Among hardcore fans of wither major mobile platform, it seems insane that someone might switch from Android to iOS or vice versa. To these “fanboys,” their platform of choice is leaps and bounds better than the alternative and they simply cannot understand why anyone would choose not to have access to all the amazing features their favorite mobile OS provides. Diehard Apple fans can’t imagine using Android phones that are overcomplicated and riddled with malware. Diehard Android fans can’t imagine using an iPhone that is far too basic and closed, so users have no choice but to play by Apple’s rules. There’s nothing wrong with either of those stances, of course, but they always seem to feel the need to convince everyone else that their opinion is the only opinion. It’s like watching liberals and conservatives argue over politics. It’s also just as likely to induce nausea among in the more even-keeled among us.
Indeed, for the rest of us it’s a different story. Our needs change, our wants change, and we use whichever platform might suit us best. Perhaps we decide to switch from Windows to Mac, for example, and ditching a Samsung smartphone for the iPhone seems like a good idea so we can take advantage of Continuity. And then there are people who simply buy whichever new phone they can get a good deal on when it comes time to upgrade, be it an iPhone or an Android device. Switching between platforms is still an adjustment though, and there are inevitably features from your old phone that a person will miss having on his or her new phone when switching from one platform to another.
Stories shared by people who switch from one mobile platform to another are often quite interesting to read. In fact, they’re on the opposite end of the spectrum as the whiny diatribes we see from fanboys who write about why they would never switch. Some people are curious to learn about the benefits another platform might have over their own, and they also want to know about a rival platform’s shortcomings.
Every so often, civil conversations pop up on Reddit that are interesting to see, whether or not you’re actually considering making a switch from one platform to another. One such thread popped up on Sunday in the iPhone subreddit, which is often home to discussions that are far more civil than the ones that take place in the larger Apple subreddit.
This particular thread is titled “iPhone users who’ve used android devices before, what feature did you miss the most and did you regret switching to iOS?” It was posted by a Reddit user who is considering making the switch from the Samsung Galaxy S7 edge to an iPhone 8, and he or she was genuinely curious to hear about the experiences people have had when they made the switch from iPhone to Android. After all, learning about the things other people miss after having switched is a great way to prepare oneself and eliminate some surprises.
The iPhone subreddit isn’t anywhere near as big as the Apple subreddit, but plenty of people responded to the user’s question. At the time of this writing, there were nearly 150 comments in the thread. The conversations within the thread remained civil as people discussed the key features from Android that they missed when they switched over to the iPhone.
As you might expect, the top-voted and most frequently mentioned feature is the Android notification system. People continue to complain about Apple’s notifications on iOS devices, mainly because Apple’s notifications on iOS devices are awful. With iOS 12 set to be unveiled on Monday during Apple’s big WWDC 2018 keynote, we may finally see Apple take some steps to fix this issue.
An interesting thing multiple switchers miss from Android is a feature that counts down to when an alarm goes off. This is great because if you wake up early for example, you can easily dismiss your wake-up alarm(s) instead of having to stop them once they go off anyway, as is the case on the iPhone. Many users also want home screen widgets on the iPhone, and they wish swipe style typing was available on the native iOS keyboard. Third-party keyboards offer swipe text input, but iOS’s third-party keyboard support is horrible so many people steer clear of installing new keyboards.
Read through the full Reddit thread to see what else people miss from Android when they switched to the iPhone.
