It's Been 6 Months, and I Don't Miss My iPhone

It was the summer of 2010 when I made the switch from Blackberry to an iPhone. I was so excited to do so at the time. My white 32 gig iPhone 3gs was one of my most prized possessions. I would love to show it off to my friends and use all of the features: The built in iPod, Maps, Camera, etc. My love for technology had just started taking off, and the iPhone was such a pretty piece of hardware compared to most of the Android phones at the time. Fast forward 7.5 years and it is a much different story. Android phones are as good of build quality if not better than the iPhone, and the software experience is also as good, if not better than iPhone, depending on who you ask.

6 months ago, I made the switch to Android via a white Google Pixel 2 64 gig. My iPhone 6s was on it's last legs and I needed a new phone. Verizon was having a sale for Black Friday that knocked half the price of the newly released Google Pixel 2. I took the plunge. I was a little worried that the phone would leave me disappointed, not to mention that my wife, also a long term iPhone user took the plunge with me. If she was not happy, I knew I would hear about it for a long time! But as the days, then weeks, then months passed, we did not have any issues of troubles with jumping the iPhone ship.

Apps

All of the apps we used the most on our iPhones, were also on Android. Not to say that they were the exact same user interface, but they all did the same functions on either platform. To be honest, switching to Android may give people more functionality than they had before. For instance, I am a long time user of Google services. Apps such as Maps, Photos, Gmail, Docs, and more all work seamlessly with the Google Pixel 2. This is something I really like. An example of the increased productivity I have is when I take a picture on my phone, I can go photos.google.com, log in, and all of my pictures will be there, including the one I just took a minute ago. From there I can download it, and do whatever I need to do with it.

One of the major annoyances I had with the iPhone was that when I received an address in a text message, it would open on Apple Maps and there was no way to change the default navigation app. We all know that Apple Maps is no where as good as Google Maps, so this was a big L for me. With my Google Pixel 2, I can change the default application for each type of service, but out of the box there is no need to for me, I use all of the Google services anyways.

These are just some of the benefits of using a Google Pixel 2 over any iPhone.

Camera

The camera on the Google Pixel 2 is the best camera I have ever seen on any smart phone. There recently is fierce competition with the Galaxy S9, but I still believe the Google Pixel 2 offers a slightly better result over the S9.

What makes the Google Pixel 2 camera from other phones is that it offers portrait mode on both the rear and front camera without having to use a dual camera setup to achieve it. Google uses a neural network algorithm to determine what is the subject of the photo and what is the background of the photo. Once it does this, it then uses what Google calls it's "secret sauce" to make the image a portrait photo. It is a lot more technical than this, but this is the gist of it.

Simply put, although the iPhone X camera is one of the best cameras out there, the Google Pixel 2 camera is the best camera I have ever used.

Battery

Coming from a 2 year old iPhone 6s to a brand new Google Pixel 2, the difference in battery was very apparent. I really could not remember how battery performance was on my iPhone 6s when I first got it, but I can say that the Google Pixel 2 battery last a very long time. So long that one day I left the house at 7:00 am with 38% battery, and got home at 5:00 pm with 10% battery left. I really do not use my phone while at work, but that is still an impressive feat for a phone that is still receiving texts, emails, and calls all day, while streaming music and making calls on the 30 minute drive to and from work.

Needless to say, the battery on my new Google Pixel 2 is much much much better than on my old iPhone 6s.

Conclusion

In conclusion we are very happy that we made the switch from iPhone to Android. Specifically, to a Google Pixel 2. The operating system on the Pixel is so clean compared to many Android phones, and that is something I really appreciate. Also, the openness of the Google ecosystem is something I like. Apple tries to keep so many things closed off to developers which is affecting it's customers, and I did not like that about the iPhone. I felt as though I wasn't accessing the full potential of my phone because Apple didn't let me.

If you are on the edge of jumping off the Apple ship, just know that there is a little green Android waiting to jump in and save you.