers just get burned. Maybe Swappa is trying to go the Amazon route? I do not think there are real shortcuts here. Either the marketplace needs to vet sellers manually, or offer a competitive, transparent reputation system like eBay.
I think eBay's larger volume makes it easier to find a seller that will go through the "infeasible" trouble of sorting OEM-unlocked devices. I very recently switched to Graphene and nearly purchased from a listing that had similar "may or may not be OEM locked" language before finding one that promised it was unlocked.
Unlocked bootloader, grapheneOS, etc etc are all technical terms and nerd culture no one knows outside of technical world, most of these sellers are not technical people, nor they have the time to check it, and unless the seller is technical dude himself, highly unlikely you will get a definitive answer.
This has a downside like your scenario, but also a positive side when you find gems in used markets but the owner doesn’t know its potentials.
I wonder why almost no one in these GrapheneOS praise topic mentions that you won't be able to pay with your phone, and often even bank apps refuse to install on it - it was a deal breaker for me personally, and now I'm back under Google umbrella :<
Limitations are on the website - https://grapheneos.org/articles/
I don't care about google pay/wallet or android auto. My credit union's app does work fine, but even if it didn't, I'd still use GOS. It's great.
This is a fantastic find, thank you very much! I ended up switching from Lineage + MicroG to GOS for the android Auto support because I couldn't find something like this. I will be setting this up on my secondary Lineage device.
Once upon a time I would be happy to put custom ROMs on my phone and do all these patches.
These days I just care so much about "things should just work" that I cannot justify doing this. I cannot think about how I could spend time figuring out what to do when the repo is no longer maintained or something breaks for random reasons.
and if you did you could use curve pay instead. Basically the same thing with more features, the only catch is that they charge FX fees after surpassing a limit (but that can be mitigated by paying with the same currency of your linked card, thus never executing a change in the first place)
My tiny local credit union app isn't on there, but it worked fine. I miss wallet a bit and it's a shame that there are important apps which still refuse to act reasonably, but I don't think it's really that bad.
Paying with your phone just seems like one of those separation of concerns problem. I'm sure you have backup forms, and cash, etc, but there's something about not having to worry about the multinefarious capabilities of my phone if it's not in my posession.
I guess I'm so paranoid that not only do I run GrapheneOS, I've never had nor wanted banking nor payment apps on my phone. Having ALL my money be accessible from something so easily lost, stolen, or seized would be a constant source of stress for me. There's (hopefully) a lot of security around accessing it, but sometimes the only winning move is not to play.
Fair point, but how much extra effort is it to put a credit card between your phone? I'm still under the Google umbrella as well, but this would be my first issue solved.
Banks will readily send you a completely separate computer just to perform payment transactions with. It's very thin, and you can even get a phone case that holds it as well. There's really little reason to bundle all that functionality up into one device, especially if a consequence is that doing so requires you to run surveillance industry malware.
I just bought an official Pixel 9 to install GrapheneOS, and the process couldn't be simpler. Their webusb installer is extremely polished. You just plug your phone in, click through a few steps, and you're done. There's absolutely no reason to bother looking for a phone with GrapheneOS already preinstalled.
As a side note, I've been using it for a few months now, and it works great. All the apps I use run on it just fine. Battery life is great, and you don't have a bunch of cruft from Google running on your device. Can highly recommend for anybody looking for a phone you actually own.
85 comments
> we are unfortunately not able to guarantee bootloader unlocking, as it is not feasible for us to search through thousands of devices in order to find one that is
Ohhhh, is that how it works? Maybe I should try that next time. Instead of selling broken hardware as "NOT TESTED, AS IS, PARTS MACHINE" I should sell them as "100% working!" and when someone asks, I'll tell them "sorry, it's not feasible to search through all devices and find the working ones"
Source: I ditched the techpocalypse at the end of 2024 and now happily work at a grocery store.
Go make a stink about it at the customer service desk and they will probably say exactly that.
Facebook Marketplace almost all of phone for sale is locked/stolen or the person selling does not know originator (f.e. Verizon phone never unlockable, includes all reseller) and often they are too non technical to know if it was bought from google play store ("factory unlocked") Often it will not even be paid off or intentional to scam you with a phone that will work for a month until it is reported stolen and unpaid loan
> Devices sold in partnership with specific carriers may be locked by the carrier, which will prevent installing GrapheneOS. This is primarily an issue with US carriers and isn't common elsewhere in the world. To avoid this, either don't buy a carrier device, or make sure it can be unlocked.
https://swappa.com/faq/answer/unlocked-device
Their About page says:
> The inspiration for Swappa sparked when Ben had trouble finding a good source for test devices for Android development projects.
I only buy used devices from online marketplaces/vendors with free returns, as it keeps the incentives aligned such that sellers don't want to hide defects (as it just increases their return rate).
The easy way is to search for ones for which the seller explicitly says "OEM" or "bootloader" unlockable/unlocked (or seller says it already has "grapheneos", "graphene", "calyxos", etc., installed).
For awhile, I came up with some tricks to try to get a better price by identifying ones that were bought directly from Google (rather than through a carrier, which are who has been disabling bootloader unlocking thus far), but decided it wasn't worth the effort.
Of course, you can also just buy a new one from Google.
Swappa staff were unhelpful and only after I opened a dispute with Paypal did I get my money back.
I don't blame Swappa for a random dodgy seller, but this was an "Enterprise" seller, whom is still selling on Swappa today!
See this reddit review, which isn't mine, but is almost exactly what I dealt with.
https://reddit.com/r/Scams/comments/1d8emzf/suckered_on_swap...
Reading OP's post, I can't help but wonder if they bought a Verizon Pixel. This is a very very well-known gotcha. Verizon locks their bootloaders and you can't bootloader-unlock Verizon Pixels, even after they are carrier-unlocked.
So I bought an “unlocked” Pixel that had a locked bootloader. Returned it. Felt bad because the seller correctly classified it.
Ultimately I found an eBay seller (thegizmotrader) that explicitly lists the bootloader as unlockable.
When buying secondhand, I suggest looking for Pixels not associated with any particular carrier (as are sold by Google online store), and especially not Verizon.
I generally trust private sellers a lot more than professional ones, if you vet them well enough (check their page, check their reviews, check their other listings), the chance that you'll get a good deal on a device in the condition described. The incentive to gain a profit is a whole lot lower, a commercial seller has to make sure they're the winner in some way during a transaction, they have bills, staff and assets. A private person is often happy to just get rid of the phone, as it would usually rot in the old phone drawer, until it eventually ends up in an e-waste bin a decade later when they clean out. Getting a little money back is already a win. Surprisingly, I've never had a bad experience. I presume there's also buyer protection, but I'm hoping I never have to use it.
I feel like eBay put a lot of work into creating a competitive marketplace where honesty was rewarded, and it basically works well but they got an unsavory reputation anyways. Then Amazon tried to hide that complexity from the end user and buyers just get burned. Maybe Swappa is trying to go the Amazon route? I do not think there are real shortcuts here. Either the marketplace needs to vet sellers manually, or offer a competitive, transparent reputation system like eBay.
This has a downside like your scenario, but also a positive side when you find gems in used markets but the owner doesn’t know its potentials.
- https://github.com/sn-00-x/aa4mg
These days I just care so much about "things should just work" that I cannot justify doing this. I cannot think about how I could spend time figuring out what to do when the repo is no longer maintained or something breaks for random reasons.
>I don't care about google pay/wallet
and if you did you could use curve pay instead. Basically the same thing with more features, the only catch is that they charge FX fees after surpassing a limit (but that can be mitigated by paying with the same currency of your linked card, thus never executing a change in the first place)
My tiny local credit union app isn't on there, but it worked fine. I miss wallet a bit and it's a shame that there are important apps which still refuse to act reasonably, but I don't think it's really that bad.
I also dont think everything needs to be an app.
also my bank apps install, but yes, no tap to pay
As a side note, I've been using it for a few months now, and it works great. All the apps I use run on it just fine. Battery life is great, and you don't have a bunch of cruft from Google running on your device. Can highly recommend for anybody looking for a phone you actually own.
I had issues with receiving incompatible "variants" of compatible devices when shopping for used phone for custom roms