After spending over a decade with various Android phones, I finally made the switch to an iPhone. Here’s why I made the switch and what I’ve discovered since.
The Struggles with Samsung/Android
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Slow Shutter on Samsung Flagships: One of my biggest gripes with Samsung’s flagship phones has been the slow shutter and shutter lag. Trying to capture a moving subjects often resulted in blurry photos or missed shots entirely. This has been an issue with Samsung phones for many years.
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Google’s Service Abandonment: Google has a notorious history of abandoning services. The most recent one being the Podcasts app. The podcast experience on YouTube Music is just terrible.
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Hardware Design: The Samsung S24 Ultra has sharp corners that make it uncomfortable to hold. The Pixel 8 phones have issues with connectivity and overheating. The S24+ comes with an inferior Exynos processor.
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Performance: No matter how fast the hardware is, Android phones always seem to slow down and stutter after a few months of use. It’s like they age in dog years. (My most recent Samsung phone was the S23+, and it already started lagging).
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Apps: Android apps have an inconsistent look and feel. It’s like a patchwork quilt made by someone who doesn’t know how to sew. Also, a lot of Android apps require excessive permissions.
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Disaster: A Samsung update once made my phone unbootable. I had to do a full reset and lost some data. People said I should have made a backup before the update, but Android doesn’t provide an easy way to completely backup the phone. That was the last straw.
The iPhone Revelation
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Shortcuts: The Shortcuts app on iPhone is a game-changer. It automates tasks in ways I never thought possible.
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Face ID: Face ID on the iPhone is leagues ahead of Samsung’s version and even better than Touch ID. It’s fast, reliable, and just works. With the amount of unlocks I need everyday, this turns out to be more impactful than I expected.
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Files App: The Files app is actually useful, and it has built-in support for Windows file shares.
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Look & Feel: Everything on iOS feels smoother and more premium. The animations, the UI design – it’s all just so polished.
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Audio: It’s much easier to select audio output in-app when connected to multiple Bluetooth devices and AirPlay.
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Driving: CarPlay is a joy to use compared to Android Auto. Plus, Apple Maps has better voice directions.
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Emulators: Emulators are now possible to use on iPhone without jailbreaking.
Switching to iPhone has been a breath of fresh air. While Android gave me more freedom and customizations. The consistency, reliability, and overall experience of iOS have won me over.
What was your experience switching to/from “the dark side”?
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I continue to be baffled that “anyone can grab your phone, point it at your face, and have access to everything” is somehow a feature and not a critical vulnerability. In the US, you can be compelled to unlock a device using biometrics, but not a password, under the 5th Amendment.
There’s a FaceID setting for “attention aware” that I think is on by default. It won’t unlock unless you are looking at the phone with eyes open.
That won’t help with police abuse of authority, but if you power down, restart, or lock the phone it will require your password. US police can’t legally require you give up your password, although courts have.
You can choose not to use FaceID, but it’s less convenient
If pulled over or something. Hit the power button of your iPhone a couple of times and FaceID is disabled. Easy as that. Or if you’re really paranoid: lock it before leaving the house.
You ever been pulled over? The cop makes it to your window in record time and I would not recommend fumbling around your center console to lock your face ID during said time.
Then say “Siri who am I”. It will lock it as well.
Exactly. You sit still,and wait for the cop to direct you, you don’t grab for shit unless they tell you to.
Crazy. Every time I’ve been pulled over, I have time to dig out my I’d and registration before they get to my window. Maybe I shouldn’t but I don’t have patience to wait for them
I, too, have abandoned Samsung.
Not going over to iPhone, though, screw that noise. The one time I tried it was on an iPad and yeah, no, screw most of that UX. Plus I’m not giving Apple money. I’m on an Android phone with a 3.5mm jack and a SD card slot, like nature intended.
I wish there were more choices other than Samsung. I don’t want any Chinese phones. Sony isn’t available in my region, and most other Japanese/Korean phone makers have given up the international market.
I’m not gonna force you to say if you don’t want to, but what is this region where the choice is just Samsung or Chinese phones? No Google Pixels? How about ASUS, or are you ahead of the curve in lumping Taiwan in with China? Nothing? That’s aggressively western. Fairphone? Motorola? Heard some positive things about their offering last year.
And to be clear, I think “I want an iPhone” is an absolutely valid stance. You don’t need an excuse to like a specific phone, it’s just the implication that you’d like to stay on Android but don’t have alternatives.
There are Pixel phones, but the current/last generations suck. Taiwanese phones are not available here, at least not with my mobile carrier.
Motorola is Chinese as well. I’ve never seen Fairphone and no idea who the makers are.
are you ahead of the curve in lumping Taiwan in with China?
Don’t worry, I am definitely not a tankie. Fuck the CCP.
I… guess Motorola is Lenovo now, which I think highlights the “not Chinese” thing as somewhat arbitrary, because… well, you get people on Lenovo laptops everywhere in government and enterprise, and nobody is out there boycotting that for political reasons.
I think as somebody else mentioned before, that restricting it to one carrier in one country is very arbitrary. There are perfectly good out of carrier options, and I presume that opens Sony back up (which is my personal choice) among others.
Again, if you just want an iPhone, just get an iPhone, but it increasingly seems like nobody is twisting your arm here. There is definitely plenty of choice available, and you’re taking quite a long walk to this “Samsung or bust” position.
Complete list of brands from my carrier:
And I have to stick with the carrier because of my workplace.
My dude, that’s your carrier only. Buy an unlocked phone from a different store, it’s not that hard.
Let’s assume I can choose any brand. Which brand would recommend?
That’s complete nonsense, so many options out there. Samsung sucks I agree though.
Can you please give me some examples?
Is OP an Apple shill? Does OP know that Samsung is not Android and viceversa?
These look like all Samsung issues and not Android issues
My experience mirrors yours.
The realization that for most apps, the iPhone version clearly has more effort put into it.
Seeing what an app ghetto the Play store is; they let anything on there and it’s scams galore.
Janky UI, as you said.
The final straw for me, though, was phone calls not ringing on the phone and going straight to VM. This was on a “pure” Google phone using Google Fi. When a phone can’t even act like a phone anymore, I’m out.
At my age, I don’t have time or desire to fiddle with shit constantly. I want it to Just Work.
for most apps, the iPhone version clearly has more effort put into it.
Even Google Maps work better on iOS!!
At my age, I don’t have time or desire to fiddle with shit constantly.
Yeah I used to install custom ROMS on my Android phones. Android has more customizations, but I would rather use a design that works well out of the box.
Even Google Maps work better on iOS!!
Really? I find that Android Google Maps is far better, at least through Android Auto. Showing current speed + speed limit icons while driving is a big one. Android Auto allows pinch zooming while Apple CarPlay Google Maps has 2000-era “zoom in and out buttons” only. I believe Android also shows tolls for alternate routes as well.
Google Maps on CarPlay shows current speed and speed limit too.
On my CarPlay implementation, Google Maps has a better layout, button size etc compared to the Android Auto one.
There are so many kinds of display configurations with car manufacturers, so I guess it is down to the implementation and personal preferences.
Oh, ok - my mistake then. I have tried both on two cars and thought that was normal.
I have a Pixel 8 and don’t have connectivity or overheating issues. I say this as it’s 38°C right now 🥵
The lack of being able to use extensions in Firefox on iOS is a deal breaker for me.
No idea why Samsung is seen as the best manufacturer of Android phones. Bloated crap.
For me add the fact that the AirTag network is vastly larger and more mature than Tile or another other service. And Apple Pay works better* and I was sold
* anecdotal personal experience, ymmv
That has changed with Google’s “Find my device” network since android has a worldwide market share of over 70%.
Can’t say the android phones I’ve used have slowed down over the years ( mainly one plus ). I always stayed away from Samsung and the sort because they add too much bloat.
Not to mention that an update changed the power button to “activate bixby” and the constant harassing OD the Samsung app.
I bought the latest Samsung tablet and its underwhelming compared to the precious Samsung tablet I had. At this point I wish I had bought an iPad instead :/
Having moved to iPhone fairly recently I do like the overall experience, however Face ID is by far the biggest downside over a good under screen fingerprint scanner.
When picking up the phone and holding it in front of my face it works perfectly well, but that’s probably less than 50% of the unlocks I do.
Most of the time the phone would lie flat on a desk, on a nightstand, couch armrest etc. I can see and interact with the screen just fine, but the phone can’t see me properly. Making me pick the phone to quickly check a notification.
I’m probably entering my password about 4-5x as much as my old phone because of that
You just made me realize that I haven’t used the fingerprint ID on Android for a long time. I had to use a 6-digit PIN because of the requirements of using a work profile.
But even when I could use fingerprint, I thought it was slow (Samsung S10 and S23). I ended up using either PIN or pattern.
iPhone face ID is extremely fast, but in your use cases I can understand the frustrations.
@Inktvip @cloudless I moved to iPhone too recently and generally really like it particularly the camera but find it a bit harsh when, after a short night or when feeling rough in the morning, faceID declines to recognise me and I have to type in the pin. It’s oil on the fire for me…
Apple devices could literally be the best device ever created and they should still never be purchased because Apple is a garbage company.
The shit state of the world right now is largely because we keep giving garbage companies our money because they make the shiny shit we like to be distracted by.
The absolute strategy of the billionaire corporate class is “who cares if the world burns as long as we collect all the money and keep people looking down at their screens so they don’t notice.”
Fuck them. And fuck anyone who keeps the status quo going by shelling out for their shit. And doubly fuck anyone who then shills for them on social media.
And Samsung is a shining star of a tech company? Google, too?
Hell no. Fuck all of them. My point is get off the corporate cycle.
You’re phone isn’t dead just because two years have gone by and Apple/Samsung/Google tell you so. Stop giving them money and use your phones for longer, or preferably (though understandably much more difficult for most regular people so not really feasible for most) replace the built in software with privacy respecting alternatives that don’t send all your data back to their home office.
Sure. Keep your phone until it’s dead, I’m all for that. Same with cars. But when it goes, what do you replace it with?
Are you going to build your own car? That’s awesome if you can and have the time. Otherwise, you’re going to buy a car, hopefully used, that was still built by EvilCorp.
Same with your phone.
I drive a Tesla; bought it used. Elon is a shit human. Know who else is a shit human? Literally every CEO of every car company in the world.
I have an iPhone. Bought it used. Tim Cook is a shit human. Know who else is a shit human? Literally every CEO of every major tech company in the world.
I work for NVIDIA. I make them a lot of money and they pay me very well. Do I think Jensen Huang is a shit human? Fuck yes I do, he exploits people the same way every other CEO ever does.
But what can I do? I self-host most of my services and pay for privacy-respecting ones that I don’t. But I’m a career IT worker; I know how to do that. Most people don’t even know what Linux is.
Sure, I could just move to Baja and live a Mexico beach bum lifestyle. Doesn’t sound so bad until one thinks a little deeper about it.
You do what you can, when you can. Every bit helps. Buying your iPhone used is a great thing. Self-hosting services. Also great.
There is no “one” solution that is ever going to be perfect, because the corporate greed has been allowed to run rampant as far back as the 80s. Reaganomics took us from a world where company “x” would make a product, attach a reasonable profit margin to it (usually 30-40 percent) and be happy with that. Then shareholders came along and suddenly it wasn’t about a profit margin, it was about INCREASING a stock price at the expense of everything else. At the expense of customers. At the expense of employees. At the expense of the environment.
But all we can do is do what we can, when we can. Otherwise we’re rapidly heading for the movie “Elysium”, where the super rich live on a space station (or other paradise) while the rest of us are in slums. The only difference being is that unlike Elysium, no one in the slums will notice or care, as long as long as they can spend a months wages on the new hotness each year.
My experience switching to iPhone 4 years ago after only android is texting is incredibly more annoying due to terrible autocorrect and prediction on iphone
I’ve used tons of different phones (both Android and iOS) and although I always defended Android in almost every past conversation, I ended up using an iPhone, here’s why:
- On Android the base system that provides all the functionality comes from Google and if you try to remove Google services from Android, your phone is basically crippled. I don’t need to get into how hungry Google is for your personal data.
- Pixels advertise features that they do not have and they probably will never have. Some Pixels have the feature X, but you go buy the same exact model again and bam you don’t have feature X on that phone for some reason. (Also the Pixel launcher has a non removable Google search bar which I hated)
- Samsungs are great mini PCs you can carry, especially with DeX, but why do I have Samsung suite + Microsoft suite + Google suite of apps on one phone? You can’t remove Samsung apps, so you take a photo, view it through Samsung gallery and backup through Google Photos which is very inconvenient.
- Android overall has more personality, although your options are more and more limited each day due to bad hardware offered by brands. You want performance, you need a Samsung and then you get your data collected by all the big tech.
- I’ve had multiple call, audio or app issues with many Android vendors, never had an issue with an iPhone.
- iPhones are stupid and I hate the fact that I have to use it because Android makers are incompetent. iPhones work really well if people around you also use Apple devices (especially for US)
- You pay almost the same price for a new Pixel 8 and a new iPhone 15. You get an experimental chip with the Pixel that is generations behind in terms of performance and you FEEL IT. I felt my Samsung S24 was A LOT faster in terms of performance compared to my iPhone 15, but since the Android system never became coherent, using iOS feels smoother.
- Main reason I’m on an iPhone is getting away from Google (especially with all the AI features coming our way). But I hate that Apple tries to lock you into their ecosystem every step of the way. You can’t access Apple services on an Android (except with a browser, which sucks). Google services work great, but knowing that Google logs my every interaction, file and input feels like hell when you think about it.
- Being in the cyberspace myself, I am aware that there is no such things as privacy online anymore, but at least with an iPhone, if Google pulls a stupid stunt I can just go back to iPhone’s services.
TL;DR Every phone is the same, Android in general is faster for getting things done, and although iOS is limited, it gets done whatever it can get done with no issues. It’s a matter of who you want to give your data to and I think we all know Google’s not to be trusted.
Takes time to write thoughtful, detailed post in an Apple Enthusiast community
gets downvoted by 30% of readers
😒
Few months ago I switched to an iPhone 15 Pro Max after being on Android for years. I think I briefly tried an iPhone 6s back in the day? For maybe a month and gave up. I only switched because I happened to be able to get the phone without having to pay anything down, and the one good thing I’ve always heard about iPhone is the camera. Going to be honest, I despise iOS as much as I remember. Navigating around is a nightmare. The number of times I try to use the android back gesture, only for nothing to happen, is in the dozens of times per day. The fact that there is no dedicated back button or gesture, unless a specific app graciously decides you get to have one(in the most inconvenient location possible), is obscene. Back on Android, not only do I get said feature, I can tweak and customize it to my liking. And for that matter, I can do the same to pretty much the entire UI. The nearly non-customizable UI on iOS is infuriating. The fact that I can’t seem to predict which volume is about to be adjusted when I hit the volume buttons is even more infuriating. As is the phone’s insistence on not switching audio devices when it should. Or refusing to connect to Bluetooth headphones or other devices automatically, constantly forcing me to going into the settings and do it manually. And just countless other things I absolutely hate about this thing. The only thing I have found to be an improvement is the battery life, which after a full day is still at 90% when I am ready to go to bed. But that’s only because I just don’t touch the phone anymore. I check an email or two during the day, and the phone otherwise just sits in my pocket untouched. Switching to an iPhone is probably the single biggest technology-related mistake I’ve made in years. And that’s coming from someone who is running Arch as the only OS on my gaming laptop, and owns multiple VR headset and AR/XR glasses.
I’m glad other people seem to like their iPhones, but I absolutely despise this thing, and oh my god am I desperate to get the hell back onto Android at the first opportunity. I got this through Boost Infinite, so I’m hoping that when it’s time, they’ll let me “upgrade” to the Galaxy S24 Ultra. Which is the phone I wanted to begin with, but they were conveniently only advertising the iPhone at the time, so I didn’t know they had other phones.
Moral of the the story is, if you tend to do any customization at all when you get a new Android phone, you’re probably going to hate iPhone. If you tend to just log in your email account and use the phone as it comes, you might fare better. In either case, do what you have to, to get your hands on a borrowed iPhone and spend some time with it before even considering making the switch.
