Here are all the reasons an Apple iPhone is better than a Samsung, LG, Lenovo, OnePlus, Xiaomi, Realme, Oppo, Google, Motorola, or any other Android smartphone.
The iPhone versus Android rivalry has gone on for as long as I can remember; and so has the war over which operating system is, in fact, king. No lives were lost, obviously, but I’m pretty sure many egos have been hurt and many hilarious battles, mostly over forums, have been waged.
But if we just set aside our pride, we could acknowledge that both iOS and Android are impressive in their own right, and each has its share of strengths and weaknesses. And it really boils down to the user which is more ideal for them.
I’m an ambidextrous user myself – although iPhones do lend themselves better to my specific workflow – and there are things I love (and hate) about both.
Indeed, there are lots of things that an iPhone can do better than an Android phone. Oh, for sure, there are lots of good things about Android phones when you put them up against iPhones. Right now, though, I’ll explain reasons why iPhones are better than Android phones (in my opinion.) Check out this article, though, for an argument the other way.
Here are 10 reasons why iPhones are better than Android phones.
1. iPhones are easier to buy
There are fewer models and configurations of Apple phones to choose from than there are Android phones — if only because only Apple makes iPhones and anyone can make an Android phone.
Unless you really know what to look for, picking an Android phone can be daunting, especially if you’re browsing on sites like Amazon.
But if you just want a good phone and don’t want to do a ton of research, Apple makes it easier for you to pick. Just pick one that matches your budget and it’ll do great for you.
2. iPhones are faster
Having used an Android phone and Apple phone daily for years, I have encountered fewer hiccups and slow-downs using an iPhone. Performance is one of the things iPhone usually does better than Android phones. This seems ridiculous, considering iPhone internals. The iPhone 15 Pro Max is currently the most powerful Apple smartphone, featuring the Apple A17 Pro SoC — the first chipset to use a 3nm manufacturing process. This may sound impressive, but we tend to get a little lost in the specs and often forget to look at what matters. Performance doesn’t only come from powerful specs. There is more to processing power than cores and speed clocks. There is proof that Apple processors are better than Qualcomm’s.
Whether Apple processors are better or not, what matters most is iOS is optimized to work perfectly with the few devices Apple makes. Meanwhile, Android is dropped into a sea of smartphones, tablets, and other products. It’s up to OEMs to optimize the software for the hardware, and they sometimes do a poor job at it.
Apple’s closed ecosystem allows tighter integration, so iPhones don’t need super powerful specs to match the high-end Android phones. It’s all in the optimization between hardware and software. Having full control of both its hardware and software, Apple has optimized iOS to use resources more efficiently than Android.
Honestly, I have been using iPhones for years, and the biggest issue I’ve ever encountered is when apps start to slow down or act up since there’s a new iOS in town, and I have to update. And this only really happens if I wait too long to upgrade to the new OS. Everything else works great, apart from the occasional app crashing, which happens once in a blue moon.
That isn’t the case with my Android Phone. There are always random issues popping up, some apps don’t always work so I have to uninstall and install them again, there’s an endless list of worthless old keys in its registry, and even just a small Android update can cause migraines.
This is not to say all iOS devices can outperform all Android devices. Some Android phones are made with beastly internals and stunning performance. Generally, though, iOS devices are faster and smoother than most Android phones at comparable price ranges.
3. iPhones are super simple to use
When comparing iPhones vs Android phones in terms of ease of use, iPhones generally are better. Some may lament the lack of change in the look and feel of iOS over the years, but I consider it a plus that it works pretty much the same as it did way back in 2007. Pick it up, turn it on, touch the app to open.
Android tends to present more complexity—more burrowing down menus to get to the setting you need, multiple home screens, and more variation among different phone model interfaces. If you value an easy to use and good smartphone for basic use, an iPhone is the obvious choice.
4. Better app selection
Another reason iPhones are better than Android phones is their high-quality apps. As someone who has jumped back and forth between iOS and Android, I’ve been consistently blown away by the quality of apps built by iOS developers, and mostly disappointed in their Android counterparts.
Don’t get me wrong — there’s great software and developers on Android, but they’re harder to find, in my experience. Apps and games often come to iOS first and are of higher quality, because app developers tend to make more money there; and iOS has a larger selection of “pro” apps for creating and editing images, video, and audio. These apps are also usually optimized for both the iPhone and the iPad’s larger screen; many Android tablet apps look like blown-up versions of phone apps.
5. Superior Ecosystem
I know that Apple’s streamlined ecosystem is designed to compel its users to buy a whole slew of products, and those products… they’re pretty expensive. But hey, if you love Apple and you need a phone or a tablet anyway, why the heck not?
The beauty of having all Apple devices is that the manufacturer had made it so that they all communicate with one another, and you don’t really have to lift a finger to make them do that (apart from following some prompts that gives permission during a device setup).
Apple has designed a multitude of continuity features that allow you to carry over work and data from one of its devices to another, and these features can certainly save you time. Take Handoff, for example, where calls on your iPhone and web pages in Safari can move seamlessly between iOS and macOS. Universal Clipboard allows you to copy paste text, files, images, and videos between your devices. You can, for example, copy a particularly salacious bit of gossip your friend just texted you on your iPhone then paste that text in an email to another friend on your iMac. Another one of our favorites is Continuity Camera, which allows you to use your iPhone as your Mac’s webcam.
Another great feature is AirDrop, which lets you easily transfer photos and videos over Wi-Fi from your iPhone to a MacBook, and thanks to iCloud keeping everything in sync, you also have easy access on your Mac to the photos you take on your iPhone, as well as any notes or documents you create.
You can also take calls you get on your iPhone through your iPad or Mac and see all your iMessage texts on all your devices.
This seamless switching between Apple devices is a key reason why iPhones are better than Android phones. Only a handful of Android phone makers have hardware ecosystems that approach Apple’s, and even for some that come close, like Samsung, you won’t get the depth of integration possible between the iPhone and other Apple-built devices. Microsoft is helping Google close the gap somewhat with its new Your Phone app for Windows, which allows Android users to respond to texts and notifications on their PCs, though the experience is a little clunky and there is still work to be done.
There are many other great examples of continuity across iOS, iPadOS, watchOS and macOS — and the iPhone is a critical component in that puzzle, especially now that iPhone apps can be seamlessly ported to macOS. Power users already immersed in Apple’s ecosystem can stand to gain a lot by adding an iPhone to their repertoire. And that’s to say nothing of friends and family members who prefer to use iMessage and FaceTime to keep in touch.
6. Reliable customer support
If you’re having a hardware or software problem—or if your device is two or three years old and it’s time to replace its battery with a fresh one—getting help is easy. The company offers a dedicated support app and website with a variety of remote options, or you can reserve an in-person appointment at any Apple Store.
Owners of Android phones don’t necessarily enjoy that luxury. If you need a new battery or a screen replacement and you didn’t purchase a protection plan from the retailer you bought it from, you’ll probably have to ship it back to the manufacturer. That’s quite a time-consuming hassle, given how much we all depend on our phones day in and day out. Some reputable repair shops like uBreakiFix help bridge the gap a bit, like for Pixel phones.
7. There’s no bloatware
No matter how you buy your iPhone, where you buy it from or what iPhone you buy, you won’t see any bloatware preinstalled when you boot it up for the first time. That means it’s clean from the very start, with no power- or data-siphoning apps you didn’t ask for sabotaging things behind the scenes.
Android phones are often preloaded with a ton of bloatware — particularly one that you’ve bought through a carrier. Even spending $1,800 on a Galaxy Z Fold 5 doesn’t spare AT&T customers from the affront of seeing software like CNN and DirecTV Now cluttering their app drawers. And it can be even worse if you buy a budget handset that has been heavily subsidized by a discount carrier.
Android buyers who purchase one of the best unlocked phones without a service agreement will have better luck avoiding bloatware. It also depends on the company. For example, unlocked Pixel phones aren’t mired down by any third-party apps; on the other hand, it’s not totally unheard of for some unlocked handsets to come with the odd unwelcome sponsored software (or ads). OnePlus is a recent example of this, and Samsung’s ads on its smartphones have become notoriously annoying. You can always remove that bloatware, but the fact that it’s there in the first place leaves a bitter taste in my mouth.
8. Resale value
Affordability is not precisely one of the things iPhone does better than Android, but Apple has a market advantage over most of its mobile competitors. A used iPhone holds its value so much better than other high-end smartphones that you might want to think twice about buying anything else. I hate saying that, but it’s true. Thanks to the latest SellCell Tech Depreciation report, we now have data to back up anecdotal evidence.
Keeping an eye on minute-by-minute trade-in values, the report claims that Apple products are the best at keeping their value. The company’s best performer — the iPhone 13 Pro Max — was originally released in September 2021, but had lost just 44.6 per cent of its trade-in value by December 2022.
That sounds like a lot, until you see what happened with the competition. Samsung Galaxy S22 family, released five months later than the iPhone 13, had lost between 58.9 per cent and 63.3 per cent of its value by the same point, while Google’s Pixel 6 had lost 67.4 per cent for the regular model and 72.5 per cent for the Pro version.
Taking into account phones dating back to 2015, SellCell found iPhones lost an average of 68.8 per cent, Samsung Galaxy S handsets 84.2 per cent, and Google Pixel phones 89.5 per cent. For phones from LG, Motorola and OnePlus, the data doesn’t go back as far but, for reference, they lost 93.3 per cent, 92.3 per cent, and 82.3 per cent respectively.
Let’s take the two-year-old Google Pixel 6 phone, which I own. Used Pixel 6 devices with wear and tear are selling for an average of $185 each on B-Stock, which buys and resells used smartphones in bulk.
The average is $410 on B-Stock for used two-year-old iPhone 13 devices in similar condition.
That means a two-year-old used iPhone is still worth about half its original $799 price. A similar age Pixel device is only worth 30 percent of its original $599 price.
It’s not just the Pixel. A used iPhone 12 from 2020 is worth 35 percent of its original price, according to B-Stock, while a high-end Samsung Galaxy S20 released the same year is only selling for 15 percent of its original price.
I found that if I wanted to sell a used phone on a site like Gazelle or Swappa, an iPhone 13 was worth up to $300 more than a similar Pixel. The resale price difference was roughly the same for a comparable used Samsung Galaxy phone.
9. Fast software updates for many years
iPhones are also far better for software updates. Apple generally supports new iPhones and iPads with iOS updates for five to six years after their release date. You get new features and apps, support for new image and video formats and security protocols, and patches for both online security threats and flaws that could allow people to get data from your phone. The oldest supported devices may not support every single feature of the latest software, but they continue to get most of the functional improvements and all of the security updates for as long as the hardware will last.
What’s more, when a new iOS version is released, it is available to everyone on the same day, at the same time, and can be installed on all models that support it instantaneously. By contrast, Android releases are rolled out in waves to individual phones, not just by model. Among Android phones, only Google’s Pixel phones and phones in the Android One program are guaranteed prompt updates—The actual timeframe of updates varies on your phone’s manufacturer. At the time of writing, Google promises Android updates for its Pixel phones for at least three years. For flagship Samsung Galaxy phones, the software update guarantee is for four years.
Let’s take the last iOS release, iOS 17, as an example.
The oldest devices supported are the iPhone XR, iPhone XS, and iPhone XS Max. These phones were released in 2018, the year of the Samsung Galaxy Note 9.
That Samsung phone is one of the best-supported Androids of the year, but it dropped off Samsung’s official support list in 2022.
For five-year-old phones to be getting (mostly) the same software features as the brand new iPhone 15 is something Apple can be proud of and that its users can be grateful for.
There’s another important time span to consider though, which is the one for security updates. These updates continue to be issued for older phones even after major software updates have finished, so important vulnerabilities can be patched and phones can be kept safe even if they’re no longer getting new and improved features.
For Google and Samsung, security updates are provided for five years. Apple doesn’t have a fixed approach. For example, the iPhone 5s is almost a decade old, but it got a security update in January 2023.
10. There’s a bigger selection of accessories
Walk into any Best Buy or Target, and you’ll find aisles of cases for every iPhone that Apple makes — something that certainly cannot be said for the Android contingent outside of flagship devices from the biggest companies. Once you get past the semi-healthy selection of products made for the latest Galaxy S device, you’re out of luck. Don’t bother expecting a choice of accessories for your new Pixel or Motorola handset at any brick-and-mortar retailer. Sure, you could go online and snag a $4 case off of Amazon, but then you’re guaranteed to get what you pay for.
The selection and availability of iPhone cases, screen protectors, car mounts and other goodies is simply far greater than you’ll find for any Android phone out there, and that’s more important than most people realize. iPhone owners will never have the problem of not finding a case to their liking.
Conclusion
I’m not here to give Apple iPhones a hard sell and convince you to make the switch – though I did, welcome! – but we have to accept there are certain things that the iPhone does better than Android, which makes it a better choice for those who need that will help streamline and simplify their daily workflow. If you’re one such user and still on Android, I truly think you should give iPhone a chance.
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