iPhone 5 Touch Screen Twice as Fast as Android Touch Screen

[MacRumors]

The iPhone's touch screen has a much faster response time than its Android and Windows counterparts, according to a new set of TouchMark benchmarks from cloud streaming company Agawi.

Using a 240fps high frame rate camera along with a custom-built device called a Touchscope, Agawi measured the App Response Time (ART) of several different smartphones. The ART is the latency experienced between the time a user touches the device display to the device's on-screen response.

Apple's iPhone demonstrated a minimum app response time (MART) of 55 milliseconds, a much better performance than the Galaxy S4, which had a MART of 114ms. The Lumia 928 had a similar high MART time of 117ms, and the iPhone 5's closest competitor was the iPhone 4, with a MART of 85. The HTC One and the Moto X had the highest MART times, coming in at 121 and 123ms, respectively.

Relan, Agawi CEO, spoke to Venturebeat about the company's benchmarks.

"App responsiveness is judged by how quickly the app can respond to your inputs," said Rohan Relan, cofounder and CEO of Agawi. "Smartphones with touchscreens that have lower MART scores feel snappier. This is probably why, to many users, the iPhone keyboard feels more responsive than an Android phone keyboard."

Microsoft has published a video that demonstrates how the differences between various touch screen response times translate into real world device experiences. As seen in the video, there is a noticeable difference between a 100ms latency time and a 50ms latency time.

Agawi speculates that Apple's touch screen hardware is better calibrated for capturing and processing touch than the Android and Windows devices that it was compared to. The company does note, however, that more comprehensive testing is required, and that coding differences may have slightly altered the results.

In the future, Agawi plans to develop additional TouchMark tests, releasing both the hardware and software behind the benchmarks so that its results can be replicated. The company also plans to test additional Apple devices, including the newly released iPhone 5s and iPhone 5c.

Article Link: iPhone 5 Touch Screen Twice as Fast as Android Touch Screen

 

[Chuck-Norris]

wow, thought all capacitive touch screens were essentially the same. i guess apple does have an edge

 

[Col Ronson]

im not surprised. might be bias, but everytime i use an android phone, it feels clunky and slow.

 

[akbarali.ch]

So we talking about iPhone spec now, hmm, atleast in one area it beats Android.

 

[keysofanxiety]

Who cares about screen speed? I've got a hex-core 6.5GHz ARM Z4-X345 with 64 petabytes of RAM, AND an SD card and removable battery.

Sure, my phone still lags now and then -- when doing CPU-intensive tasks such as going back to the lock screen -- BUT SPECS MEAN EVERYTHING! (except for if the specs are in Apple's favour, such as here)

 

[Gherkin]

this is very interesting. I wonder if the 5S has improved things even more?

 

[needfx]

ios7 keyboard on iphone 4 feels less responsive though and a bit laggy

 

[likemyorbs]

I have the new Nexus 7 tablet, it definitely does not feel nearly as responsive as my iPhone. I don't care what android apologists say, android is definitely clunkier and not as polished and responsive as iOS.

 

[Four oF NINE]

I really had no idea that there were any differences between touch screens. This is fascinating.

 

[Derekeys]

Nice!

 

[YeahBuddy]

The iPhone's keyboard is so responsive, I don't understand why people desire a 3rd party keyboard so badly.

 

[gaximus]

This is probably why, when I play with android devices at the store the home screen never feels as smooth as my iPhone.

 

[baryon]

I'm glad someone actually did a test on this. I sometimes feel like most people just don't care about or even notice lag. For me, it simply drives me crazy. If a mouse pointer, brush, or UI element lags, it really pisses me off and it makes everything feel annoying and slow. Your brain tries to evaluate your movements in real-time, and adjust your hand accordingly. If there's lag, you cannot adjust your movement as accurately.

Apple does a great job at reducing such lag and it makes their products feel far more responsive, even if the actual processing time for tasks is the same. Take for example scrolling on a Mac trackpad vs. scrolling on a Windows trackpad. The former feels like you're actually moving the content with your fingers, while the latter feels like you're constantly being punched in the face by Mike Tyson.

These things mean nothing to someone who simply isn't sensitive to it, which is why lots of people don't mind having laggy devices, and they will tell you that they don't notice any lag, while you can clearly tell the difference.

 

[firewood]

The trick is that iOS runs the driver that checks the touch sensor, and the driver for the graphics rendering pipeline that displays the result of the touch, both at a higher priority and/or more often than does the Android OS kernel.

There's not too much the touchscreen vendor and the app developer can do if the OS thinks it should be busy doing other stuff.

 

[CEmajr]

Makes sense. Every Android I've used the screen doesn't respond quite as fast as the iPhone. Even older models like the 4/4S seemed to always respond faster than the latest flagship Androids (HTC One, S4, etc.)

 

[d4rkc4sm]

can they test my pos garmin gps' touchscreen

i want to laugh

 

[Some guy]

I always thought the delay when trying to paint on an iPad was really annoying.

 

[Northgrove]

Most I've asked are saying the same. My old iPhone 3GS is more responsive and smoother to scroll with than many much more recent Android phones, no contest. Apple may be able to take shortcuts here though, since they can optimize their software directly for specific hardware down to the displays themselves, unlike Google who can't make assumptions about which display some Android phone will use.

 

[ValSalva]

This is a pretty significant difference. Android has improved in the last few years though. I wonder what this study would have looked like three years ago

 

[WilliamG]

I have the new Nexus 7 tablet, it definitely does not feel nearly as responsive as my iPhone. I don't care what android apologists says, android is definitely clunkier and not as polished and responsive as iOS.

100% true. I have the new Nexus 7, and the difference in responsiveness of the screen between it and my iPhone 5 (and now 5s) is not even in the same league.

 

[RabidMacFan]

With that research video from Microsoft, we know that they are very aware of the differences in touch latency. I wonder where the surface would fall on this benchmark and I'm kind of disappointed that it wasn't included.

 

[appleisking]

Not surprised at all especially considering the bloat OEM skins add

 

[Fruit Cake]

Could be because iOS prioritized touch input over other threads so it responds much faster. These days android hardware is fast enough that unless your really fussy the lag time won't bother you much. It's much better then 2yrs ago.

 

[likemyorbs]

100% true. I have the new Nexus 7, and the difference in responsiveness of the screen between it and my iPhone 5 (and now 5s) is not even in the same league.

I know, I can't even fully explain the feeling. Android just makes you feel like you're inconveniencing it when you touch the screen lol.

 

[kdarling]

This would be more meaningful to me if I used a tablet for drawing or painting all the time.

Although, in that case, I'd pick a tablet with a separate non-capacitive digitizer for its speed, and ability to recognize the fine point of an active pen.

Now, if this affects typing speed, then yes, it would be meaningful to a lot of people.

(The video seems to concentrate on speed of recognizing movement, not of tap recognition speed.)
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