Open source phone Necuno Mobile to run KDE Plasma interface

The open source phone Necuno Mobile will run on a mobile version of the KDE Plasma interface. Both organizations have announced this. It is still unknown when the phone will be released.

Necuno sees KDE Plasma Mobile as an alternative to the ‘walled garden duopoly’ of iOS and Android, the company says. Necuno doesn’t want to limit the device to a single OS and so will open it up to other operating systems, although it is not yet known which ones.

The Necuno Mobile has a 5.5 “screen with unknown resolution. The phone has an NXP i.MX6, a quad-core processor with four Cortex A9 processor cores at 1.2 GHz and a Vivante GPU. That is not the most powerful processor, but NXP is making the entire source code of its processor publicly available, which is why Necuno believes this is the right choice.

The device has a micro USB port and a 3.5mm jack. It features a button that users can program themselves, in addition to the usual buttons for volume and power on or off the phone. It is still unknown when and for what price the phone will be released.

KDE announced its mobile version three years ago. The Necuno isn’t the only one to run KDE Plasma Mobile. The Purism Librem 5, which should be released next year, also has this operating system on board.