ZenPhone

An accessible Android launcher for older adults and people with visual or motor impairments.

ZenPhone replaces the phone's interface with a larger, simpler and friendlier one. It is free and open source, and it stands on the shoulders of two earlier projects: the original BaldPhone by Uriah Shaul Mandel, and its modernized continuation BaldPhone Neo by Damian Kuzmiak.

ZenPhone is an independent fork with its own roadmap. It is not affiliated with or endorsed by the upstream authors.

Features

• Home launcher with large, high-contrast targets
• Dialer and contacts designed for shaky hands and poor eyesight
• Alarms and medication reminders
• SOS button
• Photo and video viewer
• Simplified keyboard
• Notification management
• Available in 38 languages

Status

Early stage. The project inherits an in-progress migration from Java to Kotlin — roughly half the codebase has been converted so far — along with a modernized Android toolchain.

Current priorities:

1. Restore full-screen alarms on Android 14+
2. Raise targetSdk to 35, then 36
3. Continuous integration
4. Continue the Kotlin migration

Building

Requirements: a recent Android Studio (the project uses AGP 9.1.1 and Gradle 9.4.1), JDK 17 or newer, and Android SDK platforms 35 and 36.

git clone https://github.com/zenolabs/ZenPhone.git
cd ZenPhone
./gradlew assembleDebug

On Windows use gradlew.bat, and make sure JAVA_HOME points at a JDK 17+ installation — the runtime bundled with Android Studio, under <install dir>\jbr, works fine.

Installation

No releases yet. Distribution will target F-Droid and direct APK downloads.

Note that Google Play policies restrict apps requesting several system-level permissions at once (call log, contacts, media). Publishing there would require splitting the app or dropping core functionality, so it is not currently planned.

Contributing

Bug reports and pull requests are welcome. For larger changes, please open an issue first so the approach can be discussed.

Translations are inherited from upstream and cover 38 languages. Improvements to existing translations are especially welcome.

License

Apache License 2.0 — see LICENSE and NOTICE.

The NOTICE file records the full attribution chain and must be preserved in any redistribution or derivative work.