iPhone SE (2022) Just bought an iPhone SE 3 (2022) - Migrating from Android

[Wingsley]

My current smartphone, a Lenovo-Motorola Moto G6 Play, is a disaster. Horrible performance: sluggish, occasional screen freezes, and truly terrible battery life. I've regretted getting this phone since shortly after I got it. What an awful mistake I made. It runs Android 9 and I equipped it with an additional 64 GB microSD card.

I want to transition over to my new iPhone SE, 3rd generation. I just bought it, new, from Apple direct. The SE has 128 GB SSD on-board. My only experience with iOS is a much older iPad Mini 2 running iOS 12.4. So I have no direct experience with newer versions of iOS.

First, I want to ask, just generally: what the best way is to migrate from Android to iPhone?

The SE is due to arrive 2 May 2022. Thanks in advance.

 

[Paddle1]

I know there is the Apple "Move to iOS" app on Android. I've never tried it though.

 

[NoBoMac]

^^^This.

Move from Android to iPhone or iPad - Apple Support

Ready to transfer to iOS? Download the Move to iOS app to get help switching from your Android device to your new iPhone or iPad.

support.apple.com

Or, just turn it on, setup an Apple ID, and use it. Things like Contacts, Calendar/Reminders can keep talking to one's (assumed) Google services. Or Outlook/Microsoft.

Set up mail, contacts, and calendar accounts on iPhone

On iPhone, set up accounts for Microsoft Exchange and internet-based mail, contacts, and calendar services.

support.apple.com

One thing to look out for is any Android apps that don't exist on iOS: will need to find a replacement and potentially find a way to extract any data from the app and import into an iOS app. Apps that seem to arise in this category are password protected document vaults, password managers; health apps, recipe/shopping list apps (aka things that might have a database involved). So, go through the Android phone and see what apps you are using that have critical to you data in them and start planning for that.

(EDIT: since you have an iPad already, already have Apple ID, so can skip that step)

 

[Mark Stone]

My current smartphone, a Lenovo-Motorola Moto G6 Play, is a disaster. Horrible performance: sluggish, occasional screen freezes, and truly terrible battery life. I've regretted getting this phone since shortly after I got it. What an awful mistake I made. It runs Android 9 and I equipped it with an additional 64 GB microSD card.

I want to transition over to my new iPhone SE, 3rd generation. I just bought it, new, from Apple direct. The SE has 128 GB SSD on-board. My only experience with iOS is a much older iPad Mini 2 running iOS 12.4. So I have no direct experience with newer versions of iOS.

First, I want to ask, just generally: what the best way is to migrate from Android to iPhone?

The SE is due to arrive 2 May 2022. Thanks in advance.

Congratulations on your new SE! The above responses to your question are excellent, but I will comment that Google apps run flawlessly on an Eye Phone. I think (just my opinion) that they run better on iOS than on Android. Calendar, Photos, Chrome, Google Keep, Maps, Google Earth, etc work really well on an iPhone, so the transition is really pretty easy.

When you get the SE on the 2nd, don’t be afraid to ask questions here; and also Apple provides excellent phone support to new users, so don’t be hesitant to utilize that service. If you’re physically close to an Apple store, bonus! Again, congrats and I think you’ll be very happy.

 

[Spudlicious]

My current smartphone, a Lenovo-Motorola Moto G6 Play, is a disaster. Horrible performance: sluggish, occasional screen freezes, and truly terrible battery life. I've regretted getting this phone since shortly after I got it. What an awful mistake I made. It runs Android 9 and I equipped it with an additional 64 GB microSD card.

I want to transition over to my new iPhone SE, 3rd generation. I just bought it, new, from Apple direct. The SE has 128 GB SSD on-board. My only experience with iOS is a much older iPad Mini 2 running iOS 12.4. So I have no direct experience with newer versions of iOS.

First, I want to ask, just generally: what the best way is to migrate from Android to iPhone?

The SE is due to arrive 2 May 2022. Thanks in advance.

I don't think there is one best way, although I can vouch for the Move To iOS app working well and it's especially good if you have a ton of photos to copy across. But since you already have an iPad you can just sign in on the iPhone and take it from there. I agree with a previous poster that Google apps are often much better than Apple's efforts so you can bring the best of them with you.

 

[eyoungren]

I know there is the Apple "Move to iOS" app on Android. I've never tried it though.

It works and it works pretty well.

We went from the iPhone 6s+ in 2019 to the Pixel 3aXL. That was about a year and a half before we got our 11 Pro Max iPhones.

The transfer from the 6s+ to the Pixel went well and the transfer back to the 11PM using Apple's app was good as well. However, in our case, we had other devices capable of using iMessage so the iMessage history was never interrupted. I believe though that the Apple app did transfer SMS/MMS.

That was February 2021 when we moved back. I'm sure Apple's had updates since.

 

[Wingsley]

I don't think there is one best way, although I can vouch for the Move To iOS app working well and it's especially good if you have a ton of photos to copy across. But since you already have an iPad you can just sign in on the iPhone and take it from there. I agree with a previous poster that Google apps are often much better than Apple's efforts so you can bring the best of them with you.

The iPad actually belongs to another family member; I just use it frequently. The iPad's AppleID is for the other family member.

 

[Wingsley]

Congratulations on your new SE! The above responses to your question are excellent, but I will comment that Google apps run flawlessly on an Eye Phone. I think (just my opinion) that they run better on iOS than on Android. Calendar, Photos, Chrome, Google Keep, Maps, Google Earth, etc work really well on an iPhone, so the transition is really pretty easy.

When you get the SE on the 2nd, don’t be afraid to ask questions here; and also Apple provides excellent phone support to new users, so don’t be hesitant to utilize that service. If you’re physically close to an Apple store, bonus! Again, congrats and I think you’ll be very happy.

That's one big problem for me: I'm "down in the boondocks". The nearest Apple Store is about 100 miles away and I don't go in that direction except once every ten years. There are no Apple Stores nearby.

 

[tarsins]

As others have said, Apple's Move to iOS app works well. The only real problem I have is WhatsApp chats. There are apps you can buy but I just export the chats as text in case I need to refer to them and start afresh.

 

[Wingsley]

Well, maybe I'm the oddball here, but I've never used iMessage, or WhatsApp, or any list apps. I guess I've been living in a cave all my life. (I didn't get my first smartphone until 2017.)

Thanks for the advice, everyone.

 

[ian87w]

My current smartphone, a Lenovo-Motorola Moto G6 Play, is a disaster. Horrible performance: sluggish, occasional screen freezes, and truly terrible battery life. I've regretted getting this phone since shortly after I got it. What an awful mistake I made. It runs Android 9 and I equipped it with an additional 64 GB microSD card.

I want to transition over to my new iPhone SE, 3rd generation. I just bought it, new, from Apple direct. The SE has 128 GB SSD on-board. My only experience with iOS is a much older iPad Mini 2 running iOS 12.4. So I have no direct experience with newer versions of iOS.

First, I want to ask, just generally: what the best way is to migrate from Android to iPhone?

The SE is due to arrive 2 May 2022. Thanks in advance.

Do you have all you contacts and calendar synced to Google? If yes, you don't have to do anything extra. Simply add your Google account to the iphone mail and it can sync with the contacts and calendar directly with your Google account. If you synced your photos on your Android with google Photos, then just download the Google photos app on iOS and they will be all there from the cloud.

Very easy.

 

[Wingsley]

Do you have all you contacts and calendar synced to Google? If yes, you don't have to do anything extra. Simply add your Google account to the iphone mail and it can sync with the contacts and calendar directly with your Google account. If you synced your photos on your Android with google Photos, then just download the Google photos app on iOS and they will be all there from the cloud.

Very easy.

Thank you for the suggestions. While I do use Google Contacts and Calendar regularly, I stay away from Google Photos.