Some iOS apps are not as good as Android

wilky76 said:

As this being my first iPhone i always thought iOS had the best apps, but I've recently found out this is not the case with some of the apps i use.

Whatsapps for instants is just better on Android, it just seems to be set out better and for some reason better to use than on iOS, sending pictures is alot easier aswell, plus it always seem to get updated often aswell.

Satnav I have Co Pilot Premium on both Android & iOS it was the first app i bought for my iPhone, thinking it might actually be better on iOS than Android.... nope Android version wipes the floor with it & doesn't crash neither and seems more polished than the iOS version, voices also using VOX speak street names alot better than siri does.

Ebay app this aswell it just better on Android than iOS, it seems Ebay has put more effort into it for some reason over iOS.

Natwest banking app, this also is better on Android.

Then you've got the Google stuff, but that to be expected as they never gonna make their experience better on a rival OS than their own.

Maybe in time these will get updated to iOS 7 & improve more, but atm i get the feeling iOS is now playing second fiddle when it comes to apps & updates, where Android is getting priority.

So anybody else who has both iOS & Android agree with me on this or i am just being stupid lol.

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Abridged version...
eBay - nope. Better support, better UI (iOS 7) and reliable notifications.
Google apps - some yes, some no. Kinda sad that some are superior on iOS and not Android since their from Google TBH.
Whatsapp - never used it but heard it is better on Android.
The rest - never heard of them.

Has been awhile since I had Android and compared the two OS version apps, but at the time iHeartRadio was an app I used all the time and the ios version was much better than the Android version and had more stations. When searching for a station in a certain area the ios version always had mor stations. Contacted Devs and they had no explanation for this one glaring difference as they both polled the same DB but ios definitely always returned at least 5-10 stations more (and the stations were always local radio stations whereas the android app only returned Internet radio stations). It never was resolved during the times had android and for me was a glaring point that always bothered me. So yes I did notice differences and that is just one that has stuck with me since then, quite a few years ago so might be fixed now.

Some iOS apps are not as good as Android.

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With the number of apps out there this is bound to be true.

But IMO the statement "most Android apps are not as good as iOS," is also still true.

I've seen the opposite to be true, at least a while ago. Several apps coworkers had were very buggy and their Android phone had to be restarted in order for the to get notifications etc. Both have switched to iPhone now, so I don't know if it's still true.

Since many of us don't have android devices, some screen grab comparisons would be helpful.

any app can make it into the android market it seems..there may be a handful of better apps on android but no way...android doesn't offer one better twitter app than ios NOT 1..

I use both ios and android and it really just boils down to a per app basis. For example the Chase banking app is more full featured on iOS, android just got balance notifications where as iOS has had it for quite a while, and a bunch more to boot.

Although for the most part I've noticed that when devs take their time to code for android and not just port their apps over to android the droid apps tend to have more features i.e. sharing, etc because the os allows for more than what iOS allows.

I find Apple apps better in general but the widgets on Android are just too cool.
My favorite is the on-screen toggle switches

wilky76 said:

As this being my first iPhone i always thought iOS had the best apps, but I've recently found out this is not the case with some of the apps i use.

Whatsapps for instants is just better on Android, it just seems to be set out better and for some reason better to use than on iOS, sending pictures is alot easier aswell, plus it always seem to get updated often aswell.

Satnav I have Co Pilot Premium on both Android & iOS it was the first app i bought for my iPhone, thinking it might actually be better on iOS than Android.... nope Android version wipes the floor with it & doesn't crash neither and seems more polished than the iOS version, voices also using VOX speak street names alot better than siri does.

Ebay app this aswell it just better on Android than iOS, it seems Ebay has put more effort into it for some reason over iOS.

Natwest banking app, this also is better on Android.

Then you've got the Google stuff, but that to be expected as they never gonna make their experience better on a rival OS than their own.

Maybe in time these will get updated to iOS 7 & improve more, but atm i get the feeling iOS is now playing second fiddle when it comes to apps & updates, where Android is getting priority.

So anybody else who has both iOS & Android agree with me on this or i am just being stupid lol.

Click to expand...

The reason why Android Apps get updated more frequently is because the developer has to fix bugs that show up on the 100 other android phones he doesn't own when he wrote the app.

Btw ... Google Maps first was updated on iOS and stayed that way for many months before the Android version came out recently ... and yes Google Exec publicly acknowledged it in an interview that iOS native coding allowed them to get it done quicker and cleaner ... and Android one took time ...

I have both though, so dont bash

It depends on app .... I could say the contrary for a number of other apps.
I think there is much more trashware in Google Play Store than in App Store.

I only agree with WhatsApp...

wilky76 said:

As this being my first iPhone i always thought iOS had the best apps, but I've recently found out this is not the case with some of the apps i use.

Whatsapps for instants is just better on Android, it just seems to be set out better and for some reason better to use than on iOS, sending pictures is alot easier aswell, plus it always seem to get updated often aswell.

Click to expand...

The picture sending is more of an issue with iOS than it is with WhatsApp. Apple does not allow much in the way of data sharing between apps in iOS. When I was trying to teach my mother-in-law how to send a picture I could not figure it out.

On Android, you can go to your gallery, select the picture and then select the <Share> icon/command. It will then come up with a list of apps where you can share the image to. You select WhatsApp and it will go to the screen where you can select your contact/group and you sent your picture.

On iOS, when you try to share a photo from the gallery, will not see WhatsApp on the list of apps you can share to. You are limited to a few like the default email app that comes with iOS or Facebook because they decided to integrate FB with iOS somewhat. In order to send a picture with WhatsApp in iOS, you have to go to WhatsApp and from there, attach an image. In Android, you can do this both ways, but in iOS, you can only do it from WhatsApp and not starting from the photo gallery app.

Other than the sharing of photos, I haven't noticed too much difference between WhatsApp on both platforms.

Stuntman06 said:

The picture sending is more of an issue with iOS than it is with WhatsApp. Apple does not allow much in the way of data sharing between apps in iOS. When I was trying to teach my mother-in-law how to send a picture I could not figure it out.

On Android, you can go to your gallery, select the picture and then select the <Share> icon/command. It will then come up with a list of apps where you can share the image to. You select WhatsApp and it will go to the screen where you can select your contact/group and you sent your picture.

On iOS, when you try to share a photo from the gallery, will not see WhatsApp on the list of apps you can share to. You are limited to a few like the default email app that comes with iOS or Facebook because they decided to integrate FB with iOS somewhat. In order to send a picture with WhatsApp in iOS, you have to go to WhatsApp and from there, attach an image. In Android, you can do this both ways, but in iOS, you can only do it from WhatsApp and not starting from the photo gallery app.

Other than the sharing of photos, I haven't noticed too much difference between WhatsApp on both platforms.

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Are you sure that's an iOS problem? One of the apps that show up when I try to share a photo is Flickr, and I know that didn't come with my phone.

Generally apps that I find better on Android is because iOS restriction water them down on iOS.

However I agree some are better. DI Radio is just more reliable for me on any Android device then it is on an iPhone or iPad.

By in large I personally prefer iOS apps though.

Tiptizzle said:

Are you sure that's an iOS problem? One of the apps that show up when I try to share a photo is Flickr, and I know that didn't come with my phone.

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My understanding is that Apple does tend to lock down iOS to a certain extent. Apple has to decide if they want an app sharing a certain way and if so, they will allow it. A few years ago, one of the new features they touted in iOS was Twitter integration. The next year, they touted Facebook integration. As an Android user, I was a bit confused because my expectation using Android is that apps have the ability to share more freely with other apps.

With regard to WhatsApp specifically, I couldn't figure out how to share a photo because I was used to the greater flexibility in Android. My brother-in-law ended up telling me how to share photos to WhatsApp in iOS by going into WhatsApp first and then selecting the attach action. It just wasn't the way I normally share stuff in Android.

When I use my phone, I may be in a browser reading stuff or gallery looking at pictures. If I find an item that I want to share, it's just intuitive for me to initiate the share from the browser/gallery that I am currently in to the other app. I don't go to the other app and then attach the item.

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Another app issue I find is that I would consider an Android app that looks and works like an iOS app to be poorly designed. Specifically, I mean the app's use of the Android menu and back buttons. Actually, it's more like the app's lack of using the menu and back buttons.

Android has either on-screen or hardware menu and back buttons. It is a poor Android app if the app has a button called, "Menu" on the screen and yet does not respond when I press the Android menu button. The same goes for the back button. It frustrates me that when I press the back button and it either doesn't work or does something totally unexpected while somewhere else on the screen there is a button labeled, "back". The worse behaviour is when the back button exits the app when all I want was to go back to the previous screen.

I see what I would consider to be lazy ports of iOS apps to Android. It looks like the developer did the bare minimum to get their app working on Android. By not following proper Android guidelines (which are different than iOS guidelines), it makes for a poor experience on Android phones. I find this happens often with apps made by service providers and banks. You can't get alternatives elsewhere and pretty much have to put up with these crap apps.

Reddit apps on Android are much better.

I agree that you should be able to share from your camera roll. It's just that Flickr found a way to do it so I would think whatsApp could too. Unless Flickr has now become integrated into iOS, it's just poor coding l.

The poor coding on android phones with regard to the menu and back buttons is one of the things that turned me off of android.

Of all the apps I personally use, there is not one I would regard as better than the iOS equivalent.

Equal at best, but not better, and often times not as good

rtomyj said:

eBay - nope. Better support, better UI (iOS 7) and reliable notifications.

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How is the UI better? Reliable notifications? The last I checked the iOS eBay app had hardly no configuration options for notifications and no ability to set a timeout period like Android does.

thing is, even if the equivalents of android apps are more polished on ios (doubtfoul in my experience), there are literally thousands of apps which do not even exist on ios adding productivy and funtionality and that alone makes android vastly superior.

ValSalva said:

But IMO the statement "most Android apps are not as good as iOS," is also still true.

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Agreed. I find that many of the apps I use on both platforms are better on iOS than Android. YMMV.

bozzykid said:

How is the UI better? Reliable notifications? The last I checked the iOS eBay app had hardly no configuration options for notifications and no ability to set a timeout period like Android does.

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UI is subject. A lot of people don't get this. I don't like Androids UI at all. I get notifications in real time. Not so much on Android. Timeout wouldn't be useful to me, but hey your not me.

CarlosQG said:

I only agree with WhatsApp...

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Ditto, but given most Apple owners only install whatsapp to chat with Android owners, not surprised.