Following a successful crowdfunding campaign, it was manufactured in China and released on 27 November 2013.

In addition to the comparably limited number of native Sailfish applications available in the Jolla app store, the Jolla Phone featured the proprietary Alien Dalvik to provide support for and installing Android-applications[a] from Aptoide.

On 20 May 2013, after IamTheOtherHalf internet campaign, Jolla unveiled the following details and design of their first device: The Sailfish OS SDK was published at the end of February 2013.

4G and 3G will work in Europe but support is not guaranteed in other regions, even if a compatible frequency band is used.

Other Linux distributions like postmarketOS continue to provide updates for the original Jolla phone but don't support calls, SMS or mobile data.