Sorry Apple, I didn’t miss my iPhone at all this year

Opinion: Historically, I would probably describe myself as an avid iPhone user. I’ve bought or reviewed every iPhone generation since the iPhone 3G’s doldrums, and I’ve owned various combinations of iPads, Apple Watches, AirPods, and Macs over the years.

However, since taking on the role of Action Editor at Trusted Reviews, I’ve found myself using more and more Android smartphone.

This is not surprising. Apple may launch about four iPhone models a year, but that pales in comparison to the decline in Android smartphones over the same period.

Therefore, I spend more time using flagship Android smartphones. While I always initially switched back to an iPhone after completing an Android phone review, that urge waned over time—so much so that even with a high-end phone iPhone 16 Pro Max I switched back to Android at the end of the year shortly after the review went live and haven’t looked back, but why?

To me, I think it’s the combination of Android hardware that has steadily improved over the past few years that rivals or even surpasses the hardware on an equivalent iPhone, but also has an increased number of bugs and issues. to the problem.

Android smartphone hardware is impressive

Let’s take a look at some of the great phones you get when it comes to Android. Whether you want a foldable candybar, a small phone, or a large phone, there’s something in the Android ecosystem that’s right for you.

Phones I find myself using regularly in 2024 include Motorola Razr 50 Ultra, Honor Magic 6 Pro, one plus 12, Honor Magic V3, Google Pixel 9 Pro XL, OPPO Find X8 Pro Of course, there are also absolutely wonderful Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultraall of which offer features not found on the iPhone.

Take Motorola Razr 50 Ultra and Honor Magic V3 as examples; clamshell and book-style foldable devices offer an impressive experience through bendable screens, which can shrink a 6.9-inch phone to fit in the palm of your hand, or go from a regular phone to Expands to tablet-like size.

This is an experience that simply does not exist in the Apple ecosystem. I increasingly like having a large 7.92-inch OLED screen to browse the web and chat, especially one like the Magic V3.

Then there are some great camera phones to consider; while Apple’s high-end iPhone 16 Pro Max excels at taking photos, it’s a huge step up from the Android competition thanks to partnerships with photography giants like Leica and Hasselblad. So it no longer has the same appeal it once did.

In my experience, phones like the GooglePixel 9 Pro When you start zooming in the lens.

In fact, I even chose to use the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra iPhone 15 Pro Photographing my engagement earlier this year.

Then there’s screen technology. Now, I’m not going to say that the iPhone 16 Pro Max doesn’t have an absolutely best-in-class screen, because that’s simply not true; it’s hands down one of the best screens on the market, with ultra-thin bezels and impressive HDR performance.

However, products like the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra offer an equally impressive screen experience, and in the case of Samsung’s flagship, it comes with a handy anti-reflective coating that makes the screen more visible in bright sunlight.

It also includes an S Pen, further enhancing the capabilities of the S24 Ultra’s large 6.9-inch screen, making it a truly attractive alternative to Apple’s high-end Super Retina XDR panels.

The gap between Apple’s own silicon and Android chipsets has also narrowed over the past 12 months, with phones such as the recently released Oppo Find X8 Pro matching or surpassing the A18 Pro in the iPhone 16 Pro Max in benchmark tests .

So at the flagship level, there’s little difference in the day-to-day experience between the two camps, with the Android rivals capable of handling the same high-end games as the latest iPhones.

Finally, there’s the charging speed; while it was rumored that Apple would eventually increase the charging speed to 45W on the iPhone 16 Pro Max, this never materialized, instead remaining the same as recent entries in Apple’s smartphone lineup, which is around 30W.

Readers, this is simply sluggish compared to the 100W charging offered by the OnePlus 12, which in my testing took the phone from dead to full in just 26 minutes.

Yet even with great hardware on the Android side, Apple’s ace in the hole is iOS — well, that wasn’t the case until recently, anyway.

The Dilemma of iOS 18 and Apple Intelligence

Generally speaking, you buy an iPhone not for the hardware, but for the hardware. You’re buying it for Apple’s iOS software.

Apple’s user-friendly approach to iOS has historically been a winner for the company, with many users deciding to stick with an iPhone between upgrades because the software on offer is familiar – and it runs well and plays well with other software. Apple products that iOS users may own.

However, I found iOS 18 For me, this was a more cumbersome experience than usual, even when it comes to fairly basic aspects of using an iPhone.

That manifests in several forms ranging from the slightly annoying, like widgets disappearing on my lock screen after unlocking my device, to the downright frustrating, like notification announcements permanently turning my music down until I completely disconnect my AirPods, turn off Bluetooth and restart my Spotify app.

Of course, there are always little bugs and issues with Apple’s software, but none stuck with me as much as the ones I found in iOS 18 when I reviewed the iPhone 16 series.

I also found that Apple’s major initiative in 2024, “Apple Intelligence,” is completely different from Apple in execution. Apple is known for taking longer to bring new features to the iPhone, but when it does, it usually does it better than most of its competitors, but in my experience, that’s certainly not the case with Apple Intelligence.

In my review of Apple’s notification summarization technology, I’ve already spoken glowingly about how inaccurate Apple’s notification summarization technology is. iphone 16and recent headlines Misrepresenting BBC News Notices It may still be fresh in the memory of many, but it means so much more than that.

Other elements fall short; Apple’s transcription technology is far less accurate than the Pixel 9 Pro XL’s, and despite upgraded Siri intelligence, it’s still not as capable as the Gemini for general queries.

I said it in my iPhone 16 review and I’ll say it again here; if you’re buying an iPhone 16, make sure it’s not for Apple Intelligence.

There are some things that only Apple can do

Don’t get me wrong, there are elements of the iPhone experience that are unparalleled in the Android space.

What impressed me most was the iPhone’s ability to shoot videos. For whatever reason, Apple has always latched on to elements like OIS, which gives video a Hollywood-like floating flair, which makes Android alternatives seem a bit clunky by comparison, and it’s rare to find anything like the iPhone in Things like the smooth zoom functionality that the Android side offers.

However, it’s not just limited to capturing great video; iOS works very well with other Apple products, and I don’t want to say “it just works,” either. Your AirPods will intelligently switch between iPhone and iPad depending on the device you’re using. Or something as simple as clearing notifications. iPhone and make it disappear on other Apple devices.

And then there are the smaller elements of the iOS experience, like you don’t have to bother with background app optimization to make sure your apps run properly, all iPhone models get timely software updates on the same day, and you can even easily customize the lock screen . There’s a lot to love about iOS.

For me, however, the appeal of phones like the Oppo Find X8 Pro and Honor Magic V3 is hard to ignore, and if Android makers keep up their current pace, it might even tempt die-hard iPhone fans to switch. We’ll just have to wait and see what happens in 2025.