iOS vs Android vs Windows in 2017

by Chris Smith

, 29 January 2017

Everyone has their favourite big web company and associated operating system (OS). We're all either Apple, Google or Microsoft. Maybe not quite all of us. There's always one weirdo who finds something "better".

I'd say that for office desk based work most people are either on Apple or Windows (Mac or PC). I'm not sure if any significant numbers use a Chromebook and Chrome as their serious OS. I may be wrong. For phones it's iOS, Android or, to a lesser extent, Windows. Do people still use Blackberry in big numbers? I'm assuming not.

People who use Windows for work might have any kind of phone. It's actually pretty unlikely that they'd have a Windows phone as it's smaller in the phone market. On the other hand, I bet almost everyone who uses a Mac has an iPhone. And without even considering any of the other options.

I'm in quite a lucky position where I work on a Windows laptop, use an Android TV box and an iPad at home so have access to all 3 operating systems. I thought I'd do a quick comparison, nothing scientific, or even particularly fair, just my own impressions. I should also point ut that this isn't about bashing anything. I think all 3 are great. More or less they all do the same things. It's the little differences and the UX of them that becomes interesting. Here are some pros and cons for each.

iOS and Android are miles ahead of Windows in terms of apps available.
iOS is on Apple hardware only whereas you have more choice with Android and Windows.
The point of entry in terms of price is much higher for iOS.
Android (Material) and Windows have more modern UI whereas iOS doesn't seem to have changed very much in the last few years. Not necessarily a bad thing, just an observation.
iOS has Safari as its default browser, which is not quite as feature rich as Chrome or Edge. It's easy to install Chrome though.

For what it's worth, I have a Windows 10 phone (Microsoft Lumia 550) and I absolutely love it. The main drawback is the lack of apps compared with the other platforms but I don't find that to be a major obstacle. Since Windows 10 there's now a first class web browser in Edge so most services which don't have a Windows app seem to have a web equivalent.

My phone cost me £55 (about $70) and does everything I need, whereas a new iPhone would probably cost me about 10 times that. My phone doesn't have a great camera or loads of storage, as you'd expect at that low price but I have a digital SLR camera for that. I'm not going to pretend my Windows phone is anywhere near as good in spec compared to the latest iPhone or but I'm also not convinced that my overall mobile experience is 10 times worse. I feel I'm getting the better deal.