Trump Phone Teardown Proves It Is Just An Old HTC With A Fake Tan

by Aaron Leong — Thursday, October 29, 2026, 11:06 AM EDT

Turns out the Trump Mobile T1 is a HTC U24 Pro in emperor's new clothing - Image: HTC

Many have been waiting for this: JerryRigEverything just put the Trump Mobile T1 through a complete teardown and stress test. What he found was surprising structural durability, while also definitively exposing the phone's not-so-American identity.

Prominent tech reviewer Zack Nelson (of JerryRigEverything fame) put the inaugural gold Trump phone through his usual battery of scratch, burn, and bend evaluations. Under the blade, the phone revealed a plastic side frame and a gold-painted plastic rear cover that easily flaked off, complete with the botched American flag featuring only 11 stripes. Oof!

Interestingly, when it came to structural integrity, the T1 held up remarkably well. The display glass scratched at a standard level six on the Mohs hardness scale with deeper grooves at level seven, and despite heavy force applied from both the front and back, the chassis resisted snapping or suffering any catastrophic structural failure. Even its internal moisture indicators remained pristine despite prior submersion.

(Left) HTC U24 Pro, (right) Trump T1 - Image: HTC/Trump Mobile

This resilience, as we noted previously, is inherited rather than an engineered feat on Trump Mobile's part. As Nelson disassembled the T1 alongside a two-year-old HTC U24 Pro, the internals and display were shown to be practically identical, including the same 120Hz refresh rate, and headphone jack and microSD expansion slot locations. Both handsets even share the same internal layout down to screw placements, cameras, cooling hardware, and ribbon cables. Confirming previous findings by iFixit, Nelson did a motherboard swap, and yes, the HTC motherboard booted effortlessly inside the Trump Phone and vice versa, thus proving that the hardware is fundamentally a repackaged Taiwanese mid-ranger.

Like the U24 Pro, the T1 features a 6.7-inch OLED screen, Qualcomm Snapdragon 7 Gen 3, 12GB of RAM, 512GB of ROM (expandable via microSD), an IP67 dust and water resistance rating, and a triple rear camera system including a 50MP primary sensor.

Where the Trump Phone differs from its sister device is a gold plastic casing, modified rear camera module shape, substantially higher price tag, a slightly larger 5,000mAh battery with slowed 30W wired charging (versus 60 W), and Android 15 preloaded with Truth Social (of course).