I bought a Kompakt in September 2025, right before the 1.3.0 OS update. I’ve been using it as my main phone since then and overall I’ve been happy with it.
Still, it took a lot of work to figure it out. I’m a professional software engineer and I did a bunch of research beforehand; even so, it took me months to be able to fully switch from my old smartphone. Here’s what I wish I’d known going into it. Hopefully this is useful for other customers and for the product team.
good
Reasons I’m happy to use it as my primary phone. Lean into this.
no notification area
This is the killer feature. Not carrying around an endlessly growing list of distractions, I’m so much more relaxed and present. As some people point out, yes, you CAN do this in stock Android, but it’s an uphill battle every step of the way. The Android notification area is addictive by design and you have to constantly opt out of it. I have 30 apps sideloaded on my Kompakt and not one of them needs notifications to work. Don’t compromise here.
sideloaded apps
Mudita’s decision to embrace sideloading is a cornerstone of what allows it to be a realistic option in the modern world. So many things only work with an app: two factor authenticators, preschool check in, shared grocery list, train tickets, thermostat, music system… Being able to opt in to the ones that are are truly necessary to always have in your pocket frees you from having all of them with you all the time.
tethering functionality
The (mostly) seamless tethering allows you to have one mobile account but still use other devices as needed. It’s a critical capability.
e-ink screen
It’s beautiful, simple, and easy on the eyes. Light Phone made a huge mistake switching to OLED. Give the Kompakt slightly higher resolution and slightly better controls and the screen is perfect.
small form factor
Modern phones are so huge. Even with L/XL size hands, I can still type well enough on the Kompakt. Sideloading a better keyboard helps too. Heliboard takes some configuring, but it’s what I use most often.
great fingerprint reader
The fingerprint reader is one of the few things about the hardware that is genuinely competitive with any device on the market. It’s fast, accurate, and reliable. This is a must-have.
wireless charging is pleasant
I’m really grateful for the wireless charging feature. Some chargers are a little finicky becaue of the thickness of the case, but with the right one it works flawlessly. It’s a nice modern convenience for a minimalist phone.
first party accessories are very good
I got a case and screen protector from Mudita and don’t regret it. Neither is immune to fingerprints but it’s not even noticeable most of the time. I saw some people complain about lint, but other than one particular pair of pants I haven’t had that issue. Build quality and sturdiness feel excellent.
bad
Annoyances that might make me consider using another phone but are not deal breakers. Feedback to take into account.
stock apps are mostly uselsss
The only standalone apps I really use are calculator and notes. Plus alarms, weather and phone/SMS functionality.
Music is too tedious to load all the files manually; I use AntennaPod for podcasts, or stream music. Maps doesn’t have any useful info; I use Organic Maps or Kagi Maps. Calendar can’t sync from any online source; I use Proton Calendar. Meditation is fine, but my watch is easier to use for timers.
It’s hard building an operating system and app ecosystem from scratch. This is why sideloading is essential.
managing sideloaded apps could be easier
There should be a menu option to uninstall sideloaded apps from Manage Apps screens. Other Android flavors offer this, it would be really useful.
The home screen should have folders or groups. There are lots of apps I only use in a certain context like “Home” or “Auth” where I’d love to organize them.
There should be a custom order for home screen apps. Alphabetical is not as bad as I feared, but you build up a lot if muscle memory on which icon appears where and it’s disrupted when you install/remove one.
It would be nice to set a custom icon for apps. Some are illegible on e-ink, so it would be helpful to replace those with something useful.
It would be nice to make Aurora Store and/or F-Droid easily installable through Mudita Center. This keeps sideloading opt-in but makes it easier for non-technical users.
some notifications still ring even though you can’t see them
The worst offender with this was actually the built in Duraspeed app, which I only realized when I paired my phone to my computer and saw what the constant dinging was about. I found a workaround with Activity Manager on the forums here but it’s not ideal. The OS should take care of this out of the box.
touchscreen activates in pocket
It’s VERY sensitive. Most of the time when an alarm goes off in my pocket, my pocket dismisses the alarm before I can even get the phone out.
no RCS text messages
The recent addition of group text messages is barely catching up to table stakes. So many people use reactions to communicate these days, full RCS support should be a priority.
offline switch is more stressful than useful
I’ve never once used offline+ mode intentionally. Even having that switch makes me nervous, because I often set my phone down and forget where it is. It’s paired with my watch, which has a find my phone feature, which doesn’t work with Bluetooth off. And Bluetooth headphones disconnect too. At the very least I would love a system setting to disable the offline+ switch; ideally a user would be able to configure the switch for something more useful like airplane mode or do not disturb mode, so you could keep listening to music on Bluetooth earbuds but turn off everything else.
Bluetooth tethering turns itself off
WiFi hotspot runs down the battery noticeably more than Bluetooth, so it’s not efficient to keep it enabled all the time. I’ve found it much more practical when on the go to keep Bluetooth tethering on all the time, then connect a device paired with my Kompakt as needed. The only problem is that the setting inexplicably turns itself off periodically.
awkward screen and backllight controls
The best setting for the backlight is on but as low as possible. If it’s bright out, you don’t need it at all. If it’s dark out, you don’t need it very much. But it’s hard to drag the slider down to the very bottom pixel. It would be nice to have a default / snap / button to set it back there.
The adaptive brightness setting would be a lot more useful if you could set a minimum and maximum for the range. That’s what I really want – to set minimum to off and maximum to 5% and have it come on automatically.
Boox OS has extensive options to tweak the e-ink screen on their devices, to the point of being excessive and overwhelming. It would be nice to have just a tiny bit of that flexibility, don’t go all out like they did. The Kompakt has better defaults than they do as well.
app compatibility
Some apps just plain don’t work. Lyft and Uber still need Google Services, but there’s not much Mudita can do about that. Some music apps like myNoise don’t respond to the volume key for playback volume, that is something to iterate on. The Steam app’s integrated authenticator doesn’t detect the camera for qr code scanning, maybe that could be fixed. This issue is hard – especially because everyone values different apps – but it’s something to gradually chip away at based on which apps users find important.
Ugly
These are the major issues with no workaround that have me still looking around for an alternative.
camera is uselsess
Taking a picture is the top reason I still reach for a smartphone. It takes 3 seconds until the Kompakt camera even turns on and the pictures are all blurry and out of focus. It’s barely even functional for scanning QR codes in sideloaded apps. Otherwise, it’s truly useless.
To be clear, you don’t need to go chasing the top end phones on the market. The 2000-era low-fi photo vibe (washed out, “flat” feeling colors) is actually fine. Look at the Camp Snap, for instance. The Kompakt camera just needs to be usable, or don’t even bother. The slowness is far more disruptive than the image quality.
cpu is ancient
It’s amazing the Kompakt works as well as it does with four A53s – it really highlights how bloated modern phones have gotten. Still, there is noticable lag, even in the system apps.
I think I heard somewhere that it was an intentional decision by Mudita to opt out of a chipset with a 5G radio? I have no strong opinions on 5G personally, but it’s become ubiquitous. Could it just be disabled in configuration or system settings instead for those who want to opt out? It would allow a lot more flexibility for the next hardware.
The CPU doesn’t need to be all that much faster. A Helio G92, or even G50 – with some slightly faster cores and proper image processing capabilities – would probably be a noticable improvement. The G99 seems so ubiquitious these days you could probably find them in a bargain bin somewhere.
no integrated media control
The only time I miss having a notification area is for managing media playback. That should be added to the quick menu. Having to hunt through the app list to find the app that’s playing, open it up, and pause the audio there – it’s enough to make me think twice about starting audio in the first place.
Then once playing, some apps don’t respond to the volume buttons. You have to go into sound settings to turn media volume up and down.
Sideloaded media apps stop playing sporadically until you turn on developer mode and hunt through battery settings to allow them to run in the background. And even then, those settings get cleared out so you have to go re-enable 3rd party media apps periodically. You should be able to easily exempt an app from being stopped in the background and have the exemption stick permanently.
The offline switch turns Bluetooth off so there’s no quick way to mute notifications while keeping audio on. I often want some brown noise for a meditation session while also disabling messages. That’s not possible right now without going all the way into sound settings.
Those issues add up to a major pattern of audio frustration. It’s a shame, because otherwise Bluetooth connection and audio quality are flawless.
Other observations
use case assumes other devices
In case it wasn’t clear, using a Kompakt as your only device in the modern world is impossible. But that’s kind of the point.
At first, I really struggled with the transition. I found myself constantly reaching for my old phone and sometimes even keeping both in my pocket. I’ve had a Google phone since the very first Nexus One; my daily life has become slowly intertwined with the smartphone.
The Kompakt didn’t really click for me until I stopped fighting the one-device-for-everything mindset and leaned into its limitations. Things you’re in the habit of doing on your phone immediately can usually wait until you get to another device. I started making a note to do things later instead of trying to do them right away. As I figured out more and more of the daily functionality gaps, I started leaving the old phone in the other room, then leaving it at home occasionally, then forgetting about it entirely for long stretches of time.
I’ve settled on a 4 device lifestyle:
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Kompakt in my pocket for daily necessities
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Lightweight Android e-reader for distraction-free reading and to-do list
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Powerful tablet in my day bag for notifications and communications and everything else my old phone used to do
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Full-size laptop or desktop for any extended typing or serious productivity
That configuration has been quite pleasant coming from a phone-centric mindset. The iPad Mini is particularly compelling companion device for the Kompakt: powerful and portable, but not so portable that it fits comfortably in a pocket. If only there were an Android competitor.
Having different devices for different tasks really helps stay focused and avoid distractions. Moving most apps from my pocket phone to a tablet also makes it easy to keep technology at arm’s length – keep it out of the bedroom, leave it in your bag, don’t bring it to dinner – kind of like a scaled down version of the Amish phone shack. It’s extremely liberating.
Android is dominated by Google
Getting untangled from Google’s ecosystem has been the second most freeing aspect of using the Kompakt. It hasn’t always been easy, and I’m not de-Googled yet by any means, but it’s been rewarding to be less and less dependent on big tech in my everyday life.
battery life is good but not unbelievable
I get 1.5 - 3 days from a full charge depending on usage. If it starts the day at 80%, it ends the day somewhere between 30-60%, usually around 40%. Much better than others phones but also kind of underwhelming. Most people will want to stay in the habit of charging it every day. I tried the “stop at 80%” feature but turned it off.
no real competitor
I evaluated a lot of alternatives before going with the Kompakt for my daily driver.
Most minimalist phones don’t allow sideloaded / 3rd party apps, those are all non-starters. I even looked at the Palma 2, and while it has a much more sophisticated hardware and screen management options than the Kompakt, it’s just too big, and it feels overstuffed and inconsistent like a lot of devices designed around a spec sheet and price point rather than a coherent design strategy. The Minimal Phone could be compelling, but they had a rough start, and the physical keyboard and larger size won’t be for everyone.
The Kompakt is a truly unique device. If the major issues are resolved in Kompakt v2, it’s a no-brainer.
Is it right for you?
The Kompakt isn’t for everyone. But despite all the rough spots, I’ve still been happy to use it. Even if I switch to another phone someday, being forced to establish a more mindful relationship with technology has been well worth it. If you can afford to try it, I can recommend the experience.