The original post: /r/android by /u/CrunchatizeYou on 2024-12-20 17:34:05.
I've been primarily an iPhone user in the US for over a decade now, but that's not really how I'd even like it to be. There are many things that I appreciate about Android phones and the OS, and many things I dislike about iPhones and iOS. I don't care about Apple's ecosystem, I don't use really any of Apple's first-party apps, and with RCS available I don't care about iMessage.
I've tried to main a decent number of Android phones over the years, though (Galaxy S9+, Pixel 7, Pixel 8, OnePlus 12, Galaxy S24 Ultra, Pixel 9 Pro XL), and this is the list of dealbreakers across all of those phones that consistently causes me to sell them and revert to an iPhone:
- Scrolling. Honestly, this alone is probably enough to be a dealbreaker on the phones I've tried. Despite a few slight differences between the phones (with the OnePlus 12 being the best of what I've tried), the scrolling smoothness, speed, and inertia on Android phones drives me insane. Scrolling is a major thing that you do on a smartphone, and the "on-ice" scrolling on iPhones causes you to scroll less often with slower-speed scrolling that makes text easier to read when in motion. Android phones almost always have scrolling speed inconsistencies when a flick will cause the page to scroll down less or more than you expect it to, and the scrolling will abruptly stop in a way that feels jarring. On top of that, widespread app optimization issues means that scrolling in many, many third-party apps is a stuttery mess (Reddit, X - Pixels are the worst with this).
- Apps. This is likely more of an issue in the US than in other places, and it's also probably more or less of an issue depending on the apps that are important to you. However, I've felt like a second-class citizen in the US as it relates to the third-party app experience on Android. There are many popular, well-designed apps that are only available on iOS (Flighty, Copilot Money, Overcast, Apollo when it still existed) or apps that prioritize iOS and release updates there first (Instagram, Snapchat, United Airlines with boarding pass integration in Apple Wallet) in addition to optimization being far better on iOS devices as I mentioned earlier. I know that there are also a ton of third-party apps on Android that are not available on iOS and that may allow you to achieve customization or features that iPhones cannot do, but this is still primarily an issue for the many popular apps that people use every day.
- Speakers. This isn't quite as important as the other two, but it's still extremely annoying to me. I listen to podcasts, music, and watch videos on YouTube constantly at home on my phone, and the speaker quality on basically every Android phone I've tried (with the exception of the Pixel 9 Pro XL which comes somewhat close), is terrible. They all lack the full, low-end sound of the pro iPhones that allows voices to be heard clearly while in the shower or music to sound like it's not being played from inside a garbage can.
Reading sentiment from others online, I'm starting to feel like I'm crazy because so many Android users claim that these aren't issues at all. Has my brain just been warped by Apple over the years?