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

  1. 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.

  2. 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.

  3. 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.

  4. 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).

  5. 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.

  6. 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

  1. Shortcuts: The Shortcuts app on iPhone is a game-changer. It automates tasks in ways I never thought possible.

  2. 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.

  3. Files App: The Files app is actually useful, and it has built-in support for Windows file shares.

  4. Look & Feel: Everything on iOS feels smoother and more premium. The animations, the UI design – it’s all just so polished.

  5. Audio: It’s much easier to select audio output in-app when connected to multiple Bluetooth devices and AirPlay.

  6. Driving: CarPlay is a joy to use compared to Android Auto. Plus, Apple Maps has better voice directions.

  7. 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”?

  • @bokherif
    9•2 months ago

    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.