Most of us carry a tiny surveillance device in our pockets, which we call a smartphone. If that bothers you, your options have historically been limited. Buy a Google Pixel, install GrapheneOS, and accept the irony of running a privacy OS on Google hardware.
Motorola just made that calculus a lot simpler. At MWC 2026, the company announced a long-term partnership with the GrapheneOS Foundation, making it the first non-Pixel manufacturer to officially support the privacy-hardened OS.
So what is GrapheneOS?
GrapheneOS is a privacy and security-focused mobile OS, developed as a non-profit open source project. Think of it as Android, but stripped of all the Google Play Services. It results in a more private and secure operating system that has no built-in tracking.
What separates GrapheneOS from others is the level of control it gives users, letting them choose how much privacy they want and how much data they’re willing to share. You can decide to run your smartphone entirely devoid of any Google services. You don’t even need to sign in to a Google Account to use it.
As you might expect, this will severely limit the apps you can use on your phone. If you are comfortable with trading some level of privacy, GrapheneOS allows you to install and run the Google Play Store in a sandboxed version. This allows you to manage what permissions you grant to Google rather than giving them unfettered access to your device.
Why this partnership matters
Before this Motorola and GrapheneOS partnership, you could only install this secure OS on Pixel devices. According to the project developers, GrapheneOS only supported Pixel devices because Pixels are the only phones that met their exceptionally strict hardware and security requirements.
That means you were stuck with either using an old Pixel device or forking out a considerable amount of money for a brand new Pixel phone. Motorola becoming the first officially confirmed non-Pixel partner means users may finally have real alternatives to choose from, and more choice is always a win from a consumer perspective.
Can I install GrapheneOS on my Motorola phone right now?
Not yet. The Motorola partnership was announced at the ongoing MWC 2026, and neither company has confirmed which Motorola devices will be supported or whether GrapheneOS will be pre-installed or offered as a manual install option.
Motorola stated that it will work with the GrapheneOS Foundation to strengthen smartphone security and engineer future devices with built-in GrapheneOS compatibility.
For now, we’ll have to wait and see which Motorola devices will support GrapheneOS, and it’s possible that only future-generation models will make the cut.
