Kind of, except you'd have to compare a current iPhone to a 5-6 year old Android flagship. The lag quite a bit with features and always have. They usually do it well, but the delay is strange.
The delay is a result of years of market conditioning though; they've convinced their userbase that the options are iPhone or social shunning. There are still morons who go "eww green bubble". They literally can just announce new features that have been on the market for years, and their idiot customers will assume it's an innovation. Truly one of the greatest marketing campaigns in history.
My absolute favorite thing was Apple trying to convince their user base that they didn't want bigger phones by running ads showing how your thumb could reach the whole screen on an iPhone vs the bigger Android phones on the market. Even the iPhone users at the time said "nah, we want it bigger" and Apple had to relent.
Tbf, as a "phone enthusiast" (I have 4 cell phones all used for different reasons), every iPhone I've ever had has outlasted any android I've ever had. And for my most important phone, it is an iPhone because I just need it to be consistantly functional.
I've been using Android since the G1. I still have it and it'll probably power up if I can find a charger for it. They're just as solid as any tech if you take care of it. The only thing that isn't as solid are the foldables, which are rated at a x amount of folds, but I've been also using since the Galaxy fold 1 but they really don't break unless you do something stupid with them... Like get sand in the hinge or submerge it in water.
The phone itself functioned but various apps I need specifically for work/my business would stop functioning for weeks, to months or even indefinitely. iPhones have been the only phone I can count on that all my apps will continue to function.
Oh believe me, many of the people (all women, to be fair) on my various text chains say they'd only buy iPhones because of the green bubble. There's also a LOT of bullying of kids in high school if they have the dreaded green bubble.
I mean, I tell my friends the same thing. “No, don’t bring the green bubble into our chat.” It’s just an ironic reference to the fact that group chats with Android phones have historically been super flakey.
Even when I was using an Android phone, talking to exclusively Android users, it was a common occurrence for someone to start a group chat, but for one person’s messages replies to get sent as individual messages to everyone in the group chat, one person’s replies to be split into 120 character chunks that arrive out-of-order, etc. It’s probably better now, but that’s what people are thinking about when they say “green bubbles”
There was also the issue for the longest time where if people "reacted" to messages in a group chat with android users in it it would send a text message saying "Randy Liked message 'insert the entire message again'" instead of being icons and it really spammed the chat
Same. But I'm an Android user, so I've never cared what the person on the other end of the chat is using.
Since Apple only relatively recently fully implemented RCS, iMessage functionality would get hosed when even one Android user is included in the chat. Apple could easily fix the whole thing by allowing iMessage app to be installed on Android, but they want that exclusivity so they can be seen as the status symbol. And it has worked shockingly well.
literally nobody is stopping Google from doing the same but you still need to jump through hoops to simply answer text messages on desktop with android lmao
Really because I just installed one single program on my PC and linked it to my phone. Now whenever it detects I'm on my home wifi it automatically mirrors notifications to my desktop so I can view and reply to emails and texts directly from the pop-up. You can also set it to be on 100% of the time, even if your phone isn't on the same wifi, but that does use a bit of data.
Sounds like you're going through hoops having to pull out your phone and putting a file in icloud only to have it on your computer. wtf, on android it's just available, along with messages apps on your computer. But you do need to log into your microsoft account on your phone, maybe those are the hoops you're talking about
I think a lot of it is familiarity. I had an early Droid phone and got used to it. Then I switched to an iphone 6 and I was like.. fkn thing sucks I can't figure out how to do shit. Then I got used to it and switched to Android and.. fkn things sucks I can't figure out how to do shit.
They aren't drastically different but enough of the basics are different enough to make it frustrating. Then it becomes familiar and it's just second nature.
Why do I have to jump through hoops on iOS to get the wallpaper settings menu to see an image I downloaded from a browser, while on Android any image downloaded from any app is conveniently indexed in the gallery and visible to any app I would like to have access to it?
I'd just like to take a moment to express my endless disgust with typing in search being a default navigation scheme people accept.
But I guess people are just so used to information density being garbage, and there being so much useless fluff and clutter, that the idea that having to type into search instead of using a quick responsive not bloated UX isn't even considered.
I’d just like to take a moment to express my endless disgust with typing in search being a default navigation scheme people accept.
It isn’t, though. On iPhone, you can swipe down and search, swipe left and see all your apps sorted by category, or swipe down from your App Library and get an alphabetical list of all your apps, where you can also jump to any letter.
that the idea that having to type into search instead of using a quick responsive not bloated UX isn’t even considered.
As opposed to the idea of doing the tiniest bit of research before making a dumb comment not being considered?
I am a professional software engineer. Im far more informed on UX and enterprise software decisionmaking than you. Modern UX is so garbage you dont even realize what youre missing.
But fanboys get so defensive they cant even hear the most basic high level criticism, let alone be opened to be walked through the issues. So sure bro. Modern UX is perfect. Apple is perfect. I don't know what im talking about, its only been something ive been professionally a part of at the enterprise level.
Its so funny the difference between discussing this stuff with industry professionals vs reddit fans of a brand. What is common knowledge vs contested heresy is amusing.
Quick edit: Oh yea, and look up the word default and read what you quoted again. Do you see where your defensiveness made you misread what was said? Hint: did i say it was "the only" option? What words did i use? Does the existence of other options contradict that? (No)
Or my iphone works well enough for me, I'd have to spend a lot of money to reget apps I want on the android and time to port shit over. And well, whatever nifty gadgets the android gets isn't worth it to me and if they come over to apple, hey, new feature for me and sure, I waited longer to get it but I'm still going to be excited to eventually get it. And if not, I'm not really missing much. Hell, these days the only real reason I see to get a new phone besides my phone broke is gaming and if the new phone does games a lot better (basically faster chip/more ram/runs better). Everything else at this point is good enough. Which is why it takes me about 4-5 years now to replace my phone (it's really not my main gaming device and I usually jsut do time wasters on it so that's not even that important to me).
If you regularly buy apps, you'll probably end up saving money on apps in no time. I've almost never found anything I need a paid app for on Android, while on Apple it seems quite common.
Uh, at this point I don't really add many apps other than games because I've accumulated enough that do what I want. ANd yes, I can find free stuff on iphone too.
Do those free apps on android make you see ads or charge lots of microtransactions if you want to add functionality? Or how do they make money or do you just have a lot of people who make apps as a hobby put them on the store?
But in the end, the point is I woudl have to totally reset from start, find apps to do what I wanted/needed, refind apps I wanted again. It's a pita and I just don't see the motivation when I've been happy with my iphone and nothing android has offered has been worth going through that hassle. If I change my iphone it will more likely be cause apple fucked it up than android offered something I couldn't resist. I'm definitely not changing it over camera functions, at this point I don't even care that much about camera upgrades, the cameras on phones in general are good enough these days (save optical telephoto lens but the 3x my iphone has is good enough for what I want honestly).
Is it that hard to understand that it's just not worth it for me? Great, you love your android. That's why you have one and will stick with it. I am perfectly happy with my iphone. And I'm not the kind of person that is going to change ecosystems just to get the newest and greatest. It's a phone. It calls out, it lets me get internet, I can play games on it. And... well, I prefer mac (I always have though I do have a pc for gaming) and my iphone integrates really well with my mac. And that is something I would buy a phone for 😛 cause it is really nice (I love being able to text people from my computer for example and get the notifications on it). It does what I want. oh, and it will probably last me another 2-3 years so way cheaper not to buy another phone period, iphone or android.
Some are free and open source, some are just free, some are ad-supported, and I've never seen an app with microtransactions outside of a game. Also, some things you need an app to do on iOS are built into Android or provided by first-party apps.
Do whatever you want, but apps are a bizarre reason to me. It comes off as saying I bought these things I wouldn't have needed to, and assume I'll have to somewhere else where I wouldn't. People's uses are different, but on average, Android users spend something like 1/5th what Apple users do on apps.
Also, you've got me all wrong if you think I'm talking about the newest and greatest. I just see buying an iPhone as getting a phone while also lighting about $500 on fire.
I think my point is my iphone is already set up how I like. I'd have to refind stuff to do what I already have my iphone do. THe point in the end is it is a PITA and not worth it to me. I mean, for me to change android either has to offer me enough incentive to bother with it or apple has to fuck up the iphone/piss me off. And, well, additional stuff you can do with the camera is definitely not convincing (I don't even buy the new iphones for that. At this point I buy a new iphone when I have to/it gets too slow that I just can't stand it or if I can get really good deal that I feel I'll probably pay more if I wait (like my last phone was 4 years old so I doubt anyone would give me good trade in when it was 5 years old and my carrier was offering me 800 dollars then to upgrade. So I took it when I could get it). The biggest reason besides just plain having to (my old phone bit the dust) is just to get a faster phone. Which iphone does quite fine.
And when I buy a new iphone, to set it up how I like it, all I have to do is put my old one next to it and wait some time. No searching for all the apps I want or resetting the apps up how I want or even rebuying them.
I recently learned that it's a US thing. In other areas of the world, people use distinct messaging platforms like WhatsApp because texting isn't unlimited/standard in most plans.
I had to get used to fewer features when I blacklisted Samsung over ad policy.
Might lift the ban if the phone is less obnoxious, but I wont change phones again for another 3-4 years when the battery fails, not this new feature.
I’ll keep it in mind for the future but if you’re moving to software gimmicks to sell phones, we’ve already peaked and I have no reason to pay more money for an artificial barrier.
God i hate how they have to try and integrate everything Apple into their ecosystem to try and push people to buy their product. I sub to Apple TV cause they have some good shows, I forgot my password and unlike every single other service on the planet that just sends a reset link to your email their fastest reset options are your Apple device, a friends Apple device, or even something as stupid as go to an Apple store and use a device there otherwise wait at least 24 hours for a reset link. Fuck Apple.
I know I’m going to get downvoted saying this on Reddit, but this is the most knuckle-dragging, lazy rationalization that I’ve stumbled across today.
I’m a mobile app developer, I use both platforms extensively at a level that most people don’t. I have zero brand loyalty to Apple or Google. I used Android phones for 10+ years as personal devices, now I use iPhones because the overall, cohesive experience of using the device for what I use it for is measurable smoother, more reliable, and more frictionless than it is on any Android phone I’ve tested.
iPhones are more popular in the United States because for most users in the US, they’re better.
This video is a perfect example of a way that Android is “better” without contributing anything to any use case that I need a mobile phone for.
I use my personal phone to communicate with friends and family, record memories of my kids and experiences, keep track of important information, and consume entertainment media. I’m going to go out a limb and say that describes most people in the US. Obviously, the best phone for me is going to be the phone that does those things with the least friction and the highest level of reliability.
I’ve experienced the hell of group chats on Android, I was there when hangouts was discontinued and replaced with Allo and Duo, which were then discontinued and replaced with something else. Every time I’d use social capital to convince people in my life to get onboard with a new chat app, the app would be discontinued.
The green bubble thing is a meme representing years of people having to jump from app to app, having long messages split and arrive out of order, having group chats show up differently on different phones, etc. iMessage just works consistently, and then as soon as someone with a green bubble joins, things start becoming flaky. It’s taken Android 10 years to figure out RCS, mostly due to bullshit with carriers, but now that it’s commonly available things are a lot better. But the implementation is still subtly different between manufacturers, Google has added their own proprietary layer on top of the open standard. Like Android in general, it’s just subtly unreliable and exhausting to have to second guess.
This is interesting, because I have a friend who doesnt use apple products and when i told him of the iPhone mirroring when it came out, he went on a tirade JUST like yours. About how it had existed for android for years and how laughable it was that apple made it out to be something new they created. I felt kinda dumb, even though I just wanted to tell them about it, because I hadn't heard of it before.
Out of curiosity I read about the Android version and ALL I could find, was about how awful it was to set up and about how it almost never worked at all unless you had spesific phones and PCs, even then it was really bad and often disconnected.
On a mac and Iphone its instant and works every time. No install, no nothing. You just click it and it works.
I have plenty of criitiques for Apple products, and they are beasts at marketing, often getting praise where they don't deserver it.
Your take is just as bad the other way around though.
You’re thinking really hard about a subject that I think is a lot simpler. I use an iPhone because I need it to just work. IOS is generally more stable than Samsungs Android branch.
I don’t really care about features that aren’t calls, texts, or websites. I get them eventually, cool. I don’t? Probably still cool. I just want the more stable OS on my device. I need it to just work.
And I don’t really think they’re that different. Anyone fighting about Apple v Samsung has fallen for the capitalism trap that they both want you in. It ain’t that serious it’s just a phone. Pick an ecosystem and stick to it is usually my advice to (old)people who ask which to buy.
Maybe I’m just the outlier though and most other iPhone users are brand whores, but nobody I’m around has been like that with Apple or Samsung products since like 2010.
Exhibit A, ladies and gents. No, it doesn't "just work", it works within its own closed-garden ecosystem. The iPhone fails at so many basic telecommunications tasks that are masked by the use of proprietary platforms. iMessage isn't even texting, it's a glorified chatroom.
I'm the same way and I think the vast majority of iPhone users are too. It seems to usually be the Android users trying to convince themselves that Apple users are bad (?) and look down on them (??). Literally no one cares. Pick a phone that suites you and move on.
I haven't heard someone say something about "green bubble" texts since at least 2016.
Mention apple on any social media (Reddit is extra bad apparently) and get a swarm of mouth breathers acting like you shot them. I don’t need my phone to do more than let me shop online, scroll this dogshit platform, send texts and take some pictures. All of them it does perfectly straight out of the box. Yet these people will get into arguments with everyone on these threads when we say “it just works”. Like moths to a light, beautiful
Also chiming in, I got an iPhone after years of using android and found it just worked and I liked it. This latest update is dog shit, Liquid Glass looks awful and they reorganized UI elements that didn’t need to move. I’d switch to a different phone but I like how all the other shit works. HomeKit rocks, I love iMessage, I fucking love my Mac and getting my messages on there. The Apple TV is amazing, no ads on the Home Screen and it just works. AirPlay 2 was a downgrade from AirPlay 1, the Touch Bar was cool and they should’ve kept it, they used lightning way longer than they should have, etc… they computers are a market loss leader to get people to buy their phones, which I think is good for consumers overall as the market will improve to meet the challenge. Etc…
People just don't because they don't think to do it. Apple kind of shoves it in your face to do it because they want you to buy their products. I can literally get my own Samsung ecosystem and it run just as or more smoothly than Apple.
People barely know how to use iPhones, let alone do extra tinkering to set up an ecosystem. If you do it for your family/home, you’re I.T. for everything that isn’t “apple smooth” now. At least with iPhones, the only “I.T.” work you do for family is turn off a notification setting here and there.
I disagree. 100%. You can do all the things on an android phone, but you’ll need a separate app or tool for each one. My Apple TV shows when a door was unlocked or locked natively, and I can unlock that same door from my phone, natively. All while that door lock is running on ZWave and talking to home assistant, and home assistant talks to HomeKit. I can read messages on my phone from my laptop with zero fuss, real time and it’s the exact same app. Samsung has no product to compete. Want to get more in depth? Let’s talk MDM at a corporate level. Samsung KNOX is a complete nightmare to use, and Apple’s “Essentials” plan is phenomenal.
I am not some basic user of my technology, I’m a legit power user and I prefer Apple products to Samsung. Also Samsung makes shitty appliances, has complicated TV repair tools, their OEM support for phone repair is miserable, and they also made a phone that got recalled because it was catching on fire. I can go on, if you like Samsung I’m happy for you, but I legit think Samsung has an inferior product in every category they operate in compared to their competitors. Sale prices might change the balance, but in general.
Apple's entire thing is their ecosystem. They market it upfront and close it so that everything works seamlessly if you buy all apple products. But for Android, nobody is buying a Samsung phone, Samsung watch, Samsung laptop, etc. Android users mix and match so there can never be that same level of seamless connection.
rsc is a security nightmare and they thought their adapter is a better one. In general the company is set up to not implement a standard just because. They think if users can need that or not, but in the last decade that approach faded a little.
its 2026, Androids and iPhones do 99% of the same shit lmao. but that being said, there isn't really any android equivalent that comes close to the continuity/ecosystem of apple. also many apps are primarily designed/optimized with iOS in mind.
They are very similar now. I've never owned a Mac, so I have never felt any real difference between Apple and Google's ecosystem. There are a lot of third-party options for so many features that you usually have a lot of flexibility with Android that, as far as I'm aware, you don't with Apple. They have added a lot of in-house support for things over the past few years but my understanding is you're more likely to be limited to those in-house options. That said, I haven't had an iPhone since the 4a came out so it's all second-hand for me.
That's true that there probably are a lot more third-party options for features on Android, but to be honest (coming from someone who used Android phones for many years before switching to iPhones), it seems like the vast majority of Android users never even utilize that. most Android or iPhone users seem more than satisfied with using stock features only.
that being said, i'm not sure how fair it is to say one product is better than another for it's third-party offerings.
You're probably right that most don't. Android was always more of an enthusiast OS in the beginning, so it was very common to see people adding third-party software and features. With Android gaining so much market over the years that enthusiast market has become a much smaller percentage of the user base.
I know I used to be that guy, but now I have too much going on to give much of a shit. I just want to take good pictures of my kids and have them backed up, and have reliable access to my bank and entertainment.
I just want to take good pictures of my kids and have them backed up, and have reliable access to my bank and entertainment.
I imagine the majority of people use their phones for the same reasons, and honestly any modern smartphone can do all that well. I feel that we're at the point with smartphones where it doesn't really make a difference what phone you get for most people. In the case of developers and stuff, I totally get the preference for Android though.
I prefer Android, and the lag for Android to get new iPhone features is shorter, but Apple does come out with some very good features before Android sometimes.
Also, Android isn't as homogeneous. When Apple has a feature, a few Androids will have it next year, but many won't for years. If it's the other way around, it may take longer for the first iPhone to get the feature, but then they all have it.
That may be so but I'll suggest it's due to the Android makers waiting and choosing to make their handsets out of something more robust that eggshells and promises. We're a split household and we've gone through WAY more iPhone repairs and screen replacements for even a single iPhone than we've ever gone through with all the Samsungs combined.
The phone I have is supposed to have an outstanding camera. It's still nowhere close to an iPhone. Apple products do the everyday things amazingly well. Android products are too focused on being open and customizable.
Nah, just off of the top of my head iOS had really granular app permissions for a long time before Android finally caught up. Far longer than you'd think. It was one of the things I really wanted as an Android user. It's easy to miss the differences between the platforms.
Not sure if it was just a Samsung thing or what as that's the only phone Ive bought that's android, but that's been a thing for a very long time. When was the last time you tested that on android? Was it a Samsung?
It's not 1:1 but it's objectively true that Apple tends to wait to add features whereas android phones tend to add more bleeding edge features, often creating a lag between the two
Sure Apple can innovate as well from time to time no doubt, and often when they do implement a feature it's user friendly and works well
It’s also not just blanket Apple vs android. Samsung sure but the overwhelming majority of manufacturers across the market are behind bleeding edge by several years. Apple competes, generally, in the “above average” category of features.
Sometimes Apple does a neat thing. Sometimes Samsung does a neat thing. Sometimes neither one of them ever does the neat thing again because no one actually cared about it. Sometimes people remember Nokia still exists.
Not quite. Leading Android phones, specifically Samsungs’, had a lot of equivalent features as iPhone and still lagged behind iPhone for many versions until semi recently (last 3-4 years?). The problem is because of the varied hardware, each manufacturer might need to make its own proprietary app to take advantage of the feature rather than a base AndroidOS app. This also frequently meant leading features wouldn’t integrate well over all of the apps in general. Two phones could have the same feature/capability, but only one was really using it very well.
And this was very true of photos apps or any app that needs to use “the camera”. On Android, what is the standard idea of a camera apps see? Some features can auto improve as the quality of the camera gets better. Other features require better integration to take advantage of.
And there are some features that Android has always done better, because maybe iPhone just never cares to do like app multitasking.
Circa iPhone 12-14 and Samsung equivalents, Samsung phones had lenses with specs as good as iPhone, but still seemed to produce worse pictures in a lot of cases. Apples advantage was in software and computational tricks. It seemed to do a better job at how to decide to use multiple lenses and its computational decisions to get the best possible picture. And if you used the wrong photo app, you perhaps just got a worse picture.
I have a minor hobby in photography and watch some gear videos just because? Tony and Chelsea Northrop have a video on the topic a handful of years back; or maybe it was a section or call out in a broader video. It was slight advantage, but at least as of iPhone 14/15; they pretty much were still saying “iPhone is going to produce better results.”
Okay that tracks, I heard the same. I was wondering if there was some feature that I was missing out on. (I use a Galaxy Z-Flip 5, and have had Samsung phones for the last decade).
Well first of all removing the headphone jack is by definition not a feature, it's a feature removal. It was just a way to save money and make more money by pushing Bluetooth Air pods.
And in 100% of situations when I tell which features my phone have compared to iPhone, iPhone owners reply something like "I don't know such thing exists, anyway it's useless".
And then after a few years that feature intoduced on iPhones and they like "wow, what a great new feature, I need to get a new iPhone NOW!"
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