Editor’s Note: This guest post is by an OTEKBITS frequent contributor, Brianne. She is a writer/blogger. She loves writing, travelling and reading books. She contributes to Carribean Cruise Line Scam.
The tug of war between iPhone and Android is seen since past so many years and this will continue in a longer run. Answering this question seems to be a difficult job since both of these smartphones seems to be doing better in different terms. Both are being backed by the giants in the market, iPhone being created by Apple, while Android is a product of Google. Both these companies are competent enough to take this phone war game in a long way.
There are many ways in which Android phones are better than the iPhone devices and vice-versa. Both have their own strengths and weaknesses, however, comparing the duo in various ways, could help you in finding out the right answer to this question. So, let’s try to find out the answer for a million dollar question – iPhone vs. Android- who is the real winner in this phone war?
The iPhone vs. Android phones in terms of Popularity
As per the PR coming from IDC, the current market share of smartphone world is very much dramatic. Android currently holds around 75 percent of market share, while iPhone has a meager 14.9 percent share in the market, and the remaining figure belongs to phones including Windows, Blackberry, Linux and Symbian phones. However, as per business experts, the iPhone 5 and Galaxy S III seems to be hot in the current smartphone market. At the same time higher market share doesn’t often would define which phone has won or lost the battle, however, this only tells which phones are used the most.
The huge difference between the two is because a wide range of phones use Android operating system as compared to the iOS being used by iPhone devices. The iPhone could have a small marker share just because it belongs to one company Apple, where this is not the case with Android phones. However, if you decide in terms of market share, certainly Android is leading the smartphone world.
The iPhone vs. Android phones in terms of Applications
Without the number of applications, the smartphone could be unlike any ordinary phone. The applications are considered as the core of both these phones. Both these phones carry the App Stores with iPhone carrying the Apple App Store and Android phones has the Google Play Store. Each of the App Stores carries more than 700,000 different applications for their users. Both these App Stores offer a countless amount of free applications; however, this is more relevant to Google’s Android since it happens to be an open source operating system.
On the other hand, Apple iPhone has fewer amounts of free applications; however, the worthy thing about iPhones is that these are considered as the first option by bigger companies that are into developing apps and they consider Android phones as second option for creating apps. Hence developers seen standing more for iPhones, which means you, may get better apps by paying money rather than enjoying free apps over Android with several limitations. At the core, both the phones give away standard applications including calendar, notes, tasks, music and video players, and document readers as free.
Unique features in iPhone and Android phones
If you look at some unique applications for iPhone, you could find apps like Face Time, which helps you in making video calls then you have Shared Photo Stream, which helps in syncing and sharing images, whereas the Android phones are seen with comparable photo sharing applications. The iPhone gives you an application called Passbook, which are meant to hold coupons, boarding passes, movie tickets and several other similar items, and iWork comprises of Pages, Numbers and Keynote and Numbers along with giving you office tools including Word, Excel and PowerPoint.
Looking at the Android unique applications, you could see things like Google Docs, Google Drive, Google Plus, and several other productivity applications. Also, it gives you several Widgets that help you in getting the add-on tools, which run over the home screen in which iPhone seems to be lagging behind.
The iPhone vs. Android phones in terms of features
Both the devices have their unique features, which is only possible due to the fierce competition. If you look at the latest iPhone 5 features, you could find the device very much intuitive and sleek giving you common interface as seen with other Apple products. These are quicker in booting up and in terms of loading several applications. It has better retina display as compared to the Samsung Galaxy S III Android phone. It is competent to send videos through email. The other features include iPhone/Remote wipe function, VIP email filtering, Airplay with Apple TV to stream content via the iPhone device, iCloud, good call quality feature, etc.
If you look at the advance Android phones, you could see multiple operating systems, which are available for users that include Ice Cream Sandwich, Jelly Bean and Gingerbread, but the release of OS are less frequent with Android when compared to iPhone. Better battery life at few Android based phones as compared to the iPhone devices. You enjoy several customization options, MicroSD slot, removable battery option and multiple App Stores, which includes Amazon apart from getting Google Play. Also, you get the best multitasking option here, while you could add any kind of files (except too large size files) to your emails while using Android phones, which is not the case with iPhones. Lastly, you could even find features like Micro USB port, ability to hook up the USB keywords along with the mouse and these devices simply look awesome to your eyes.
Final word
If you compare the two, most of the users would say that iPhone is suitable for corporate, who simply love hassle free products, which can work anywhere and everywhere. However, the Android based phones are meant for the geeks who live in the trenches and love to custom their own operating systems along with people who love to dig deep into these devices. But in reality, users of any background love both the phones for many reasons. Few consider iPhone or Android as per the factors like popularity, number of required applications, appearance and features. Hence it’s the smartphone users, who make iPhone or Android phones the winners, not the companies coming up with these devices.
