tl;dr: I use a Note 20 Ultra with stock Samsung ROM because I’m not convinced there’s a good custom or stock ROM that well supports the stylus, but I’m open to suggestions if anyone has one.

My number 1 feature in a phone is having a built in/included stylus. I do a lot of programming stuff which I usually find is easier to plan out ideas for how I want to structure things by drawing it, it’s also easier for writing out math for some of said ideas, when an interesting question comes up, or when I want to show someone the math on how something’s done, and I’m currently learning Japanese so it’s helpful for working on my kana penmanship and learning kanji, especially learning kanji stroke order.

I’ve used other styli in the past and know that palm rejection is pretty much a must have feature. It’s incredibly annoying and cumbersome to hover over your phone to not engage the touchscreen, or have to specifically hold your phone in portrait mode so that your hand is naturally off to the side which doesn’t pair well with how we generally write horizontally. Because of this, I don’t consider dumb styli at all and only really consider powered styli that have an active connection to the phone.

The last time I was searching for a new phone, this requirement (and a few others like expandable storage via microSD card, 5G support, supported my network, etc) ruled out almost every phone on the market save 2. There was some Moto 5G discount model that for some reason had a smart stylus, then the Samsung Note 20 Ultra. I don’t recall the exact reason I didn’t go with the Moto 5G, but I believe it was something like issues with build quality (being a discount model) and the stylus wasn’t very good meaning it would defeat the entire point of getting the phone. So I went with my current Note 20 Ultra.

All of this is to say, I never really considered changing the ROM because I have doubts how well other ROMs would support the stylus. I’ll fully admit it’s not my most used feature on the phone, but there are hundreds of other phones that have a good screen, support fast charging, support Bluetooth, and have expandable storage. My first feature that would significantly rule out options unfortunately rules out almost all options, so I don’t trust that there are many ROMs out there that would even decently support the stylus.

That all being said, I’d be very happy to be proven wrong. I don’t like Samsung’s bloat and would love to move away from a lot of it. The only other Samsung device I own is their galaxy tag trackers which is currently the only reason I’ve logged into a Samsung account on my device otherwise I’d be happy to get rid of it and not give them more information.