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Why does iOS get all the good apps?

B

buddgeez

macrumors member
Original poster
Jul 2, 2012
46
0
It seems developers always go for IOS first. If you haven't noticed all the good android apps were on IOS first, ie: temple run, angry birds, instagram, cut the rope, i could go on for days. Do you think its because IOS has only a few devices, while android has millions of device, with different processors and different versions of android? I sold my iPhone 4 for a galaxy s2 on T-Mobile, don't get me wrong it was the best phone I've owned and my very first android, but a few months later I sold that and got a 4s because IOS just has so much better apps. What are your thoughs?

P.S. please don't make this a full blown ios vs android war.
 
There's more potential revenue on iOS, since it came out before android, and there's a demographic profile that people who buy iOS devices are more keen to buying applications (haven't got source, but I'm sure you can dig it up somewhere, if you don't believe me). Also, there's a lot of different screen sizes on Android, whereas with iOS you only need to develop an application that supports 2 or 4 screen sizes (depending if you want to support iPad. If you compare this to Android; there are lots of different resolutions and screen sizes, which will create a serious task of testing on these devices and debugging them, but that's the only way to release and develop a polished application.

-

Lunfai
 
blueroom said:
Because most iOS users don't mind paying for their apps.

http://www.wired.com/gamelife/2012/05/wired-uk-android-game-piracy/
Click to expand...

It's a little more complicated than that. Devs. know where they are with IOS...It's not released in different flavours with different parameters required where an app will run on Honeycomb but not on Ice Cream Sandwich etc. Easier to develop for if you know exactly what's what.

A buddy of mine was given an Acer tab for Christmas last, only to discover that it won't run ICS....He took it back, got a full refund and now has an iPad. The Android platform needs to be consolidated....Just my 10c worth.
 
Macman45 said:
It's a little more complicated than that. Devs. know where they are with IOS...It's not released in different flavours with different parameters required where an app will run on Honeycomb but not on Ice Cream Sandwich etc. Easier to develop for if you know exactly what's what.

A buddy of mine was given an Acer tab for Christmas last, only to discover that it won't run ICS....He took it back, got a full refund and now has an iPad. The Android platform needs to be consolidated....Just my 10c worth.
Click to expand...

This.

I remember two years ago Google talking about needing to address this, so far nothing has happened.

It really affects games. I had an OpenGL ES 2.0 demo I made and ran it on iOS and several Android devices, iOS outperformed all of them even though the specs on the Android devices were higher. It mostly boils down to OEMs re-skinning and doing anything they want with the OS. Google supposedly let OEMs know to tone down the customizations so Android would run smoother but there (to my knowledge) are no minimum performance requirements enforced by Google which is a shame.
 
I like Android, but as people already said, there are so many devices, different hardware, different screen sizes, different OS versions, it's hard for developers to make an app that will work well on all phones and tablets, and again, custom roms may screw it up on some phones.

Google gave too much freedom to Android device manufacturers, which ruin it with their custom interfaces, most of which only slow the device.

Apple has only few products, tightly controlled by them, with similar hardware, iOS updates come out at the same time, which makes it much easier for developers to create apps that will work and behave just as they should.

iOS will continue getting good apps until Google starts to control OEMs more, or until they begin to focus more on their own devices, like Nexus series, which are awesome, and get regular updates of pure Android.

TL;DR Apple controls both hardware and software of it's devices, Google doesn't.
 
Macman45 said:
It's a little more complicated than that. Devs. know where they are with IOS...It's not released in different flavours with different parameters required where an app will run on Honeycomb but not on Ice Cream Sandwich etc. Easier to develop for if you know exactly what's what.

A buddy of mine was given an Acer tab for Christmas last, only to discover that it won't run ICS....He took it back, got a full refund and now has an iPad. The Android platform needs to be consolidated....Just my 10c worth.
Click to expand...

Yup, that pretty much sums it up quickly. I remember reading this as an article in the NYTimes.

http://www.nytimes.com/2012/06/11/t...-of-mobile-app-developers.html?pagewanted=all


Morning Paper and coffee. by Destroysall, on Flickr

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misshalfway said:
iOS will continue getting good apps until Google starts to control OEMs more, or until they begin to focus more on their own devices, like Nexus series, which are awesome, and get regular updates of pure Android.
Click to expand...

I agree, completely! I originally wanted the S3. However, come October if I don't have an iPhone by then, I think I'll make the jump for the Nexus myself.:)

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chrono1081 said:
This.

I remember two years ago Google talking about needing to address this, so far nothing has happened.
Click to expand...

I think that's their aim with the Nexus lineup. It's just hard for them to follow through their plans atm with Apple at their throats.
 
Google is trying to attack fragmentation with ICS. It was a huge upgrade and combined the tablet and phone OS's. The problem still remains the OEMs/carriers are painfully slow to update to the new OS's. ICS is still only around 10% of the phones in use and now they have Jelly Bean. It seems there is no catching up.

I'm in the group that thinks it's that iOS users actually buy apps more.

Are there any Android developers here? Curious to know how the different phone types actually affects development outside of dealing with the different versions of the OS.
 
I started on Android, then switched over to iOS. Back then droid apps weren't even JIT compiled, meaning that the app was automatically slower because it was using a runtime interpreter. Then I saw the money side of this and it looked like droid users simply didn't buy apps.

The funny thing about Java is that it was designed to run on any or almost any machine... but we find that it can't support all the droid devices without mods and testing with all the devices.

With iOS, if it runs on my test device, it should run on all iOS devices using the same iOS version.

With droid, I have to HOPE it runs on all the different devices, no easy way to tell for sure.

So much for the value of using (misusing) Java.

... all the speed decrease with none of the cross-platform benefit... hmmmm...
 
There are many reasons but a few of them include easier development (there are developers that don't feel that way, but the majority still does—a major factor is fragmentation), and an iOS userbase which is far more willing to purchase apps. If just that second factor changed in a meaningful way I imagine there would start to become more balance.
 
Because with iOS, you KNOW your app will work because you than test it on your device wether it be the 4S, 4, 3GS, or even the 3G. They are all similar and work the same way. With Android, you have a lot of different specs, skins, and versions. Android is pretty fragmented. Basically with iOS, you know it will work, you have to sorta hold your breath with Android. Also, I think Apple provides great tools to develop like Xcode and iPhone and iPad simulator. Apple also was on top on the smartphone market share for a while until recently.

Just my opinion.
 
I went to iOS first because of less fragmentation. I can make one version app works on iPhone 3g, 3gs, 4, 4s and iPad without much work.
 
As someone who recently released a game for both iOS and android, here are my thoughts/perceptions;

1. The iOS and it's devices are more stable and more predictable from a programming standpoint. Your app either works on them, or it doesn't. Yes, there are some screen resolution differences between iPod/iPhone and iPad, but nothing remotely as different as what's found on the various android devices.

2. To some extent, android devices seem to be in a race for the bottom; how cheap can one be made and still run the OS. Apple most definitely does not do that and will probably never will. There are of course higher end android devices, but there is a plethora of tablets that are just horrible.

3. As some have alluded to earlier in this thread, my perception is that the iOS customer base is more inclined to buy software.

Wag
 
wagdog said:
As someone who recently released a game for both iOS and android, here are my thoughts/perceptions;

1. The iOS and it's devices are more stable and more predictable from a programming standpoint. Your app either works on them, or it doesn't. Yes, there are some screen resolution differences between iPod/iPhone and iPad, but nothing remotely as different as what's found on the various android devices.

2. To some extent, android devices seem to be in a race for the bottom; how cheap can one be made and still run the OS. Apple most definitely does not do that and will probably never will. There are of course higher end android devices, but there is a plethora of tablets that are just horrible.

3. As some have alluded to earlier in this thread, my perception is that the iOS customer base is more inclined to buy software.

Wag
Click to expand...

While I certainly agree that there are handsets being made at the lowest possible quality, most Android gamers opt for higher end phones. Also, the actual race for Android is the highest spec possible with the largest screen. The problem would then be a variety of processors, each with it's own coding standards.
 
qubeofwar said:
While I certainly agree that there are handsets being made at the lowest possible quality, most Android gamers opt for higher end phones. Also, the actual race for Android is the highest spec possible with the largest screen. The problem would then be a variety of processors, each with it's own coding standards.
Click to expand...

While I agree that a large number of android users do in fact opt for high-end devices, there A LOT that don't. The fact that the iOS devices are more or less on the same playing field makes developing for them a lot easier.
 
wagdog said:
While I agree that a large number of android users do in fact opt for high-end devices, there A LOT that don't. The fact that the iOS devices are more or less on the same playing field makes developing for them a lot easier.
Click to expand...

Noted. Android fragmentation is both its boon and bane. :apple: still is the most integrated system out there
 
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