[OnePlus Nord CE 5G] Notnearlynovel:
Introduction​

As the title says. We'll remove as many google things as we can. We'll replace missing functionality with microG.

This is not meant to be an extensive guide. Just a quick write up of my experience de-googling the device.

I bought this device without doing much research and was a bit bummed when I realized there's no custom ROMs for it. One unofficial build of lineage is on here, but a little known feature, called the phone app, did not work for me, so that wasn't an option. I used it with google for a while but I wanted control of the device back. I didn't find many comprehensive tutorials on how to do this without using custom ROMs, so I thought I'd make a quick and dirty one.

What's the goal?​

Remove google services from the Nord CE 5G without installing any custom ROM

Get full microG functionality (all the checkmarks)

Replace sync functionality for calendar, contacts, photos, etc with NextCloud.

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What's not the goal?​

Fully pass safetynet

Get special google functionality such as chromecast and google pay

Verify play store purchases

Who is this for?​

This is basically for me 2 days ago. You have some experience messing about with android, but you don't really know what you're doing most of the time.

What you need​

Oneplus Nord CE 5G already rooted with Magisk (I won't explain how to since there are plenty of guides)

A file manager with root access. I use fx file explorer

f-droid

Step 1: Disable all google things (or as many as you would like)​

There are ways to fully remove google apps over adb, but I wasn't sure if this whole thing would work and moreover, I couldn't be bothered. I took the simple and safe way out and recommend you to to the same. Just go to [settings -> apps & notifications], then disable google play services and all other google apps you want to remove. Surprisingly I was actually able to fully uninstall google play services after disabling it.

I disabled every google app on my phone, but you can pick and choose. Some might not work as expected.

Step 2: Install microG​

Unfortunately there are too many apps that depend on some part of google play services to function, even if they have nothing to do with google. Luckily people have recognized this problem and we have migroG, which aims to replace at least the basic features of google play services.

This is where I started to be confused. When visiting https://microg.org/download.html you'll see a bunch of apk's without much explanation. I was under the impression you'd have to install this as a system app or something, but apparently not. You can just install the apks using the normal installer. I also though you'd need to install all of these, but you really only need Services Core. It seems it has all the others baked in. You can choose to install this through their f-droid repo as well as explained on the microg page. Choose your poison.

Step 3: Making sure microG actually works​

After installing microG, you'll have an app called microG settings. It has a fun little button on top called self-check and if you click it you'll see a bunch of boxes, only some of which are checked. This is where the fun starts, because we will start to increase the number of checked boxes.

Permissions​

Some of these boxes are just permissions that are missing. So we jump to [settings -> apps and notifications -> microG Services Core -> Permissions] and grant all of them (or some). We also want to allow microG to always run in the background, so in app info we also click [Advanced -> Battery -> Battery optimization] and select Don't optimise. OnePlus' battery management is the absolute worst so let's hope that will do what it says.

Account and device registration​

microG allows to register a google account. This will allow you to use google login in apps like youtube. My personal goal is to not use any google service in the long run so I skipped this.

Google device registration means that your device will be registered with google. I enabled this to get access to google cloud messaging. Some apps need this for notifications. If you leave this off, I believe microG does not talk to google at all.

Signature spoofing​

Now we're missing some checkmarks related to something called signature spoofing. I don't fully understand it, but it's basically the ability of microG to act as if it is the real play services (or any app to act as if it's any other app). By default this is made impossible because of obvious security risks. There are many ways of getting signature spoofing to work, and therefore plenty of ways to get lost in the weeds.

The method I used is as follows

Install LSPosed zygisk release module using Magisk Manager.

There are zygisk and riru releases. I don't know what these are. If you can't find zygisk in your magisk settings (gear icon top right), you probably need to install riru and use the riru release.

Now navigate to /data/adb/lspd/ and you'll see a file called manager.apk. Install it and open the app.

Now click the download button on the bottom left and search for fakegapps. After clicking it you can click the up arrow on the top right to go to the website. Here you'll find an apk that you have to install.

back in the LSPosed manager, click modules -> FakeGapps. Enable for microG Services Core. It is recommended not to enable any other apps.

Now signature spoofing related features should work.

Location​

After all of this, location in OpenStreetMaps wasn't working and I thought there was no way to get it working.

It turns out I was just an idiot...

Apparently microG takes FOSS seriously enough to give you a choice of location backend. Simply search f-droid for "nlp" and you'll find a bunch of different options. I used one called Local NLP Backend Location since I see no reason for my location service to communicate with any server. After installing, you can enable the provider in microG location settings.

Step 4: Getting back some functionality​

Play store apps​

Now we would all like to ditch the play store altogether, but it's just a little too convenient. Luckily there is the Aurora store, which allows to download google play apps without the google play store. If you also install Aurora Services through Magisk, it will be as convenient as the real play store.

Cloud syncing​

I like to be able to cloud sync photos, calendars, contacts, and notes, so I'd like a solution that is tied to google. I've found that nextcloud works quite well for these purposes. NextCloud is an open source cloud solution with plenty independent providers and the ability to host yourself. I made an account at thegood.cloud, but will probably create my own host at some point.

The nextcloud app can take care of syncing photos and files from your phone.

To synchronize calendars and contacts, there is an app called DAVx5 from f-droid. This app allows you to log into your nextcloud account and you can tell it to sync your contact and calendar. This app is based on the open DAV standard, which is supported by most calendar and contact apps.

To synchronize notes over nextcloud, I use an app called Quillnote. This was actually how I discovered nextcloud in the first place.

Conclusion​

This whole process was a lot less painful than I anticipated at first. There is some lost functionality but most things really work fine. Lots of apps will start bothering you and send notifications that they are broken without play services, but I have not seen any of them have any issues. The notifications can be turned off, but unfortunately only one by one.

Updates will probably be a pain since you'll have to go through this whole process again, but who's really expecting major updates for this phone anymore?

Security is likely compromised but not to an extent I'm worried about.