Ö3 Lucky Bag: 320,000 Cell Phones Given Away!

The Ö3 community’s sustainability project once again provides support for families in need in Austria

January 30, 2026, 9:21 a.m

Get old cell phones out of the drawer and help twice as much: The Ö3 community has once again impressively proven how well the simple idea of the Ö3 lucky bag works in its 21st year of existence. Collecting has been going on all over Austria since November, and the Ö3 alarm clock has now taken stock: 320,000 cell phones that are no longer in use have been collected. The devices are recycled in an environmentally friendly process. Half of the proceeds of around 540,000 euros will then go to the emergency aid funds of Licht ins Dunkel and Caritas and will enable quick help for families in emergency situations in Austria all year round.

The Ö3 lucky bag – a joint project of an entire country

The campaign by Hitradio Ö3 in collaboration with the Austrian Post, Caritas and Licht ins Dunkel is a helpful and environmentally friendly way to recycle cell phones that are no longer in use. Many people are helping to make the Ö3 surprise bag as simple and sustainable as possible: The surprise bags are made from 100 percent recycled paper, made by Lenzing Papier in Upper Austria. Regionality also counts in production: VENDO Kommunikation + Druck GmbH in Vöcklabruck produces the surprise bags. The Austrian Post delivers the surprise bags with its growing e-fleet, by bike or on foot, and reliably transports the devices from all over Austria back to the old cell phone recycling center in Vienna. The waste collection centers in Upper Austria have also set up a comprehensive drop-off option at all locations with Ö3 lucky bag collection boxes. And for the fourth time, lucky bags were available in all Magenta shops, cell phones that were no longer used could be handed in directly to the shops, and customers’ discarded devices also became a sustainable donation. Hundreds of thousands of Austrians have been collecting at home, in schools, in clubs or in companies since November – and Licht im Dark and Caritas are now guaranteeing the targeted use of the money from environmentally friendly cell phone recycling. This makes the Ö3 wonder bag the most reliable and sustainable wonder in the world!

“Ö3 Lucky Bag Challenge 2025”: Schools collect 11,723 cell phones together

The schools once again made a special contribution to the success of the campaign: Hitradio Ö3, the Austrian Youth Red Cross and youngCaritas invited all schools in the country to set a strong example together and collect old cell phones in the Ö3 lucky bag. The result is a school project of a very special kind: the schools collected 11,723 cell phones and linked topics such as environmental protection and the use of resources with social issues such as hidden poverty. Across Austria, the Riegersburg school cluster, the TSMS Pettenbach and the Felbertal Werkschulheim were able to contribute the most to the collection results. The federal state rankings and further detailed results can be found at the following link: oe3.orf.at/wundertüte.

From now on, the following applies to all of Austria: Get your old cell phones ready – the campaign will start a new round in autumn, the Ö3 surprise bag will once again reliably reach all households across the country!

And if you need one sooner: surprise bags can be ordered free of charge at any time by calling 0800 600 600.

The Ö3 lucky bag – helps families, helps the environment!

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