My thesis is simultaneously highly contrarian and sort of trivial. So why write this post? Because I feel so thoroughly gaslit by society. And I have

Android is just better than iOS

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2023-01-23 12:00:05

My thesis is simultaneously highly contrarian and sort of trivial. So why write this post? Because I feel so thoroughly gaslit by society. And I have to speak my truth.

Of course this thesis isn't really contrarian because android has 72% global market share and almost half in the US and the most expensive phones aren't iPhones. So maybe I'm just talking to smug iPhone users [1].

Smart phone OS has an almost religious feel to it where you choose one young, often copying your parents, and for the most part never convert or even try the other one. So it's no surprise we have true believers who are totally ignorant of the state of deprivation and abuse they are in. Until recently I also believed the Apple good design propaganda. I chose Android in 2010 because I wanted flash support and to write Java apps. Also slight price sensitivity and preference against AT&T. Four reasons which seem silly in hindsight. I always believed I had chosen a generally worse designed phones except for a smattering of technical upsides. Until I actually held an iPhone and flicked through it.

I'm going to go through the basic OS features and discuss how in almost all cases Android has better design. For concreteness I'm talking about my Pixel 5, Android version 13, and my wife's iPhone SE, OS version 15.6.1. These are both ~2 year old phones and Android and iOS have been copying each other for over a decade so maybe iPhone has closed the gap. I'll argue all of the following are better on Android: quick settings, WiFi password sharing, autorotation, alarms, notifications, home screen touch interactions, keyboard and body.