# Fairphone 5 - "bricked" boots only into fastboot **URL:** \ **Category:** Installation Help\ **Tags:** Fairphone5\ **Created:** [23 January 2026 15:32 UTC](https://community.iode.tech/t/fairphone-5-bricked-boots-only-into-fastboot/7586 "2026-01-23T15:32:29Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 1\ **Showing post:** 2
**Author:** ![rik](https://community.iode.tech/user_avatar/community.iode.tech/rik/32/1437_2.png) [@rik](https://community.iode.tech/u/rik)\ **Post date:** [24 January 2026 23:31 UTC](https://community.iode.tech/t/fairphone-5-bricked-boots-only-into-fastboot/7586/2 "2026-01-24T23:31:28Z")
> [@Just\_a\_Human](#): > > Other fastboot commands i tried were flashing unlock\_critical which returns “Device already: unlocked!” or get\_unlock\_ability which returns 0 which indicates unlocking not being allowed. The `get_unlock_ability` returning `0` seems strange as you had recently unlocked it correct so it would have had to be allowed? There has been some confusion in the past months with some Fairphone users that effectively ended up with bricked devices because of what I _thought_ was related to first reinstalling FPOS (and not locking (??) at the end but it may possibly have set `get_unlock_ability` to `0` even though the device remained unlocked?), then ending up like you: they relocked at the end of the iodéOS install and couldn’t unlock again. The iodéOS install does not change `get_unlock_ability` to `0`, so if it reports that it must have been like that before iodéOS install, but then I still can’t sort out what led to what in that case. I think an important note for our installation process may be to make sure that users manually confirm `Allow OEM Unlocking` is enabled from Developer Options before they install, just to make sure. There is a [FP6 post in the past day](https://community.iode.tech/t/fairphone-6-flash-help/7587) as well that may be in a similar situation. In addition, upgrades to `v7.2` beta for a FP6 user with a locked bootloader left it unbootable, it then reverted to the prior `v7.1` install so that beta was discarded. This last one matches issues we have seen for FP4 users upgrading to `v7.x`: if the bootloader is locked then it refuses to boot. This also is not solved. So there are getting to be a growing number of issues with FP + locked bootloaders. Some on new installs, some after upgrading. I will pass a reference to this post the developers. --- _[View the full topic](https://community.iode.tech/t/fairphone-5-bricked-boots-only-into-fastboot/7586)._