Well it's been over a year now since i switched from using an iPhone as my primary mobile device
to using an android device specifically the Pixel 4 xl and in this video i'm going to walk
you through one why i switched to what i like about android better than iOS 3 what are some
things i miss about using iOS and then i'm going to take you through why someone may want to switch
between phone os's how easy is it to switch in between android and iOS and then i'll walk you
through my decision making process on whether or not i'm going to stick with android or if i'm
going to switch back to iOS let's dive in so why did i originally switch to a Pixel 4 xl last year
and move from my iPhone a couple of reasons one as part of the team Pixel influencer program i get
the latest Pixels from google and i was curious to see what using one as my main phone would be like
two i was tired of the same basic user interface of the iPhone that hadn't changed all that much
over the years it was just a grid of apps you had multiple pages that you had to scroll through or
just folders everywhere and i was just tired of it i wanted something that felt new and fresh and
android offers that to a certain extent finally i wanted to use a phone that had the google
assistant as the default assistant i predominantly use google services because i find them incredibly
useful they're great and they work directly with the google assistant that integration is just
tighter than what you get with Siri and at the time that i switched the google assistant could
play music and media from Spotify and youtube music which even today Siri can't do you have
to add the phrase on Spotify or on youtube music when asking Siri to play music from those services
so when i finally got the Pixel 4 xl last year it had enough of the experience i wanted where i was
like okay i'm gonna finally do it i'm switching to an android device so what do i really love
about android well first part of it is it's just a bit different from iOS in its user experience
when you've been using the same software year after year sometimes you just want a change you
want to make it feel fresh that's at least how i felt towards android when i switched i find
the notification system in android is better it's easier to quickly swipe away notifications
they're automatically sorted into conversations your regular notifications and then silent
notifications which i think is really smart also being able to set certain contacts through apps
like messenger messages etc as a priority contact so they show up at the top and you definitely
get notified anytime they message you is really smart the google assistant is faster on the Pixel
specifically and does a lot of the processing for your requests on the device itself which allows
google to implement some pretty awesome features like call screen where the assistant will screen
incoming calls from unknown numbers or it'll wait on hold for you when you call customer support for
a company and will notify you when the customer support person is there the call screen feature
basically eliminated all spam calls from ringing my phone which was a huge benefit another thing i
love about android is its integration with google cast devices like google nest speakers and speaker
groups at the os level like when you cast from google podcasts to a google nest speaker group
and then no matter where you are in the phone's ui if you hit either the volume up or down button
it'll control the volume of the speaker group you're casting to i use my google speakers to play
music and podcasts constantly especially during the pandemic so this feature has been really nice
to have android still has better customizable options on their home screen you're not forced
to have an app at the top left corner like you are on iOS which i appreciate android also has an app
drawer which i found to be a much better UX design decision than forcing everybody to just have pages
of grids of apps or force you to put apps into a ton of folders now iOS 14 has significantly closed
the gap in terms of home screen customization with the new app library feature widgets and the
ability to have a clean home screen even some of google's own widgets are nicer on iOS than
they are on android so there's definitely less of a difference between their two than there used to
be a couple of other things i really like about android are those little app icons that appear
at the top left corner of the screen letting you know that you have a notification from that app
in general i do like that android is a more open os i'm able to customize it more and i
can freely download things outside of the play store if i wish to though in reality i do have
to admit i basically downloaded everything i have on my android phone through the play store
which is owned by google so in reality i've just used my android phone exactly how i would use an
iPhone where i would download everything just through the app store which apple owns smart
lock is a feature that i've really come to love on android it allows you to keep your phone unlocked
when it's connected to a certain bluetooth device when android detects it's still on you or
when you're at a certain location like your house lastly gestures are really nice in android though
technically they're borrowed from iOS but i found them to work well and i much prefer them over the
previous standard android buttons now speaking of iOS let's talk about what i do miss about using an
iPhone considering i still have quite a few apple devices around that i use like my iMac
my new iPad Air my apple watch there are some things i definitely miss about using an iPhone
the first one is airdrop there's just not a great comparison on android that's as easy
to use as airdrop to move files wirelessly between my phone and mac handoff is another feature i miss
with the iPhone being able to have a certain app open and then pick up where i left off
on it on my mac was nice though with android i've adapted to just using mostly google's apps which
have real-time cloud backup so i don't miss this feature as much as i thought i would plus android
and chrome sync so you can read an article on your phone and pick up where you left off in the
chrome browser on your mac though i still think handoff is a bit easier to use and more polished
video recording is something that iOS and the iPhone do really well and pretty much better than
almost any other android device i've either seen or used especially the Pixel and as somebody who's
very invested in video i don't always have my fancy Sony camera that's recording me right now
everywhere with me all the time when i want to shoot video but i usually always have my phone
with me so that's definitely been something i've missed about the iPhone i have missed its video
recording capabilities last thing i miss about iOS in general are for some apps their iOS versions
are still nicer to use and designed better than on android still it shouldn't be that way and
thankfully most of the time i didn't notice that much of a difference but sometimes the
difference is still there alright so that's what i like about android and what i miss about iOS now
you're probably wondering with phones like the Pixel 5 the iPhone 12 the iPhone 12 pro and 12
pro max coming out this year if i'm going to stick with android or if i'm going to switch back to iOS
and i'm wondering the same thing myself i have not made any decisions on that yet but
i have a hunch it's going to come down to the camera capabilities
of either the iPhone or the Pixel let me explain when the iPhone was first announced back in 2007
Steve Jobs infamous keynote introduced the iPhone as a wide screen ipod with touch controls
a revolutionary mobile phone and a breakthrough internet communications device the iPhone did turn
out to be that leapfrog product Steve Jobs wanted it to be and arguably one of the most important
tech products ever released today though 13 years after the launch of iPhone how would you describe
what a smartphone does and should be in 2020 for me it should be a great communications device
internet browser music and media player and a capable still photography and video camera
now that last category has become increasingly important these past few years to a lot of people
out there and that's why phones like the Pixel and the iPhone's cameras in terms of still photography
are so highly regarded with the latest releases of android 11 and iOS 14 i think it's become obvious
that both operating systems have reached a consistent level of maturity and stability
less and less is changing with them each year and both operating systems in my opinion are
now more similar than they've ever been when looking at their ui and ux experience
to me minus a few edge cases like with assistant call screening or imessage both operating systems
represent pretty equivalent experiences when it comes to making a phone a communications device
internet browser and music slash media player however the still and video capturing capabilities
of each operating system are dependent on their software but also heavily rely on the camera
hardware as well since i live and breathe cameras and video that's likely going to be the deciding
factor in which phone i go with this year plus the ability to have an accessory ecosystem that
just effortlessly integrates with the phone that i choose now when i originally switched to android
i did miss getting calls and notifications on my apple watch and i wanted something like AirPods
that were just easy to pair with my android phone and just worked really well but over the course of
the past year i've been able to get a relatively comparable experience with my Pixel Buds which i
love and the Fitbit sense smart watch i picked up about a month ago so the camera capabilities are
going to be my deciding factor for which platform and phone i decide to go with this year now if you
don't care all that much about taking photos or videos with your smartphone the equation for what
platform and what device you go with is going to look incredibly different from mine now are there
other scenarios that we should cover here as well yes if you're a serious mobile gamer you're likely
going to skew towards iOS because of apple's superior hardware and games ecosystem or if
you really like to tinker with technology and you want to phone in a crazy variety of form factors
like folding flip phones or whatever the heck lg is doing android will likely be your platform
of choice now if you're like me and you like both operating systems for different reasons and you're
gonna happen to have multiple devices around that use either os or if you just plan on switching
from iOS to android or android to iOS and you want to know how easy it is to actually switch
in between these two mobile operating systems well the good news is if you're switching apps and data
from major companies and services like google facebook Spotify, Evernote you know etc you're
going to be fine however some apps don't switch as nicely between operating systems like take
what's app for example which backs up to iCloud on iOS but on android it backs up to google drive so
switching between operating systems and trying to migrate your data backups over to another platform
is actually really difficult plus you can only have WhatsApp installed on a single device tied to
your phone number versus other facebook products like instagram messaging or facebook messages
which are backed up and stored to facebook's cloud and can be accessed on multiple devices at once
another issue i had when switching from iOS to android was merging iOS contacts with google
contacts i already had contacts in google contacts from other sources like gmail so
depending on how many contacts you have in iOS and how many of them already exist in google contacts
when you actually do that merge just be prepared to do some cleanup all right so after a year of
using android what are my thoughts well overall i've thought the experience of using android
has actually been pretty great i like android a lot more as an operating system than i thought i
would going in especially the Pixel version it's just a joy to use and it's much more like iOS
in its gestures and overall user experience than i would have thought now while this year video
capabilities are likely going to be the deciding factor in what phone i decide to pick up and use
as my primary phone the lucky thing for me is because i review so many tech products and i
like using both of these operating systems i'll have devices around that i'll heavily use that use
both android and iOS so it's really for me at least like i don't actually have to make
a tough choice between them i can use both of them it's like a best of both worlds thing now
obviously that's not going to be the case for everyone but for me personally that will be my uh
case so well that's it for this video if you liked this video and found it informative and helpful
make sure you hit that thumbs up button below and subscribe to the channel to see more videos
on apple and google products like this one for six months later i'm Josh Teder, thanks for watching.