I am an iPhone and Android user. Taking care of a good part of the analysis in Xataka, I spend more than half of the month with the mobiles that I test and the rest of the time with my personal iPhone 13 Pro. I’ve been using iPhone since 7 and I feel like a change. Not because there is a better Android, not because the iPhone is worse. Simply, I want to have an Android as a personal mobile, at least for a while.
how difficult is this and how badly manufacturers are doing, leaving aside compact mobiles. I want to tell you why I find it so difficult to find a replacement, why I feel locked into the Apple ecosystem, and why it doesn’t seem like anything is going to change in the short term.
My point of view is that of a passionate technology. If a mobile convinces me, I buy it, regardless of the operating system you have. I anticipate this in order, as much as possible, to avoid the hackneyed war between Apple and Android in the comments, to which this type of article invites so much.
the drama of size
Finding compact mobiles on Android is a drama. Find high-end compact mobiles that they do not give up specs of his older brothers, impossible. Why is there no S22 Ultra under six inches? Why is there no small Pixel Pro? The closest thing to an iPhone 13 Pro, currently, is a Samsung Galaxy S22 or an ASUS Zenfone 9.
In the ecosystem of Android manufacturers, buying the small model is buying the least ambitious model
The ASUS falls a bit short as it lacks a telephoto lens (a point that is essential for me) and the S22, despite being a great device, is far from the S22 Ultra. The only difference between an iPhone 13 Pro and an iPhone 13 Pro Max, for physical reasons, is the battery. Otherwise, you’re buying the company’s best phone, regardless of size.
Android manufacturers do not apply this philosophy. If you buy the small mobile you buy a worse mobile. Pushing you to gigantic models to enjoy the best leaves those of us who want compact phones in the lurch. I want the best, but I want it in pocket format.
I don’t want to carry a Powerbank with me
A few years ago, it was all memes about living glued to the charger if you had an iPhone. Now there is no rival in terms of size/autonomy with the iPhone. The Pro Max sweeps away its competition (another matter is fast charging), and there is no compact mobile that comes close to the figures of the iPhone 13 Pro.
With a meager 3,095mAh, the iPhone 13 Pro offers me better results than a few high-end Android phones with 5,000mAh. But I don’t want to get into a war of screen hours and numbers here. Let’s leave it at that the iPhone 13 Pro lasts me all day, while my experience with small phones on Android has been terrible. Sweating blood to get through the night with some battery left.
I don’t understand what’s up with Android and video
Another fundamental point for me, both for leisure and for generating income from content on social networks, is video recording oriented to a more professional level. There are exponents in Android that do it well, but the iPhone sweeps. needless to say when uploading the contents to RRSS with Android, the quality is negligible. The bitrate drops, I have even observed loss of color analyzing the histogram and the audio compression is terrible.
First world problems that affect a minimum percentage of users. But I am among them. As a curious anecdote, a month in which I was uploading content to TikTok with an Android I had a drop of more than 50% in visits. After returning to the iPhone I went back to my usual numbers. The algorithm analyzes the quality of the videos and rewards the highest quality.
Apple knows how to lock you into its ecosystem
I hate the word “ecosystem” when it comes to Apple. It’s become quite a fanatical term that seems to reflect that if we have Android and Windows, we can’t get our devices to connect. But I understand why this is talked about so muchbecause Apple knows very well how to lock you into that ecosystem.
The transfer speed of AirDrop, in my tests, has come to exceed that of an Android with UFS 3.1 memory connected to the PC by cable C. The universal clipboard (copy a text on the Mac and paste it on the iPhone, and vice versa), that the products connect just by bringing them close to the phone, use the iPhone as a webcam on the PC natively…
Even products as mundane as AirTags are a far cry from rivals like SmartTag (which needed a virtual miracle to locate a device). And it goes without saying that, with the money that Apple products cost, I am not convinced by the idea of not being able to use them if I leave their ecosystem.
The money that is invested in Apple, stays in Apple. If we want to return to Android, we will have to go through the box again
Then there is the matter of all the apps you have paid for on the iPhone are not purchased on Android. After years using Apple, we are talking here about hundreds of euros that I would have to pay again. Terrible.
The Apple bullshit that has not been reached
and then they are Nonsense. Each user has their own. In his month of use with the iPhone 13 Pro, my colleague Javier Pastor missed the Always On Display, he was not entirely happy with the location system and, especially because he was outside the Apple ecosystem, he did not enjoy the promised benefits. Something understandable, since the grace of using an iPhone is that the rest of the products at home are from Apple.
I also have my hobbies, of course. I find the Android gesture system terrible. In apps like Twitter, for example, it’s easy to invoke the side menu, when what we want is to go back. On the other hand, except for the Google Pixel, the camera preview does not show the HDR, so it looks all burnt until you open the photo in the gallery.
Apple knows how to take care Nonsense. At the beginning of the week I traveled in a group, all carrying the boarding pass on the phone. Some had problems as they were on low brightness and the reader did not recognize the boarding pass. On the iPhone the brightness goes up automatically when we open the wallet with a QR. Real bullshit, yes, but bullshit that all manufacturers should implement and that make life easier.
This list is as endless as it is subjective, so I summarize it in that there are a series of automatic functions in Apple that make the user experience excellent in aspects that Android has completely forgotten.
Each one belongs to his father and mother, or so they say
It is unlikely that, with this text, any staunch Android user will understand how easy life is with an iPhone. Just as it is unlikely that anyone will convince an iPhone user that their Android does the same thing for less money.
I have tried, but there is no way to free myself from the clutches of Apple. I continue to enjoy every Android I analyze like a little child, but the iPhone will continue to be in my pocket for a good while.
George is Digismak’s reported cum editor with 13 years of experience in Journalism