I have owned a number of OnePlus phones and have been very happy - OnePlus phones come with an OS (Oxygen) that's very close to stock Android, and the company is very friendly to you running a custom ROM if that's what you're looking for. Thought the price has gone up through iterations it's still less than a "Flagship" phone, but with really nice stats, especially the "Pro" models. These phones use many of the common cell "Bands" (3/4/5G/LTE) - I am on AT&T, and my parents are on Cricket - the phones work perfectly with both providers. We buy our phones direct from the oneplus.com site and swap the sim over - no need to let the provider know what we're doing as frankly it's none of their damn business.

The only downside I will point out is that we don't benefit from WiFi calling, though the phone is capable of doing this AT&T (in my case) chooses to not offer this functionality. It's not a phone limitation, and though I have had MANY calls with AT&T, they have the stance that enabling this on accounts with only the devices the sell is a "benefit" customers get. We have been given a free microcell as well as upgraded units to live around this limitation in our home.

T-Mobile just started carrying this brand in the last 2 years, but not being a T-Mobile customer I can't say how hard they push it, or if it was a one-and-done event, so this might not "Technically" qualify as not-recognized, it's still certainly not mainstream.

I'm waiting for the refurb Pixel 5a's to get cheaper and switch over to Graphene OS.

I have the last one https://esolutions.shop/

Nothing to complain

I am happy of no google

I use cell mapper to figure out what towers have which bands on which carrier. Once you have that, you will know what phones will work .

It depends on what carrier you want & what bands are available in your area.

If you really want to go for an off brand phone I suggest using a band scanner to find out what bands are available for the carrier you want in your area. You may only have 2 of the 5 & the phone you want says works with Verizon but is missing the 2 you need. lol So write them down once you order an overseas phone you're kinda fucked.

In an ideal world you have the bands written down for all pre-paids in your area.

Then go to kimobil and find a china phone you want that has the bands you need. catbox wasn't working so here's a 3 day image https://litter.catbox.moe/xccsz7.png

https://www.kimovil.com/en/

Tmobil $15 prepaid works with a Umidigi F1 for my area but not sure on yours.

If price is the factor you can wait for blackfriday wallmart & just get a pre-paid Samsung on sale for $45 bucks.

I think T-mobile is the go-to for people using a "different" phone. You can look up what the Librem guys do as they are in a similar situation.

I wonder if they give out a different amount of radiation, compared to the "commercial" ones. I was thinking about getting a Pixel phone and installing a custom, privacy focused, OS on it.