Image by computergottyt from Pixabay
Binnen F-Droid treft je alleen FOSS Android apps aan. Een mooi startpunt om je te verlossen van het BIG Tech datagraaien.
@thore pinged us for a big update of Ente Locker:
Ente Locker now has document scanning, powered by what looks like copying FairScan’s code from Kotlin to Rust, surely that won’t end up in a drama:
…grab some popcorn.
@Licaon_Kter brings a post about 10 apps worth installing. It’s a 19 minutes read, but if you don’t have the time, here’s the TL;DR: Exodus, NewPipe, Fennec, Aegis, KeePassDX, Syncthing-Fork, AntennaPod, Phonograph Plus, Tusky, and Qalculate.
L_K notes that Proton VPN - Secure and Free VPN has a new app added with reproducible builds enabled. The old app id will still get updates. Yet, naming an app “non-reproducible” made users confused, they technically are both reproducible, it’s just a question of who signed the package. Historically, the now named “non-reproducible” one is signed by F-Droid because when added, years ago, the app could not be made reproducible. But it went through a full rewrite, and the new codebase is much modern and easier to reproduce. We are in contact with the developers, they are aware and we will work with them to somehow combine both in a way that users like.
@shuvashish76 reminds us of an update of Aard2 after 2 years. It includes a redesign with Material You and many other updates. Take a look at the changelog for more details.
And BatteryBot Pro was updated after 5 years. If you’ve been using it for so long you also got a present, unfortunately. The app won’t update, so you’ll need to uninstall the old version and install the latest.
0.15.4v0.9.31.3.41.61.0.121.3.01.6.11.1.40.0.330.31.11.1.83.11.46.6.91.19.02.25.30.5.06-fdroid3.0.30.8.81.0.137.3.70.19.3-beta1.15.61.3.01.19.093.1.682.1.73.242.12.32.12.0.71.0.52.4.82.6.10.4298566540.14.01.0.91.9.22.6.11.2.222.5.02.5.23.5.1742.9.1226.10.01.16.04.4.60.9.05.7.12.341.0.70.4.02.81.13.7.04.0.454.5.21-ose0.1.1393.43.61.0.150.4.61.9.01.3.04.5.2 (Komodo)1.8.00.5.12.2.232.22.15.8.0-rc15.297.01.1.01.4.352.2026100203.0.40.7.01.2.02.2.12.2.10.15.01.6.80.17.620.4.01.0.60.0.32_alpha2.26158.0.20.3.61.6.03.2.822026.10.12.9.34.5.50.5.04.6.02.11.02.0.11.9.71.0.31.2.013.0.2.013.0.2.0871.4.03.02.114.736.11.04.7.21.0.93.0.31.8.026.10.10.3.01.2.11.2.00.8.21.10.05.1.01.6.00.0.58-fdroid5.89.461.1.02.6.01.1.00.2.21.9.54.9.01.16.07.03.3.32.1.331.71.8.1511.82.724.00.20.53.4.02026.10.164.5.61.0.00.26.02.1.02.0.90.5.24.0.50.9.11.0.41.7.02.6.92.8.01.6.310.0.0-fdroid2.104.9.10.24.01.12.14-release3.0.30.8.0-alpha0.3.80.2.02.25.15690.0.85.2.01.41.2.44.2.02026.571.4.92.70.01.3.21.0.121.7.41.0.442.45.02.2.026.10.21.26.113.0.2.113.0.2.10.4.51.1.01.0.306.26.01.18.12.32.12.0.60.9.726.10.112.4.01.9.01.0.3204.1.3.11.1.111.590.5.1202610180.37.10.2.00.2.71.7.16.4.01.3.53.22.4-beta3.5.1.151.402.14.50.10.02.2.131.8.341180.1.15-fdroid4.2.13.1.12.0.01.12.12.02.5.00.0.671.1.82.23.0v9.8.32.3.0v1.753.6.31.2.93.2.0-oss2.12.751.5.10.4.012.16.31.5.00.12.04.1.42026.10.151.41.45.20.74.092.10.01.4.12.11.32.4.76.1.01.11.01.1.811.0.40v0.8.10.2.22.1.90.57.0v0.5.83.2.00.8.01.3.71.87.390.140.2610141.36.21.0.0-beta.51.0.81.0.31.0.17871.33.70.1.111.8.02.5.02026.10-free2.13.11.3.01.2.13.2.631.9.21.0.569.3.11.1.01.0.52.23.03.1.05.196.2.12.30.4.00.6.03.8.210.10.11.20.02.1.473.202.101.6.32.4.01.2.03.0.21.03.0.03.3.12.7.62.4.01.27.151.3.21.84.30.05.7.1/X2.2.62.5.61.42.01.7.4.11.3.01.15.00.460.7.40.51.0.303.0.22.3.34.3.101.0.3112.5.121.3.44.22.121.0.381.3.21.3.41.1.71.34.01.4.11.1.71.4.522.1.3.0v3.4.0-Stable3.7.20.2.51.9.91.41.9.11.12.11.0.220.1.131.2.00.26.2353.31.0.51.20r/50611-r-2026-10-07r/50611-r-2026-10-070.6.00.0.41.0.83.2.30.9.212.9.32.60.81.0.6-alpha8.3.32.62.11.12.0.29Thank you for reading this week’s TWIF 🙂
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Wow, almost a month since our last weekly. A lot has happened, and most stayed the same. We were busy with apps inclusions, apps updates, client fixes and summits. The PR team is also the maintainer team, the testing team and the support team. Priorities take hold.
Now, polishing the Client is a top priority, so we’ll talk about apps way below.
F-Droid and F-Droid Basic were updated to 2.0.1 and 2.0.2 adding:
- Show Calculator icon when app hiding is enabled (Full only)
- Show panic app hiding explanation dialog (Full only)
- Fix notifications quirks (Thanks proletarius!)
- Add icon shortcuts for My Apps and Search
- Sort new apps by added date
- Fix Huawei/Honor crash when drawing adaptive app icons
- Fix app installation on old Xiaomi/Redmi devices
- Disable SessionInstaller on newer Chinese MIUI devices
- Translation updates
While we had more than a dozen test versions, we still did not convince enough users to update and hit these fixed bugs early in the development process. An understandable problem given the Android ecosystem size and diversity.
F-Droid Basic has been suggested for a while, so everyone already got the update. F-Droid’s extra features took a bit more time, but we are getting close to a release for everybody. If you’ve opted into betas you already got the updates, if not, you can do it now or manually expand Versions and update.
XDA covers (their) preferred short list of of must-have FLOSS apps, that made them “ditch their mainstream rivals”. Were you even using “mainstream” apps anyway?
While we acknowledge that mobile computing is the widest available form of computing, by users numbers, we know some also use the bigger “older” kind too, and use them together with their mobile devices to enhance operations. One such tool is fdroidcl, a command-line F-Droid desktop client that allows you to get the same apps controls, but from the comfort of your physical keyboard. Matthias Kirschner, of FSFE and former F-Droid Board member, tells us how he uses it for phone setups and upgrades. Get up to speed in this 10 minutes read.
Conversations was updated to 2.20.4+free with minor UI fixes. The developer penned a post that made the rounds in the FLOSS and Android communities, as the app is now also free on the centralized app store. Why now? See the 5 minute read that might make you mad that developers are treated this way by faceless corporations and happy that you chose F-Droid.
Jami launched their Jami Web client, no phone needed.
OsmAnd~ was updated to 5.4.10 with a plethora of fixes polishing the 5.4 release. One important fix that the F-Droid contributors have pushed is OpenGL1 integration crashes as our first release was misbehaving on lower-end devices that can’t use the modern OpenGL2 rendered due to hardware constrains.
Poker Payout was updated to 1.4.22 but with a new signing key. You’ve installed it last month? Tough luck, you need to uninstall then reinstall.
SMSecure was updated to 1.4.0 adding search, better delivery reports, hiding phone numbers in the UI, updated translations and many more fixes. One important feature that might get Silence users up from the couch has been added, Import encrypted backups from a SilenceExport folder. While we kept Silence on a life line since its last 2019 version, by fixing arm64 compatibility, time will soon come for it to be archived as the app won’t be installable on future Android versions and the current notification issues are a pain for the users. Get testing!
@CodeDoctor’s Dreamy Duskywing is here
Butterfly was updated to 2.6.0:
One of the biggest Butterfly updates yet brings:
📓 OneNote & Xournal++ support
🔄 Canvas rotation
💾 Persistent document states
🧰 Paints and presets for tools
📁 WebDAV remote encryption and backups
🎚️ UX improvements
📊 Tables
🗃️ Smarter file names for templates
🤝 Better collaboration & embeds
⌨️ More inputs & keybinds
🚀 Performance improvementsRead more here
@shuvashish76 makes it modern:
NewsBlur - News reader was updated to 15.0.5 adding better tablet support, faster scrolling, images controls, enhanced Add site and more.
Rethink: DNS + Firewall + VPN, updated to v0.5.7, gets a new redesigned UI, stats, universal allow rules, smart DNS filters and more.
@theimpulson peels onion layers:
First thing, I have been working with people at Weblate to have a small plugin and library to allow updating translations without rebuilding and redistributing the Android apps. As the work is still alpha, feedback is appreciated. Join us at github.com/WeblateOrg/kotlin-sdk.
The Tor Project muses back on how Tor VPN came to be, with Rust, per app tunnels, circumvention and more. Take an 8 minute break, read here.
@TobiGr checks a resume:
NewPipe is looking for two paid contractors: One Android developer with Kotlin and Jetpack Compose experience to help with the development of our new player library NewPlayer and the modernization of our codebase. There is also an open job an UI / UX expert to improve NewPipe’s user experience by doing an UX audit of the app. More information can be found on the website of NewPipe e.V., the non-profit organisation supporting NewPipe financially.
Just three hundred? Included during these 4 weeks, and many more are waiting. Some already got updates too, but we’re listing new apps only once here. The review process is long, not only by the length of our backlog, but also to get a chance to work with the developers, to get things in perfect shape at inclusion time and for the long road ahead. NOTE: We are also tightening the rules for apps inclusion, review the docs here.
More contributors raised to this challenge, offering their hands, eyes or tokens, each with their own abilities. Developers were guided to fix the recipes, add metadata (pics, icons, description), fix reproducibility issues, fix crashes and possible issues raised by testing in emulators and on real devices.
1.1.20.15.30.1.31.7.30.8.11v0.9.21.0.80.59Beta 45.5.30.14.3v0.8.1-prodv6.6.11.0.41.5.60.7.43.32.15.0.0-BETA_10.13.1605.0.11.3.03.1.31.2.61.3.02.3.11.8.11.1.11.1.66.6.82.1.41.18.05.1.11170.14.02.2.101.6.33.2.12.25.26.77 Stable1.2.33.12.31.14.11.7.92.0.32.62.015.3.215.3.215.3.215.3.21.5.151.591.0.133.2.81.0.111.46.5.17.3.51.9.02.6.31.19.02.5.00.37.11.2.40.19.2-beta1.15.51.2.81.3.50.8.21.18.40.10.20.95.1-banglejs93.1.382.1.33.222.12.21.7.352.3.11.0.816.3.02.31.9.00.3.11.75.55.0.01.1.02.5.51.0.41.0.695.7.01.8.162.4.71.1.01.31.5.11.6.02.6.04.1.01.1.11.4.20.10.33.8.11.6.1298566521.8.81.5.221.0.51.2.01.0.81.41.9.02.6.626.09.01.2.212.4.12.22.52.3.30.3.61.10.00.9.01.5.30.1.40.66.05.5.0-rc01.6.01.10.01.5.042.9.111.6.02.45.1 (F-Droid)1.0.326.9.02.11.71.2.01.27.1a.281.15.110.6.01.644.4.40.4.15.5.21.5.02.3.01.0.45.03.2.02.11.34.Meta2.1.00.23.013.80.3.352.3312.11.0.661.20.02026.10.05-19-FDroid2.2.06.0.81.11.1-oss1.5.01.0.66.7.01.20.16.1.02.1.0-beta12.74.1.2.2v1.0.0-rc.43.6.13.1.34.0.441.9.24.5.20-ose1.3.01.0.142.7.91.8.410.00.1.220.78.02.62.02.20.00.4.52.9.02.9.11.8.04.20.5.71.1.21.4.02.2.03.0.51.0.242.5.104.5.1 (Komodo)2.3.1-beta.22.0.4670.5.00.7.82.2.92.22.05.7.55.296.00.9.191.2.02.1.222.02.1.13.0.30.5.191.270.96.01.6.016.7.11.0.334.8.2300.10.22.2.00.11.3-621.0.101.3.651.0.58-oss1.5.20.0.22-beta2.0.21.6.72.2.30.17.601.4.00.2.141.23380.1.142.3.01.0.50.1.40.21.10.13.00.9.21.4.21.0.173.45.10.9.252.24.02.24.01.18.00.0.31_alpha158.0.01.5.51.10.03.11.33.3.1-foss1.1.0v2.6.91.0.2311.07.33.2.812.9.20.6.01.7.73.0.22.3.03.72.2.340.3.64.5.40.4.25.11.14.44.5.42.10.03.2.41.8.31.0.20.17.00.17.01.9.612.10.4.012.10.10.01.12.01.1.01.6.21.14.01.10.11.8.41.7.30.51.05.17.03.6.03.1.02.1.29.8.22.10.95.11.47.11.1.126.21.1.222.114.716.10.02.3.1(2693)2.3.1(2693)1.7.01.9.31.0.6215.0.02.5.11.2.00.9.10.3.03.1.10.3.41.256.2.10.8.04.0.142.0.01.5.00.0.57-fdroid3.8.21.2.21.6.161.5.31.6.35.89.311.1.146.401.2.32.33.182.5.02.12.01.4.121.59.104.21.2.32026.8.4-minimal1.5.131.4.114.8.24.3.01.0.31.42.15.0-1-1.6.21.15.80.42.53.3.14.0.1-offline2.8.00.100.91.5.1build107.2.40.9.00.5.241.4.2v0.2.61.8.123.1.23-FOSS11.72.17.03.ose2.623.10.20.43.3.01.462.11.4.02026.10.122.0.51.36.01.13.11.3.14.5.526.10.14.6.1-foss1.3.11.0.41.0.53.10.21.1.32.0.01.1.31.0.25.0.21.4.02.9.00.20.02.0.41.5.02.48.098.090.31.41.3.10.0.27-beta4.2.81.0.31.0.21.6.02.6.72.0.22.7.41.2.10.5.01.6.09.6.39-fdroid0.29.12.2.41.17.02.2.20.22.00.2.94.9.02.6.1-rc.10.23.01.12.13-release3.0.21.1.22.0.04.4.91.9.2-community1.9.00.3.61.0.11.5.41.8.02.4.20.3.12.25.1368v2.6.9v2.6.9v2.6.9v2.6.9v2.6.9v2.6.9v2.6.90.1.75.1.31.3.50.6.01.5.11.0.54.1.04.7.12026.562026-09-29-7445fe59b50.62.201.4.41.0.141.0.1132.69.01.0.61.1.02.6.12.13.41.0.101.11.31.7.51.18.9v4.0.91.7.31.0.32.44.11.1.192.1.03.8.23.8.226.10.11.26.01.0.72812.10.6.112.10.6.10.4.30.2.1-beta2.8.2 (29322440) fdroid1.0.11.0.296.25.04.0.01.0.01.52.2.12.31.08-fdroid-160.71.3.61.92.0.02.0.61.8.55.5.13-release1.0.3191.2.010.3.140.20.32.22026-09-17-release0.17.03.103.9.172026.121.12.2 Build 01.28.5a1.28.5a1.2.51.130.110.5.34.1.30.3.41.8.22.2.18.4.5-f1.14.02.13.21.8.01.3.24.9.81.1.102.3.02.2.00.19.035.0.1202610100.36.025.0.21.17.012.7.51.2.00.1.293.18.01.8.11.3.21.41.0.87.2.72026.09.302.3.00.8.110.2.57.11.33.1.04.15.11.0.50.7.30.1.411.5.32026.13.1-release1.0.72.21.00.8.01.0.381.15.2v6.9.174.6-fdroid1.3.03.32.5.06.2.11.4.22.1.94.11.30.4.6.oc.1.56.24.22.13.22.3-beta0.4.11.0.80.8.71.39v4.29.0irreproduciblev4.29.02.14.00.7.681.42.01.8.22026.09.29-32-FDroid2.6.10.97.40.9.02.1.00.4.10.10.01.6.72.2.120.61.03.9.14.01.8.331170.1.14-fdroid4.2.01.8.51.0.701.1.1-rc12.2.21.0.72.0.31.25.22.0.22.3.01.3.2251.1.72.3.02.22.0v9.8.22.2.01.50.61.33.46.04.6.43.1.13.6.21.2.73.1.03.1.0-oss1.0.41.1.12.12.745.4.01.3.52.3.02.1.25.2.23.10.00.5.0.41.0.0.101.161.4.326.8.12.5.1112.16.01.0.0-alpha091.32.11.1.121.4.01.440.11.02.24.0-foss2026.09.191.4.22.3.01.5.14.1.31.4.62026.09.261.064.6.11.41.35.20.57.080.1.52.9.02.0.40.2.32.11.11.0.92.4.64.7.11.5.11.10.04.3.71.5.152026.09.29.2740.12.01.1.806.11.6.54.00.6.220.10v0.8.01.0.203.5.01.4.00.21.41.272.0.53.0.13.1.01.10.01.3.02.0.02026.09.024.0.11.8.00.7.00.56.00.2.30.1.2-rc15.5.499.1302-fdroid0.7.991.3.61.5.21.4.22026.3.14.141.87.370.130.2609287.1.12.5.52.9.15.5.33.1.02.9.20.40.2 F-Droid1.6.66.sc931.18.01.8.31.4.12.21.41.0.70.232.2.1-rc04.0.140.0.510.17.81.0.17731.33.61.14.00.2.282.36.30.1.104.0.20.6.1alpha-0.8.41.52.034.6.62.10.9.01.1.11.0.52.20.11.601.31.27.0.42.2.01.14.33.8.72.1.4:Artemis2.1.01.61.3.01.2.026.10.083.2.591.132.561.12.03.6.71.9.12.0.02.12.0-standard4.2.01.1.10.0.9-alpha1.151.5.10.5.00.9.01.5.22.22.00.16.01.2.01.6.43.0.35.05.186.2.03.8.192.51.19.13.202.91.6.20.12.02.3.01.7.02.0.21.17.00.2.13.0.01.1.03.0.13.3.31.7.128-lite-fdroid1.87.0-fdroid19.2.02.0.12.7.42.1.6.01.1.161.27.131.6.61.13.00.9.01.183.4.04.29.01.0.22.5.21.19.281.1.21.7.46.5.3l5.1.1825.0b124.01.2.01.14.11.3.02.3.1-fdroid0.2026.97.8.02.3.00.450.7.22.4.34.1.0042.0.10.5.23.0.110.5.12.5.22.3.21.5.04.3.91.0.3020.9.631.4.40.6.01.0.31.3.31.0.71.1.09.2.01.0.433.1360.260922.0360.260922.01.61.16.0-store1.1.04.22.102.20.0-fdroid0.191.3.15.00.51.21.1.71.3.31.1.61.6.64.2.21.32.00.4.01.3.133.6.022.1.2.00.84.11.3.026.10.21.292.5.41.7.21.9.01.0.41.12.03.1.01.17.34.3.117.01.0.203.2.400.3.50.26.222.1.13.23.81.5.30.24.42.0.01.191.8.2r/50610-r-2026-10-06r/50610-r-2026-10-061.0.34.35.10.5.141.2.11.23.07.45.33.4.53.1.00.1.230.9.11.6.412.7.01.7.12.60.75.3.00.11.61.0.3-alpha0.2.08.3.11.4.30.24.26.6.1-FOSS0.82.02101.0.101.43.0.173.17.025.11.221.42780.9Thank you for reading this week’s TWIF 🙂
Please subscribe to the RSS feed in your favourite RSS application to be updated of new TWIFs when they come up.
You are welcome to join the TWIF forum thread. If you have any news from the community, post it there, maybe it will be featured next week 😉
To help support F-Droid, please check out the donation page and contribute what you can.
This was the first time F-Droid had an official presence at IndiaFOSS, and I honestly did not know what to expect.
We actually had quite a lot of people coming by. Most were students, and many had never heard of F-Droid before. That made it a different experience.
A lot of the conversations started with the basics. What is F-Droid? Why would someone use it? How does it work? Can I put my app on it? Are there any subscription charges like apps on Play store?
Some people stayed and talked for a while. Some came back later with friends. Quite a few came up just to say that they were glad F-Droid was there. That last part was probably the nicest surprise.
People were also asking how they could help. We need that. F-Droid needs developers, but we also need testers and people willing to spend time using things, finding problems and reporting them properly.
There was a lot of discussion about AI too: People were tired of AI being pushed into every app and every product. There was quite a bit of frustration about AI-generated code and what everyone calls “AI slop”. Some people asked whether F-Droid would have an AI policy and how applications or contributions that make heavy use of AI should be handled. Those are not simple questions. There is a difference between using AI as a tool and simply generating something that nobody has properly understood, tested or taken responsibility for.
It was interesting to hear people asking these questions already. There seems to be a desire to get back to something a little more normal: build something, read the code, test it, fix it, talk to people and ship it.
The Android conversations were interesting too: People asked about Google’s Android Developer Verification system, certified devices and what these changes could mean for developers distributing outside Google Play. We talked about LineageOS, GrapheneOS and /e/OS, and the different choices people are making around Android.
Along came the Digital Markets Act. People wanted to know what the DMA and the European Commission’s work around Android might mean for alternative app stores, and whether all of these changes would make it harder for developers to distribute software independently.
These were not really abstract policy discussions. People wanted to know what would happen to their apps, their devices and their ability to distribute software.
F-Droid 2.0 was a regular topic. Several people came with issues and the missing download button on website, sometimes simply showing us what was happening on their phones.
We also met a lot of people from other projects. Our booth was next to the XMPP folks, with Badri, Divya, Perry and the rest of the group. It was really nice being alongside them for the two days.
I already knew quite a few people at IndiaFOSS, so the booth also became a place for old conversations to continue and new ones to start.
There was a recurring reaction from people who discovered us: “Wow, F-Droid is here!”
We even got invited to UbuntuCon to give a talk and several people told us that we should set up at MumbaiFOSS in October.
There was also quite a bit of interest in F-Droid’s presence in India and Asia. Many people were happy to hear that someone from India is on the F-Droid Board, and that there are possibilities for F-Droid to do more in this part of the world.
That was particularly nice for me. F-Droid is a global project, but there is a lot happening in India and across Asia that we can connect with.
The first floor was probably the one thing that worked against us. Plenty of people simply did not come upstairs, so I am sure we missed a lot of potential visitors.
The venue itself was big, but it was also hot. We were near one of the dome-like areas, and after standing there for two days, the heat certainly added to the tiredness.
Bengaluru was another story. The food nearby was good, but the hotel room was very small and the local transport was not quite as friendly to our wallets. Some of the auto drivers seemed to realise very quickly that we were from another city, and the prices almost always reflected that.
For my spouse, though, the whole experience seemed to be quite fun.
She went to IndiaFOSS knowing little about F-Droid and ended up spending two days talking about it to complete strangers. She found the whole thing interesting, full of enthusiasm and fun. She even sold more merchandise than I did. 😀
She also watched me being interviewed by some college students. Apparently, I was quite good and honest in the interview.
Her other observation was rather amusing. She said that my side of the FOSS and FLOSS world, if it were recorded properly and shown to our family members, would probably amaze them. It is apparently a very different world from the one they normally see.
She also called me a “mini celebrity”. Very mini, I should point out.
We came back tired, with fewer stickers, less merchandise and a lot more conversations.
And apparently, my spouse is now better at running an F-Droid booth than I am. I suppose I will have to remember that for the next one. 😉
After more than a year of hard work, we are thrilled to announce the launch of F-Droid 2.0, a complete redesign of the official F-Droid app and the largest app update in 10 years.
For more than a decade, F-Droid has helped people discover and install free and open source Android apps. F-Droid 2.0 builds on that foundation with a modern interface, better app discovery, improved search, and a simpler experience that works well, whether you’re new to F-Droid or have been using it for years.
This isn’t just a visual refresh. The user experience was redesigned to integrate smoothly with current Android patterns, like Material Design, while keeping familiar F-Droid interactions in place. Key components were reworked and rewritten using Kotlin Compose, the standard toolkit these days, creating a foundation that will help us deliver improvements more quickly in the years ahead.
We are excited to begin rolling out F-Droid 2.0 to users over the coming weeks after 14 test releases.
One of our main goals for F-Droid 2.0 was to make it easier to discover, install, and maintain the apps you rely on. We simplified the main navigation into three core areas: Discover, Search and My Apps. Categories are now integrated into Discover, making it easier to browse and explore, while My Apps provides a central place to manage installed apps, updates, and potential issues. Settings and Nearby Swap are still only a tap away from the top bar, but no longer compete for space in the main navigation.
Helping people discover relevant free and open source software (FOSS) was one of the primary goals of F-Droid 2.0. As the F-Droid ecosystem has grown to thousands of applications, finding the right app has become increasingly challenging. The new release introduces improvements throughout the app from browsing and categories to search to make it easier to find software that matches your needs. And of course, F-Droid does this without tracking you, or trying to “engage” you to spend increasingly more time in the app.
The new Discover screen helps uncover apps you might otherwise miss. In addition to highlighting newly added and recently updated apps, it now showcases the most downloaded apps in the repository. Whether you’re new to F-Droid or looking for something different, Discover provides several ways to explore the growing ecosystem of free and open source Android applications.
Categories play an important role in helping users browse the repository, so we’ve expanded and refined them significantly, including more specialized categories that make it easier to find specific types of apps, such as VPNs, firewalls, password managers, launches and navigation tools. Here is what you can expect:
First, we’ve significantly expanded the category system. Instead of relying on a small number of broad categories, F-Droid now includes many more specialized categories, helping you get closer to the kind of app you want in just a few taps, even before you start searching.
Second, to make this expanded category system easier to navigate, we’ve introduced higher-level “meta” categories in the Discover screen. These group related categories together and provide a more approachable entry point for browsing the growing F-Droid ecosystem.
Finally, categories now play a larger role throughout the app. Their names and descriptions are used to improve app discovery and help guide users toward relevant free and open source applications.
As an example of this effort, we’ve completely reworked the Games category. Rather than grouping all games together, F-Droid 2.0 now distinguishes between 17 different game genres, making it much easier to find the kinds of games you actually enjoy playing.
Search has also been significantly improved. In addition to app names, it can now search app descriptions, categories, and translated content. This makes it easier to find apps based on what they do rather than what they’re called.
We’ve also made major improvements for users searching in Chinese, Japanese, and Korean. The new search system provides much better support for CJK writing systems, helping users find relevant apps more reliably in their own language.
Search also remembers your recent queries, allowing you to quickly return to previous searches without having to type them again.
Browsing and searching are only part of the story. F-Droid 2.0 also introduces powerful filtering options that help you narrow down large lists of apps to exactly what you’re looking for.
Filters can be combined using multiple criteria, such as app category, device compatibility, or anti-features. For example, you can choose to view only Action Games that are compatible with your device and exclude apps that depend on non-free network services.
To help users discover these and other advanced capabilities, F-Droid 2.0 introduces onboarding screens throughout the app. Rather than hiding features behind complex settings, the app provides contextual guidance to help both new and experienced users get the most out of F-Droid.
For the longest time, the experience of clicking install or update was forced to be second rate by Android. Now, thanks largely to pressure from the EU’s Digital Markets Act (DMA) and anti-trust actions around the world, Android offers all app stores an option for a smoother and more automatic install and update experience than before. F-Droid 2.0 includes groundbreaking work on utilizing these new abilities. This allows F-Droid to use a unified installer for all F-Droid installs, whether built into the OS or you installed it on your device yourself. The unified installer makes use of the new pre-approval API, so that on supported devices the user can confirm right after deciding to install the app, instead of after the app was downloaded. That brings the F-Droid install experience on official Android devices much closer to what the built-in app store can provide.
A redesign of this size means making careful decisions about what belongs in the new app, what can be handled differently, and what no longer makes sense to carry forward. Some familiar features have changed, moved, or been removed as part of making F-Droid 2.0 more streamlined and easier to maintain, without sacrificing core functionality or features users rely on.
F-Droid 2.0 now fetches and installs app updates by default. If you prefer more control, no worries, your existing preferences are still respected.
Some users missed the pull-to-refresh gesture for checking all repositories for updates. In F-Droid 2.0, the pulling gesture is exclusively for scrolling. This is now possible because the app can now automatically check for updates in the background. Rather than preserving a familiar action, we focused on removing the need for it. The best refresh button is the one you never have to press.
Users who want more control still have fine-grained and manual update options available. If you used pull-to-refresh to manually trigger updates, that is now available under the action overflow menu, e.g. the “three dots”, on the My Apps screen.
F-Droid gives you control of what get’s downloaded when. This helps fit our diverse users around the world, who have varying requirements. Many users have cheap access to mobile data, while mobile data is prohibitively expensive for others. Some users have heightened privacy requirements, so they need to control their network traffic. While others are using limited devices which bog down when F-Droid updates in the background. The settings which control all this were reworked to make adapting F-Droid to your needs more intuitive.
Some F-Droid users operate in environments where simply having certain apps installed or even using F-Droid can attract unwanted attention. To help support these users, F-Droid has long included a set of privacy and security features designed to protect both the user and their data.
One key privacy tool is Tor, and F-Droid has long supported using Tor for all network connections, and using Tor Onion Services for repositories and mirrors. The landscape of how Tor is integrated into Android has changed quite a bit since Tor support was first integrated. Now there is TorVPN, Orbot, TorServices and more. We took this opportunity to simplify the settings and remove the auto-detection that was no longer reliable. If you enabled “Use Tor”, that will be migrated to generic Proxy Settings. Going forward, Tor VPN is the recommended approach for easy Tor support, and the Proxy Settings are still available for those who need manual control.
Another key part is the set of “panic” features, which allow users to quickly remove some specific kinds of sensitive information from their device in emergency situations. These features are still included in F-Droid 2.0 and remain an important part of supporting users with elevated security needs.
Notably, the F-Droid app hiding feature has been simplified, to give users an accurate idea of the kind of protection they can expect. F-Droid was one of the first apps that began providing app hiding features to protect user privacy, including our “panic” feature which disguised the F-Droid app as a simple calculator app. This simple feature was requested by many users, and since then Orbot, TorVPN, Signal and others have added such masking features. Over time, a standard design has emerged across widely used apps, and we have adopted this design in the new release as well. This feature is designed so that users can better understand the limits of the disguise. Instead of the mask looking and functioning as a simple calculator app, now the mask only affects the app icon, name and nothing else. This informs users that the F-Droid app will still appear in the “Apps” settings and would be detectable during forensic inspection. This change will hopefully make it easier for users to understand the limits of this feature, while still utilizing it when needed.
One feature that has not yet returned is the ability to remove and wipe apps as a response to a panic trigger app like Ripple. We recognize that some users rely on this functionality for privacy and personal safety reasons and understand it is more than a usability feature. However, it requires highly specialized work to maintain, and given the small user base, we felt it should no longer block so many other important improvements.
The app-wiping feature remains an important feature. We would especially welcome feedback from people who use it, to help us understand how and when it is used, so we can evaluate the best path forward as we continue improving F-Droid 2.0. Users who rely on the current app-wiping implementation may opt to postpone updating to F-Droid 2.0 while we evaluate bringing the feature back.
F-Droid is designed to be integrated into any version of Android or AOSP, as we can see in CalyxOS, emteriaOS, iodéOS, Lineage-for-microG and ShiftOS. Each OS can include their own repositories by default using the “additional repos” mechanism. If you use one of these OSes, these will be visible in your Repositories overview. For additional info on what changed, check out this blog post.
Also, F-Droid Privileged Extension (FPE) is not currently supported by 2.0. That means even if FPE is installed, F-Droid 2.0 won’t use it. This overhaul focused on full featured support for the Android “session” installer. That lets F-Droid run background updates on any recent Android version without requiring FPE. Like with any of the changes here, we welcome feedback.
While many of the improvements in F-Droid 2.0 are visible on the surface, some of the most important changes happened behind the scenes.
All new code in this effort uses modern Android code standards and designs. This gives us a codebase that is easier to maintain, test, and easier to extend with new features in the future.
One of the goals of the rewrite was to lower the barrier for new contributors. Android development has changed significantly over the past decade, and F-Droid 2.0 is now built using Kotlin, the language that has become the standard for modern Android development. This makes it easier for developers familiar with today’s Android ecosystem to contribute to the project.
The new user interface is built with Jetpack Compose, the standard toolkit for Android applications. Beyond simplifying development, this helped us align F-Droid more closely with Material Design, the design system used throughout Android. As a result, F-Droid feels more familiar to Android users while remaining true to its own identity and values.
Most importantly, these changes provide a foundation for the next decade of F-Droid development. By reducing maintenance burden and making contributions easier, we can spend more time improving the experience for users and less time fighting technical debt. Some new tools also depend on fixes in Android itself, one such fix was added in Android 7 forcing us to drop support for Android 6. As always, old F-Droid releases will continue to work on old Android versions.
F-Droid 2.0 is one of the largest and most ambitious projects in our history. Bringing it to life required much more than software development. It involved user research, design, testing, documentation, community feedback, quality assurance, lots of new code, a security audit and countless discussions about how F-Droid should evolve over the next decade.
This work was made possible by the support of many organizations and individuals. Torsten Grote’s development work on the new app was funded by NLnet through the Mobifree fund. The Open Technology Fund’s User Experience & Discovery Lab supported user research and design work, bringing in Ura Design to help conduct user testing, develop user stories, and refine our Human Interface Guidelines.
Additional support came from the Open Technology Fund’s Free and Open Source Software (FOSS) Sustainability Fund, NGI, Mobifree, and the Calyx Institute, whose sponsorship helps support the ongoing maintenance and long-term sustainability of the F-Droid ecosystem.
As part of this effort, the Open Technology Fund’s Security Lab in conjunction with Convocation conducted an independent security review of F-Droid 2.0. We analysed and addressed all findings relevant to the new application, helping ensure that the release meets the high security standards our users expect. We look forward to sharing the full audit report once it has been cleared for publication.
Just as importantly, F-Droid 2.0 reflects the contributions of many volunteers. Community members contributed code, testing, bug reports, design feedback, translations, documentation, UX discussions, and countless ideas throughout the redesign process. Both long-time contributors and people making their first contribution helped shape the final result.
Finally, this work would not have been possible without your support. Donations help fund many of the less visible but essential activities that grants don’t always cover, including community management, handling the issue backlog, quality assurance, release management, and project coordination. These contributions help keep F-Droid healthy long after a specific grant-funded project has ended.
F-Droid 2.0 represents a major milestone, but it is not the end of the story. Rebuilding the app has given us a stronger foundation, yet there is still plenty of work ahead.
As the rollout reaches more users, we expect to learn a great deal from real-world usage. Community feedback has shaped F-Droid 2.0 from its earliest design discussions through many alpha and RC releases, and it will continue to guide future improvements. Some ideas did not make it into the initial release, while other features are still evolving as we gather feedback and refine their design.
In the coming months, we will continue improving performance, accessibility, app discovery, and overall usability. We’ll also keep listening to users as they adapt to the new experience and help us identify opportunities for further improvement.
Like every major F-Droid release before it, version 2.0 is not a destination, it’s the beginning of the next chapter.
One area that continues to evolve is Nearby, the feature that allows users to share apps directly between devices without relying on a central server.
The broader F-Droid 2.0 redesign gave us an opportunity to rethink Nearby from the ground up. We have been working on a new implementation based on improved connection methods that should make sharing apps more reliable and easier to use.
This work is not quite ready for inclusion in the initial F-Droid 2.0 release, but development is actively underway and the foundations are already in place. If Nearby sharing is important to you, now is an excellent time to get involved. Community feedback and testing can help shape the next generation of the feature before it reaches a wider audience.
F-Droid 2.0 is the result of thousands of hours of work from developers, designers, testers, translators, donors, and community members around the world. Now that it is reaching users, we’d love your help making it even better.
If you’re receiving the update, take some time to explore the new experience and let us know what you think. Whether you’ve found a bug, have an idea for an improvement, or simply want to tell us what works well, your feedback helps guide future development.
If you’d like to get more involved, there are many ways to contribute.
You can help test upcoming features, improve translations and documentation, review issues, contribute code, or join discussions about the future of the project. New contributors are always welcome.
And if you’re able, please consider supporting F-Droid financially. Donations through Liberapay or OpenCollective help fund the ongoing work that keeps the project healthy between major releases, from infrastructure and quality assurance to community support and project coordination.
F-Droid 2.0 is a major milestone, but the work continues. Thank you for helping us build a free, open, and sustainable app ecosystem for Android.
Thanks to @linsui, we’ve unlocked a new way to add developer signed packages to apps for which we already provide packages signed by us. Historically, we’ve had two ways to setup reproducible builds. The first way, we host only the upstream package after we verify it to be reproducible. The second way, we get the signature of an upstream package, combine it with our locally built package and if they verify reproducibility, we host both our signed package and the upstream one.
The first path works better when the app is freshly included in F-Droid, so all new installs get the same package. But if we want to switch from the F-Droid version to the upstream signed one via this method, users need to backup, uninstall, reinstall and restore. We regularly announce such switches in these weekly posts.
The second path allows us to add the upstream package alongside our own, so new users get the new upstream signed one and old users get updates from us as usual. No uninstall, no backups, nothing changes. One issue is that for each new version somebody needs to extract the signature and open a merge request, no metadata autoupdate available (for now, help welcomed!).
The new third path - announced on this post - is a combination of the above two. It adds the upstream signed package alongside ours, like the second path above, but we use it directly. There is no need to extract signatures and metadata auto-updates are available. We keep the upstream package intact, since it needs to verify reproducibility, but we modify our own package with a lower versionCode so they don’t conflict.
Packages that are setup like this today:
2.20.3+free4.0.0 (Huge update by the way, see the developer post)1.6.8 this weekThis is not all perfect yet unfortunately as this method kinda “hacks” our metadata structure. We are tracking an issue about the way the preferred first installs are offered. The first two methods prioritize upstream packages, this one needs a fix to do so.
For now, we can guide users that want to install these apps for the first time to expand Versions in F-Droid client and install the top most version that is compatible with their devices even if the “suggested” label points to a lower versionCode until we fix it.
Librera Reader was updated to 9.6.17-fdroid and if the previous update made the app crash we’ve now fixed our build recipe. This version also brings an updated UI design.
0.14.30.120.10.00.14.12.5.13.1.21.2.50.30.76.6.40.8.180.13.01.6.11.12.11.61.5.131.0.97.2.31.6.11.2.30.18.3-beta6.1.01.15.31.3.41.12.11.1.50.94.0-banglejs91.0.080.0.03.172.4.00.4.02.3.01.0.611.75.41.1.11.0.572.4.52.3.23.6.0297881501.4.71.0.71.0.12.3.7.foss1.2.182.3.22.20.30.3.101.9.95.2.6-rc03.9.7.43.5.1642.9.41.0.20.2.45.1.01.0.13.1.12.11.33.Metav5.3.03.3.00.19.12.3212.0V0.1.0-RC11.17.06.8.01.19.111.5.22.32.15.1v1.0.0-beta.23.4.02.7.71.2.20.5.61.1.03.0.01.5.02.4.04.2.0 (Nounou)0.4.32.3.21.0.155.294.10.9.157.417.02.1.03.0.216.7.00.9.52.1.51.0.962.01.5.00.0.19-beta_hotfix13.5.01.6.01.23361.0.30.7.11.0.163.43.42.23.12.23.10.0.30_alpha1.31.5.4beta-14.03.2.772.8.00.5.62.2.64.4.72.9.51.8.01.7.312.10.3.012.10.6.086241.8.43.4.00.94.02.114.331.33.1.31.4.01.8.01.8.653.6.3.stable12.10.20.9.00.3.01.2.00.2.0-alpha071.6.155.89.00.13.1572.10.193.02.3.01.0.21.0.11.14.1323.0.0.92.6.11.9.10.6.04.3.02.7.3jmp-v1.7.23.1.18-FOSS0.2172.123.01.92026.09.121.35.164.5.44.4.0-foss1.2.12.1.44.0.52.6.00.19.31.1.71.41.0-fdroid0.0.25-beta4.2.31.5.02.5.82.5.01.2.0-beta.21.3.0\1.13.00.21.02.6.0-rc.20.17.01.12.3-release2.4.04.4.70.3.25.1.0.351.6.00.3.02.24.0670.1.64.11.61.2.51.5.01.0.23.24.02026.540.6.31.0.932.44.01.0.41.0.61.11.21.18.72.0.02.0.83.8.03.8.01.25.30.3.21.0.246.22.00.21.01.4.12.22.08-fdroid-160.41.3.01.7.11.50.9.51.5.21.3.62.0.51.0.3112.5.00.17.92026.91.28.4a1.28.4a1.2.31.8.17.5.1-f1.13.1v1.0.0-alpha552.12.11.4.11.2.01.1.94.6.82.0.015.0.035.0.02026091735.0.00.32.01.2.125.0.01.13.012.7.11.0.0-fdroid1.19.03.11.02.11.342.44.15.00.6.131.5.21.6.1714.0.90.6.00.8.51.0.311.14.0v6.9.11.2.126.09.62-fdroid2.2.00.30.2.01.382.8.01.8.11.5.00.97.12.2.31.8.301064.1.12.0.22.0.1v9.8.02.2.4-rc02.0.04.5.03.4.12.131.12.11.0.15.3.11.3.03.3.2512.11.01.2.31.431.3.42.1.81.4.12026.09.1191.02.0.32.11.01.0.81.2.132026.09.15.2371.1.501.0.180.2.12.0.41.7.00.45.00.1.1850.7.922.171.2.91.4.01.87.367.0.65.4.00.39.2 F-Droid1.0.20.0.423.30.17.33.8.10.6.03.1.1alpha-0.8.11.52.024.6.46.72.17.01.051.14.13.8.42.0.5:Apollo1.11.7.026.09.153.2.4432.473.6.50.0.8-alpha1.140.4.45.161.17.03.202.70.8.111.5.61.50.9.21.6.21.14.02.1.01.7.115-lite-fdroid0.7.019.0.11.6.11.0.432.2.21.102.4-t3caf7d9e7-g8fbef364a1.9.02.0.515.122.1.21.5.04.26.82.3.32.2.50.8.02.7.024.0b223.02.1.0-fdroid7.7.02.2.10.6.9841.0.7MatriX.143.FOSS2.19.12.3.11.4.12.3.10.9.621.3.21.14.1-store4.22.00.181.18.00.51.11.6.21.1.41.6.41.19.00.7.00.58.01.0.31.9.02.49.11.17.04.3.01.0.421.0.173.2.380.30.00.26.19r/50606-r-2026-09-09r/50606-r-2026-09-091.22.0559977.45.22.8.20.8.177.4.21.30.0.71.63.13.0Thank you for reading this week’s TWIF 🙂
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