New Phone that is Root freindly and has an active community

[Android Central Question]

Hello all,

I'm planning to buy a phone and would greatly appreciate your views. The key factors that I'm looking for are

1) Root friendly
2) Phone software (Android version) and hardware should be compatible with root modules such as Xposed. That's why I don't mind buying an old phone that comes with Nougat
3) An active android community for that phone, for roms and mods
4) speed

I was considering the One plus 6t or Google pixel 3 (to be released in Oct, but I'm not sure if I can flash Nougat to this)

 

[Rukbat]

The Pixel 3 will come with Pie - no Xposed for API 28 yet. But if you can get a Pixel 2 still on Oreo, you can root with Magisk and run Xposed for Magisk (and Xposed modules). Rooting with Magisk requires unlocking the bootloader, but that's trivial. (You can always flash the stock firmware and relock it. I've been through 3 Pixel 2s so far, a 4th one is coming Monday and if that doesn't fix the problem, a 5th, and new one, after that. No problem sending back "factory-new" phones.) Updates every month (you can almost set your calendar by them), new versions as they come up (we've been running Pie since about August 6th (patch from August 5th), 3 years (from release date) of updates, including new versions (3 of them). Best camera - everyone's comparing theirs to the Pixel.

I wouldn't bet on flashing Oreo to the 3, though. (I don't know if Xposed is available for Oreo, but the Magisk version of it is.) But I've flashed the 2 back to Oreo (from Pie) to see if the problem I'm having is from Pie (it seems to be related, but it's not the cause) - there's no "you can't flash an earlier version once you've flashed a later version" nonsense. In fact, Google has the full factory ROM and the update file on the web for the entire history of all their phones. It's like they're encouraging us to play.

Oh, and did I mention that their customer service has only 1 problem - don't call them when you're busy - I've never had a short conversation with their reps. They don't seem to be on any sort of metered system. (I talked to one for over an hour. Another one right through the time I should have been preparing dinner. Even the ones with Filipino accents it's difficult for an American to understand are nice people.) It's worth buying Google just for the customer service. (Ever try talking to Samsung?)

 

[Max Steel2]

Really insightful, I wanted to buy the Pixel 3, but the rumors say that it will have barely any upgrades with regards to speed and ram, which I'm looking for, if not there's also the One Plus 6T, which will be a beast in terms of performance.

Also you cant downgrade new phones to a much older OS version. For eg, you cant downgrade Pixel 2 to Android Nougat