The 4 biggest ways Android beats the iPhone

This article is for those of you who may be Android-curious. It is not a post about Android being better than iOS! If you like Apple stuff, stick with it. I’m just a tech blogger.

We here in the Aamoth household have a pretty even mix of Android and iOS devices. I use an Android phone, but also love my iPad. Meanwhile, my wife runs fully Apple—Mac, iPhone, Watch—and is happy as can be. We have a second Apple Watch for our son.

The Apple way and the Android way both have their pros and cons. If you’re looking for some of the pro-iest pros on the Android side, however, here are some things to consider.

1. Hardware selection

When you’re shopping for a new phone, your iPhone options come down to a handful of big rectangles and medium-size rectangles, plus a small rectangle in the form of the aging iPhone SE.

With Android, you’ve got rectangles of every size, feature set, and price point imaginable. You’ve also got a nice selection of foldables that flip down into squares or flip out into tablets.

You’ve also got unique takes on the modern handset, such as the Light Phone, which features an e-ink screen and a minimal set of features to discourage distraction.

In short: With Android, you can find a phone that closely matches your personality. Which brings us to . . .

Customizing your iPhone has slowly improved over time, but it’s still light years behind Android’s customization features.

You’ve got a ton of choice when it comes to apps too. Looking for your favorite web browser? The Android version is always more capable than the iOS version (here’s why). You can also easily side-load older, more stable versions of apps that aren’t available in Google Play. On iOS, it’s the current version in the App Store or nothing.

Hear me out, here. Android is easier to use than iOS. And what’s not easy can generally be modified so it’s easier.

Don’t like gestures? You can add on-screen buttons to the Android interface. Want to use your Android more like a computer? Or transfer files to a computer? It’s got seamless file management features.

On Android, you can also keep your most-often-used apps on the desktop and access the rest with a simple swipe. And drill into an app’s settings directly from the app itself instead of navigating Apple’s sprawling, cumbersome Settings app.

Love ‘em or hate ‘em, notifications are a way of life for a smartphone owner.

Android notifications are helpfully grouped, sorted, and consistent in the Notification Shade by default, which is always accessible with a quick swipe from the top of the screen downward.

They’re also easier to customize, whether it’s silencing them, assigning custom sounds to them, or deciding how prominent you’d like them to be.

Apple has put some decent work into making iOS notifications more intuitive, but living with Android notifications is simply a lot less overwhelming.

This article is for those of you who may be Android-curious. It is not a post about Android being better than iOS! If you like Apple stuff, stick with it. I’m just a tech blogger.

We here in the Aamoth household have a pretty even mix of Android and iOS devices. I use an Android phone, but also love my iPad. Meanwhile, my wife runs fully Apple—Mac, iPhone, Watch—and is happy as can be. We have a second Apple Watch for our son.

The Apple way and the Android way both have their pros and cons. If you’re looking for some of the pro-iest pros on the Android side, however, here are some things to consider.

1. Hardware selection

When you’re shopping for a new phone, your iPhone options come down to a handful of big rectangles and medium-size rectangles, plus a small rectangle in the form of the aging iPhone SE.

With Android, you’ve got rectangles of every size, feature set, and price point imaginable. You’ve also got a nice selection of foldables that flip down into squares or flip out into tablets.

You’ve also got unique takes on the modern handset, such as the Light Phone, which features an e-ink screen and a minimal set of features to discourage distraction.

In short: With Android, you can find a phone that closely matches your personality. Which brings us to . . .

Customizing your iPhone has slowly improved over time, but it’s still light years behind Android’s customization features.

You’ve got a ton of choice when it comes to apps too. Looking for your favorite web browser? The Android version is always more capable than the iOS version (here’s why). You can also easily side-load older, more stable versions of apps that aren’t available in Google Play. On iOS, it’s the current version in the App Store or nothing.

Hear me out, here. Android is easier to use than iOS. And what’s not easy can generally be modified so it’s easier.

Don’t like gestures? You can add on-screen buttons to the Android interface. Want to use your Android more like a computer? Or transfer files to a computer? It’s got seamless file management features.

On Android, you can also keep your most-often-used apps on the desktop and access the rest with a simple swipe. And drill into an app’s settings directly from the app itself instead of navigating Apple’s sprawling, cumbersome Settings app.

Love ‘em or hate ‘em, notifications are a way of life for a smartphone owner.

Android notifications are helpfully grouped, sorted, and consistent in the Notification Shade by default, which is always accessible with a quick swipe from the top of the screen downward.

They’re also easier to customize, whether it’s silencing them, assigning custom sounds to them, or deciding how prominent you’d like them to be.

Apple has put some decent work into making iOS notifications more intuitive, but living with Android notifications is simply a lot less overwhelming.