Apple’s new iPhones eliminate most reasons to buy an Android device?

Pure Android from the beginning

I have been thinking a lot along the lines of this post from Benedict Evans regarding iOS 8 and Apple’s new iPhones.

I’ve been on Android since day 1, almost literally. At Google’s 2009 I/O conference they had their first hardware giveaway, a HTC device (later sold as the HTC Magic) running a pure version of Android. It was immediately evident that previous Windows Mobile and Blackberry devices were obsolete. It’s been all Nexus since. The Nexus One, Galaxy Nexus, Nexus 4 and Nexus 5. My Android experience has been excellent as well as atypical. I have always had the most up to date version of Android and never had to mess with skins or bloatware. Personally I would never buy an Android device not running a clean install of the operating system which puts me in a very small minority. I've never had any doubt iPhones were amazing but my Android experience has been amazing as well.

I don’t know what my next device will be, but I will be considering iOS for the first time. There are a few key reasons why.

Extensibility in iOS 8

I think this is the most important new feature of iOS 8. Extensibility is the ability of applications to interact with one another as well as the iOS system itself. Google Voice / Hangouts could have more access to the dialer for example. Gmail could integrate more closely with Drive and Calendar. Dropbox could become a resource to any other application. The potential of this new functionality is limitless.

In the beginning iOS and Android fell into two extremes when it came to ‘extensibility’. Android essentially allowed any other application to do anything - sometimes this was good, sometimes bad. iOS took the opposite approach. With few exceptions, applications were essentially locked inside their own little area. They did not typically have access to iOS system application resources or other applications.

Today we see both Android and iOS moving away from these extremes and towards a common middle ground. Google continues to lock down Android and now Apple is opening up the iOS system. I think these moves are great for the overall quality of the user experience.

A lack of extensibility was the primary reason I never considered iOS.

Screen size

Every iPhone owner I’ve ever asked says they don’t want a larger screen. They are all wrong. My Nexus 5 has a 4.95 inch display and it’s pretty perfect. Easily my favorite device I’ve ever had. The iPhone hardware is amazing, always has been really, and the display terrific as well. That being said, there’s no benefit of the smaller display. Once the iPhone 6 becomes mainstream, the crowd reminiscing about the good old days of smaller displays is going to be very, very, very small. When it comes to displays in your living room or in your pocket, bigger is usually better at least to a point. The iPhone 6 Plus (terrible name) will certainly be too large for many people’s taste. The 4.7” display of the iPhone 6 isn’t too large - it’s just not. People will never look back.

The Nexus 5, and previous devices, ruined the 4” screen size for me. Regardless of how much I liked iOS and Apple's hardware, I would not have bought a device with a 4” display.

Google Integration

This really goes hand-in-hand with extensibility but is worth considering separately given the importance, and popularity, of Google’s mobile apps. I am personally and professionally heavily invested in Google’s services. I depend on them to do my job and make a living.

Over the last 12-18 months we’ve seen Google’s iOS development team really come into its own. In the past it was not uncommon for Android’s functionality to be several months ahead of iOS. Android’s ‘extensibility’ was wide open. Gmail offered a more integrated experience. Google Voice could control all outbound and inbound calling from the system’s dialer - Voice wasn’t a stand alone application that could handle calling, it was THE app handling all calling, texting, voicemail, etc.

Today it’s not uncommon for iOS to receive new functionality first. While Android still leads the way most of the time, the lag for iOS may be days or weeks rather than months. To 99.99999% of people, this difference is now imperceivable. I work with Google’s applications and mobile devices every day. I would have a very hard time coming up with much of a list of areas where Android offers more functionality than iOS across Google’s services.

The Verdict

At this point, I’m not sure. I'll wait to see what Google has in store this fall when we typically see new Nexus hardware. But this is the first time I’ll actually have a decision to make.