Hi guys basically as the title says. I have a pixel phone running GrapheneOS and I really don't want to install Play Services. Is there an alternative for me? I need reliable notifications for Telegram and signal. Edit: Thank you all amazing people for helping I learned alot and found best setup for me

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[–] 8 points 2 years ago (13 children)

It depends. Some apps have their push notifications system but may consume more battery.

You should list what apps

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  • [–] [S] 4 points 2 years ago (12 children)

    You're right I need reliable notifications for Telegram and signal

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  • [–] 3 points 2 years ago* (7 children)

    There's a fork of Telegram on F-droid called "Telegram FOSS" that runs a background service for notifications. I've used it and the effect on battery drain is pretty minor, like maybe 2% per charge. Not sure if something similar exists for Signal.

    I use MicroG on my phone, it's a basic FOSS replacement for GMS and makes push notifications work for all apps. It gets push notifs from Google's servers but you don't need an account. It doesn't use Google at all for location, which is nice as that's a highly invasive aspect of Play Services. Not all ROMs are compatible with it, I use it on Lineage

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  • [–] 2 points 2 years ago (6 children)

    I use MicroG on my phone, it's a basic FOSS replacement for GMS and makes push notifications work for all apps. It gets push notifs from Google's servers but you don't need an account. It doesn't use Google at all for location, which is nice as that's a highly invasive aspect of Play Services. Not all ROMs are compatible with it, I use it on Lineage

    Does it work with WhatsApp? Its the only app that drains my battery like crazy. I had it installed but didn't work

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago* (5 children)

    It's a drop-in replacement so it should provide push notifications and location functionality just fine for every app. Other functionality such as IAPs will probably be unsupported.

    From the data I see on Plexus for WhatsApp, the core functionality and notifications work just fine on MicroG, but backing up chats to Google Drive is broken.

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago (4 children)

    Then I'm just unlucky because it didn't work for me, no push notifications

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  • [–] 1 point 2 years ago* (3 children)

    What ROM are you using? MicroG depends on a ROM feature called "signature spoofing" that allows it to impersonate the Play Services apps.

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