I have a OnePlus 5 (a device from 2017) that's suffering the same fate. The hardware itself is fine. It has 6 gigabytes of RAM and a SoC that's fast enough that I don't notice any slowdowns in day to day usage. Yet the officially supported software by the manufacturer has been abandoned two years ago. I'm currently running LineageOS, and the phone is working as good as ever. Running a modern version of Android with monthly security patches.
It's a shame that expensive devices nowadays are made to be disposable. After getting a battery replacement, this phone is ready to go for a few more years at least. SoCs have gotten so good that even a half a decade old chip will perform well for the vast majority of users that don't play big games on their phones. It's not like you need a supercomputer to browse social media, websites and use maps for navigation.
I have a Pixel 2XL. It's in perfect condition, works well, and still has decent battery life on the original battery. It has no problems running everything I use, and there would be little benefit I would gain from getting a new phone. Yet Google dropped security updates at the end of 2020, as with the 3a, three years after launch, and around a year after they stopped selling them. My phone now nags me to buy a new one in the settings.
Now, it might be argued that Google has no obligation to produce updates for their products, but... if I try to improve security on the phone by using third-party distributions that are updated, rather than buying a new phone, then thanks to Google's SafetyNet, the phone will be crippled and have difficulty running many banking, payment, and other apps that are at this point a requirement in many situations. Thus, the reason the phone is problematic at this point is because of Google's working to make the phone unusable, not just the lack of updates.
It is bizarre that SafetyNet will vouch for the security of an OS Google itself argues to me is unsafe because of lack of updates, while not allowing a third-party distribution. Yet I suppose I wouldn't be surprised if Google eventually decides to have SafetyNet stop functioning entirely on older devices, in the name of security, to make them even less usable.
That device is officially supported by Lineage and as such gets weekly OTA updates. You'll get a clean Android experience not unlike that of the original Pixel, you can - but don't have to - install Google apps and can even if so required get one of the 'PixelExperience' distributions:
Personally I'd stay away from those since they are (by design) heavily tied into the Google world while I do my best to stay free but if you're a heavy Google user this might be the way to go.
(Owner of Pixel 3a) Yeah, that's a bummer. There's not something else I'd rather own right now, so I'll likely keep running it for a while.
But most other Android phones don't have a long support lifetime either. Heck, there are a lot of new phones you can buy today that have outdated OS versions, and you're not likely to get much in the way of updates either.
Google's horrible support might turn out to be an opening for Linux. There are a lot of Pixel owners who hate iPhones with a passion that are currently, against all of their instincts and values, considering buying iPhones because they get double or triple the functional life of an Android. They would even switch to something more difficult to use if they both could avoid buying Apple, and either extend the life of their current phone (unlikely at this point, but maybe in the future) or have confidence that the next phone that they buy would last as long as an iPhone.
If they could run Android apps on it with reasonable performance, it would be an easy switch.
> (Owner of Pixel 3a) Yeah, that's a bummer. There's not something else I'd rather own right now, so I'll likely keep running it for a while.
I have the 3a and 4a (non-5G), if you can find a 4a someone is trying to give away on the cheap it's basically a nicer version of the 3a IMHO. It's going to EOL in a year so I wouldn't spend much on it, but if one crosses your path for $100, well...
3 years of use from a piece of complex hardware that could keep going easily for 7/8 years.
This kind of narrow planned obsolescence should be an environmental crime.