Android is a better operating system, or wait no, the iPhone’s better right? It's
the age old question: Which phone operating system is actually better? And now that Apple
and Google have wrapped up their developer conferences for the year
and shown to the world what's coming to iOS and Android later this year,
I think it's time to reevaluate which one of these platforms is actually better in 2022 and for whom.
So, if you were starting out from scratch today and needed to get a smartphone, what should you
consider? Well, the first thing you'd probably consider is cost, especially if you're price
conscious or you're in the lower price tier of the smartphone market. And you'd probably pick
an Android device historically because there are just many more cheaper Android phones out there.
But in recent years, Apple has actually been making iPhones available
and all different types of price tiers in the smartphone market. So
I don't think that advantage goes to Android as much as it has historically. And when a lot
of people have done this in the past, they've gone with an Android device because it has an
OLED screen or more RAM or expandable storage or some other hardware spec.
But in 2022, I don't think that's the right way to go about choosing a phone
operating system. Now, if you’re still hellbent on just considering specs alone,
Apple actually has a huge advantage here with one particular spec
and that’s their A-Series custom ARM SOCs, which stands for system-on-a-chip,
and these typically will outperform the competition from Android manufactures,
especially at the lower and mid-tier parts of the smartphone market. Plus, Apple will also give you
5 years of software updates with their phones, which most Android manufactures can’t match.
But if you go with iOS you are stuck with Apple as the only manufacturer of your phone whereas
with Android, you can easily switch between manufactures, which means there is a greater
variety of phones to choose from in different form factors. And Android is also a more open OS,
which will matter to some out there who want the ability to be able to download apps outside
of Google’s app store, which you can’t do on iOS, you’re locked into downloading everything through
Apple’s App store.
So those are some of the things I think people historically would consider when choosing between
Android and iOS. Now, as a user myself of both Android and iOS
in 2022, the biggest difference to me between these two phone OS's…it's
actually their ecosystems, meaning how well your phone, smartwatch, tablet, computer,
smart speakers, wireless earbuds, and other devices all work together.
Now I know that's going to cause an eye-roll for some of you out there
and others are going to just be like, oh my gosh, like you have talked about this
in every Apple video already and the difference in 2022 now though is,
Apple isn't the only company talking about ecosystems anymore. Google is too.
Google now has an entire website dedicated to the new features they announced for their
budding Android Ecosystem, and the company announced a slew of new Pixel devices
for Google’s own Pixel hardware ecosystem. So why are both companies now talking about
Ecosystems instead of just their phone operating systems In 2022?
My theory for this is it's because Android and iOS,
they're just not that different from each other anymore. And as you furiously type
a reaction to that statement in the comments below. Please do. Let me unpack that a bit.
Both iOS and Android have almost the exact same way to navigate around the OS,
both home screens have widgets that are customizable,
both have an app drawer or app library to view all of your apps,
and both have notification systems that work in similar ways, and even a lot of the apps nowadays
that you can download for each device, especially the major ones, work in exactly the same way.
Now there are of course still differences between iOS and Android, but I don’t think
they’re going to change the fundamentals of how you navigate around a phone, open apps,
check notifications, etc In 2022. I think it's much more likely that you're going to choose an
iPhone for example, because you can get AirPods and an Apple Watch to go with it
or because it'll make using your iPad or your Mac even better.
And that’s the power that these ecosystems can have your purchasing decision and why
Google now sees it as a necessity to catch up to Apple, and Samsung, in this space.
But specifically what features do you actually get when you have more devices
that can work really well with your phone? Well first, let's look at Apple.
With the Apple Ecosystem, your iPhone can work with an iPad, Apple Watch, Apple TV, Mac, AirPods,
AirTags, and HomePod Mini. The ecosystem features you can get include having messages automatically
appear on your other Apple devices. This makes syncing and being able to access my
text messages and iMessages on all of my Apple devices incredibly easy because the messages app
is installed by default on all of Apple's main products. Continuity, which makes it easy to
pick up where you left off in an app or a web page on your iPhone and bring it over to your iPad or
Mac. And Apple announced another new feature under the continuity umbrella called Continuity Camera.
This will allow you to use your iPhone as an external wireless webcam for your Mac.
Another great ecosystem feature is being able to make a phone call for my iPad, Apple Watch
or HomePod Mini as well as having the ability to hand off a call from one device to another.
New this year, Apple announced that you'll be able to do this with FaceTime calls as well
later this year. And this is actually a perfect illustration of something Apple's been doing
a lot more of recently which is instead of just developing for specific software
platforms like iOS or iPad OS, they're actually developing features for the entire Apple
Ecosystem which gives them a pretty big advantage over a lot of players.
And that level of integration gets you one of the most useful features on Apple's products to me
which is focus modes. This feature allows you to turn on Do Not Disturb on one Apple device
and have that applied to all of your Apple devices simultaneously. You can also create
and schedule various focus modes to align to your work schedule. Hide My Email is another
example of a beneficial feature not just to the iPhone, but to all of Apple's main products
When a company asks you for an email address, your Apple device will generate a randomized
email address that you can give a company or service and Apple will forward any emails the
company sends to the randomized address to your actual email address That way,
if there's ever a data leak, your actual email address won't be involved in that data leak.
And if you just don't want to have to give a company or organization your email address,
with Hide My Email, you no longer have to. Another area I've enjoyed with my iPhone
and the Apple Ecosystem is the ability to send and read messages through a HomePod Mini. This
is oddly an area where Google hasn't been able to figure out how to a similar feature, even though
like Apple, they make both phones and smart speakers.
And if you're curious about setting up or expanding your smart home, we've actually
done an entire how-to guide on how to build a smart home. So make sure you check that out,
and subscribe to the channel for more content on smart homes and smartphones.
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And you can also Airplay content from your iPhone to a Mac, Apple TV, or a smart TV that
supports Airplay. Plus Airplay 2 seems to be supported on more devices like Sonos and other
third-party speakers which makes grouping speakers together on the fly and controlling their volume
through Apple's AirPlay, controls on iOS, extremely simple. And if you use AirPods,
you can automatically switch your earbuds or headphones between Apple devices as you use them.
The last benefit I found with the Apple ecosystem and the iPhone is actually Apple's
weather app. It's just better than anything I've seen on Android and iOS 16’s weather app
ups the game. This year Apple has actually launched their own weather service which was built
in part with the acquisition of the Dark Sky weather app and service in early 2020.
Apple's weather app is beautifully designed and can now give you
up-to-the-minute precipitation forecasts, and Apple makes this information available
in more places throughout their ecosystem compared to Google,
like as a complication on the Apple Watch or a widget on the new iOS 16 lock screen. And for
the first time ever this year, Apple is bringing their weather app to the iPad and the Mac as well.
Now Google on the other hand is in a type of situation. They develop Android and let many
other manufacturers use Android as the operating system on their devices. But
historically Google has not been focused on making Android devices all work better together
in a similar way to what Apple has done.
Samsung is pretty much the only game in town for Android users who want a similar ecosystem to
Apple’s currently, and they’ved develope many of the same features I just mentioned
when talking about Apple’s Ecosystem for Samsung devices, which include computers,
tablets, earbuds, smartwatches, tvs, and more. But by the end of this year and in early 2023,
this is going to start to change as what Google announced at their
developers conference actually starts to come out, which in some respects
is really just Google catching up to where Apple and Samsung currently are.
Google announced a new Google Wallet which will act as a digital wallet for Android,
allowing you to keep things like vaccine cards, student IDs, State IDs, and keys to your car,
all within your Google Wallet, just like Apple has had with their Wallet app for the past few years.
Google also made a big deal about upgrading the Android tablet experience so its basic
navigation & app experience will be more on par to what Apple’s been doing with iPadOS for years.
For the Android Ecosystem, there’s a lot of catch up to Apple here as well.
You’ll be able to use your Android phone to control Google’s TV software,
control media from an Android Smart Watch, more devices will be getting Google Cast support,
new turn-by-turn navigation directions on Wear OS, Smart Lock, so you can use your Android phone
to unlock your Chromebook, Phone Hub, which allows you to manage your Android phone from
a built-in control center in your Chromebook, and you’ll be able to respond to text messages
on a Chromebook as well. Wi-Fi sync, which will automatically connect your Chromebook to
trusted Wi-Fi networks you’ve used already on your phone. Copy something on your phone
and paste it on your tablet with a universal clipboard-like feature. Google also announced
updates to their fast paring feature for easy setup and that they’ll be supporting
the new Matter smart home standard, just like Apple is, which rolls out later this year.
Lastly, Google announced new hardware coming to their own Pixel Ecosystem of
devices including the new Pixel Watch, Pixel Buds Pro, Pixel 7 and 7 Pro, and
the Pixel Tablet which comes out in early 2023. So that's what Google announced. But what about
Apple? Well, this year, Apple is deepening the relationship between its platforms and devices.
including lock screen personalization with widgets, which while not an
ecosystem feature specifically, its actually a fundamental re-think on how you’ll interact with
an iPhone going forward with Apple’s new lock screen widgets & live activity notifications,
which will lessen the need for you to open the phone just for glanceable
information like sports scores, weather report or flight status.
iMessage will also be getting some key new features across Apple devices
including the ability to edit messages, undo send, and mark imessage threads as unread.
The company also announced expansions to SharePlay, which allows you to watch
and listen to content with friends and family remotely in sync. New family sharing controls,
so if you impose screen time on your kids devices and they want to request more screen time,
it’s easy to accept or deny that request from within messages, and they announced a new feature
for photos which will automatically share photos to family and friends that you take when your
iPhone detects you took a photo of other people and their iPhones were in proximity of your own.
So taking a look back at everything coming this year, I think you can sum it up like this:
Google is playing catch up with Android in certain respects to where Apple’s ecosystem of devices has
been for years, in mid-2022 if you want to go with Android but have a similar ecosystem experience to
Apple’s, you’re better off going with Samsung, but towards the end of the year and early 2023,
Google looks like they might just catch up to Samsung with their own Pixel Device
Ecosystem of products & ecosystem features for Android as a whole.
And if you're on Android, let me know what excites you about, what Google's announced at I/O,
and their focus on the Android ecosystem, and have you been tempted into the Samsung ecosystem,
or maybe even you're tempted into going with Apple's ecosystem. And if you're an iPhone user,
let me know what Apple ecosystem benefits you're taking advantage of. Let me know down
the comments below and if you have any further questions about choosing between iOS and Android,
leave them in a comment as well. And while you're down there,
hit that thumbs up button if you liked this video and found it helpful. Subscribe to the channel
for more videos on platforms and smartphones like this one.
And if you're looking for what to watch next, check out some of our other smartphone review
videos, like our six months later review of the iPhone 13 Pro, Google Pixel 6 and Pixel 6 Pro
and the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 3. And you can get to all of those reviews
by clicking on the playlist to my left. For 6 Months Later, I'm Josh Teder, thanks for watching.