I'm past the point where I care if my next device has "phone" features like calling and SMS. I'm fine with technical limitations, but I'm done with Apple and Google adding artificial ones.

Maybe I'll get a used Librem5. I'd get a Jolla phone, but they don't ship to the US. But honestly in my research, there's been no blogs I can find that compare these 3rd party phones to each other that aren't like 4 years old and outdated.

Take a look at FuriPhone. It runs Debian with an Android kernel and runs Android apps in a container. Out of all the Linux phones out there, this is the most interesting one to me. Though I'm still just a bystander. I haven't tried it yet.

https://furilabs.com/

The term of art here is “voice-centric”. Where “voice” refers not specifically to voice communications, but the first-class coupling between cellular modems and the IP multimedia subsystems (IMS) core that mobile network operators run to provide VoLTE and messaging services.

It’s a moat designed to protect the incumbents and raise the barrier to entry for any competitors in the mobile networking space.

Graphene has been the best alternative I've found so far.

You'll soon find that those phones will be useless because you are required to own a certified device to interact with your government, bank, insurance company, postal service etc. I can see it happen every day.