I’m using a Pixel 6 Pro right now, and I’m looking around to see if there are any good phones. However, I have heard that there are ads in the newer flagship phones (Samsung, Xiaomi). I am willing to spend around USD$750 on a new phone, but I just don’t want any crazy ads or preinstalled apps like Facebook. Are there phones that don’t suck nowadays? I can buy a phone that is sold in the US, Canada, or EU.
(I don’t want to go through menus to disable ads (Xiaomi), and I’m currently looking at phones other than the Pixel lineup to see if there’s a better option for me)
(I also don’t want to mess around with custom bootloaders/systems, I rely on Google services way too much)
EDIT: If it wasn’t clear enough, I am not looking for things like GrapheneOS or LineageOS or others, I am looking for a phone and judging based on the stock system on it.
iPhone.
I can’t use an iPhone because no sideloading, no filesystem access, you need iTunes to upload music (really?), etc.
(I’m asking in an Android community because I want an Android phone, not an iPhone.)
Sure, makes sense. But the title was “what’s a good phone that doesn’t force ads on me.” None of the things you listed were mentioned in the post. I stand by my answer 😎. Come, join us in the land of good-user-interface.
I consider Weather telling me to open Apple News last weekend an ad… there are ads every time I try to search for something in Maps, and when navigation ends (or soon will be).
I agree with you, I’ll buy another iPhone until it gets worse. But I feel like were starting to lose the moral high ground here, how about you? 
Is Apple that bad nowadays that they need News ads in a weather app? I thought Apple was the almost ad-free and privacy-focused company.
Yeah, I hate to fanboy cuz’ Jobs was a prick… but cracks are starting to show. It’s been careful and slow but I have a marketing allergy so I’m not a happy man.
Granted it was a link to a local story, in apples news app, on a weekend where people were loosing their shit because it was going to rain… but it should have been well below all the content that’s supposed to be there.
So my calling it an ad was disingenuous, but I’ll stand by it.
Apple seems to be losing my respect for their software each year…
I’ll second that in a heartbeat. It’s not just the obvious stuff either, much of the inobvious refinement is just gone. I hated Apple for years because their UIs were offensive and the thought of a single mouse button seemed convicted for the feeble minded… but I came to really appreciate the small refinement, common actions requiring minimum input. It’s hard to be specific without getting to esoteric, but the primary input field always having focus is the one that on my mind constantly.
For example I navigate somewhere with maps, hit end navigation, it’s now 3 clicks to get back to a search field and type the next destination… not a lot of work, but that’s coming from 0 clicks.
I would happily go on, but I sound like a cranky graybeard already and we’re supposed to be finding you a decent phone ;-)