I’m tired of hearing “Android seems cool, but the apps just don’t have that same polish as iOS ones.” Yes, there are duds on Google Play (their App Store). But there are duds in Apple’s App Store too. Here are some Android apps I’ve been using that feel “as good as iOS”
Google Music. Google Music’s All Access (their new all you can eat music subscription service) is really nice. I love how my uploaded music lives in the same Library as their store’s music. Radio feature is great. Search, of course, is pretty good too.
Flickr. They made a splash last week with their web app redesign. The new Android app design brings it up to the same level as their iOS app. It’s very nice.
Pocket Casts. When I’m not using Google Music I’m using Pocket Casts. If you like listening to Neil deGrasse Tyson’s voice, this is the app for you.
Press. I’m an RSS guy. I know that’s not cool anymore. I’m sad about Google Reader. I use Press every day to catch up on interesting stories across the web. Really nice app.
DashClock Widget. Android’s nice because you can run apps on the lock screen. DashClock gives me information without having to drill into apps.
Facebook Messenger. I like chatheads. It’s replaced my SMS app.
Google Chrome. Chrome is smooth. The funny thing is, when you’re viewing a website Chrome’s browser chrome goes away. Google depends on the web, so it makes sense that their browser is top notch.
Google Now. I use Google Now many times a day.
Twitter. There’s no reason to download a 3rd party client. The official app is great.
The Verge. When RSS goes away I don’t have to worry. I check The Verge app daily. For entertainment I read the comments. Their commenters aren’t as fun as ours though.
I’ve showed you some of the “polished” Android apps I use every day. Did I miss anything?
Joe Fusco
on 30 May 13I like Google Keep…
Sundarlal Chuddha
on 30 May 13Not to be a jerk, but do these apps all have consistent UI treatments? I mean of the frustrations I had when I played with Android was that I never knew when to push the back button and when to use an App button. It was very frustrating.
Jonathan
on 30 May 13These look great. But it’s all awfully mainstream, isn’t it – multiple Google apps, Facebook, Twitter, Flickr. I guess monopolies are the reality these days.
Eric H.
on 30 May 13Jamie, you’re almost pushing me over to the dark side with these posts; almost.
Connie
on 30 May 13Actually, I’d say Falcon Pro is a better Twitter client than Twitter’s. The ability to see images, including Instagrams & Imgur, within the feed without having to click into each tweet is key. The in-app browser does a good job of showing you pages without having to launch your browser app.
BaconReader is fantastic for Reddit.
Christian Cito
on 30 May 13Wow, I have all of those apps except Twitter(I use Falcon Pro). Interesting to see someone with the same taste in apps.
Scott Semple
on 30 May 13I don’t use many of these apps, but I agree with the bad rap sentiment.
I started handling all of the Android support requests at work, so I devoted a month last fall to using Android exclusively. I wanted to learn Android; not just pretend I knew it.
That month of learning about Android led me to switch permanently. If I do have to pick up my iPhone, I usually get annoyed at how clunky the navigation is and how restrictive the apps are.
Scott Semple
on 30 May 13Clarification: I should have said that stock Android (on Nexus devices) and many of the Android-current designs surpassed iOS a while ago.
I’d never buy a device with a carrier-flavored version of Android, and the Play Store does have a lot of old, crappy apps that they should get rid of.
That said, the last two pieces of the puzzle for Nexus would be some as-nice-as-Apple hardware and an app to match iMessage. (If Google Hangouts adds SMS, that may be the one.)
Martin
on 30 May 13Could not agree more Jamie. The Android experience these days is as good or better than iOS, especially stock Android. I hope posts like these encourage any iOS to check out the modern Android user experience.
Pirijan
on 30 May 13I’d love to switch to Android, but what I haven’t been able to find a great alternative for is Omnifocus. Can anyone recommend an alternative with the same level of polish as the stuff above?
Joe
on 30 May 13I’ve been an Apple fan forever, but now am in love with my Nexus 7. Google is on the move.
John W
on 31 May 13I really like my Nexus 7 (the only Android device I have) but just when I’m about to say “Yep, the next phone will be an Android” it has some kind of hideous lockup or starts lagging terribly and I am reminded how well my iPhone and iPad behave. Of course, the phone decision is over a year away so I have lots of time to see how Android progresses… and what Apple does in iOS7.
I love the idea of Android; I’m waiting for the experience of using it to catch up a bit. And to be able to get a phone that is really great with stock Android on it from Verizon.
And I do think the bad rap is still deserved, although one hopes the gap is closing. The Kindle app on Android is a dud, for example, with awkward page turning and navigation. That’s one of my most-used iPad apps and would be a real problem for me.
(And as a previous commenter noted, the “back” button is total disaster. I joke that it’s the Wheel of Fortune button, because you’re never really sure where it’s gong to take you. Exciting!)
But yes, there are some beautiful Android apps; thanks for highlighting a few.
Eliot Landrum
on 31 May 13Jamie, it’s not that Android doesn’t have polished apps (or that iOS store doesn’t have terrible duds), but that there aren’t any significant third-party Android-first or Android-only apps. In your list above, all of those are clones of iOS apps or Google’s own apps. That’s cool that the experience is equivalent, but where’s the amazing app that I can’t even get on an iPhone?
Ryan Parman
on 31 May 13Two questions:
1. How well do these apps work on 10” tablets? In my experience, many (most?) Android apps are designed exclusively for phones.
2. I have 3 Macs, an iPad 3, an iPad mini, 2 Apple TVs, and multiple Airplay devices which I play music/video to near-constantly. My biggest gripe isn’t that Android is bad (4.2 is pretty darn good, actually), but rather that it lacks the full-scale ecosystem that iOS enjoys. A phone is not an island unto itself.
Kåre Hansen
on 31 May 13I do use a iPhone 5 primarily, but in March I bought an Nexus 4 to update me on the Android experience. It’s getting tolerable, and there are many excellent apps. My primary apps are Pocket Cast, Falcon Pro and Press. In my opinion Press is better for RSS than the competition on iOS (or are there any better apps than Reeder for the iPhone?).
Compared to 2-3 years ago, there are more developers now that are sweating the details on the Google Play store.
But I still use the iPhone as my primary device.
Danny
on 31 May 13Love the post, I was forced to transition from my Nexus Galaxy back to an iPhone 5 for work and am hating it. The iOS experience feels like I have my hands tied behind my back and I am being slapped with a wet fish. It is just awkward and restrictive.
I know this is more emotional than logical, but for me the Android experience kicks the crap out of the Apple one, it just felt natural, intuitive and helpful. And don’t get me started on the iPhone 5 battery life or lack there of.
Jamie
on 31 May 13Thanks for the insightful comments everyone! This could easily turn into a troll contest, so thanks for being civil.
@Eliot Landrum That is an interesting point. I see Apple is touting exclusivity now in the App Store. This is the first I’ve seen. That could be the big message at WWDC.
My experience with exclusive iOS apps has been good (Letterpress). Personally these apps are something of a novelty. They’re great to play around with for a week or two, but I keep going back to the basics (on the phone).
A while back my 37signals co-workers were talking about Ridiculous Fishing. Well, everyone on the Internet was. I was disappointed that I couldn’t try it. It’s like everyone’s watching Game of Thrones and you have no idea what a Lannister is. But, it seems like everyone’s moved on from Ridiculous Fishing to the next novelty.
That definitely is a problem for Android though. Developers waiting 6 months to 1 year to port their iOS app over. You can see that with Vine. Very good points.
John W
on 31 May 13The tablet vs. phone issue is another point worth considering; I notice that on my Nexus 7, lots of apps are just blown up phone apps, whereas in the iOS ecosystem you’re a lot more likely to get dual versions for the phone vs. tablet. It’s the difference between “compatible with” and “designed for” and it is one of the areas where the my experience on my iPad pulls ahead of the Nexus. Again, nothing inherently wrong with Android there, just an area where I’d love to see application developers be a bit more thoughtful. Google could help with labeling in the Play store (presumably apps that have tablet versions vs. big phone versions would do better with tablet users, if they were clearly marked as such).
Scott Semple
on 31 May 13@JohnW: The idea of separate apps for phone and tablet is particular to iOS. If an Android app is designed properly, it should automatically adjust its layouts to different screen sizes, similar to responsive design on the web.
scroll weary
on 31 May 13This post was excruciating to read on a laptop. Scroll scroll scroll. some text. scroll scroll scroll. a huge picture taking up a couple screen heights. scroll scroll scroll. its like being watching tv with your face two inches from the screen. oh look, its a cave… wait no its a nostril!
Alex
on 01 Jun 13Flat …
John W
on 01 Jun 13@Scott Semple – that’s interesting, thanks to the link (not being a developer I didn’t know this). Seems like a better solution that dual versions. Would love to see it implemented more!
Danny
on 01 Jun 13I forgot to add SwiftKey as a keyboard app. It is brilliant it’s predictive text allows you to type things a lot quicker. I used to be able to type the text message “heading home now I love you” in about 6 presses tops, and on iOS the same message takes about 28. This makes a huge difference.
Matt Radel
on 02 Jun 13Droid Sans. Everywhere. I really dig a lot of what they’ve done with Android, but it feels really limited typographically. Anyone else bothered by this?
Darren
on 03 Jun 13Everything wrong with Android can be summed up in the system icons in the upper right hand corner. It’s like car companies and auto dashboards …. all they need to do is have a good designer spend 10 minutes to point out some of the stupid stuff and they would be 100% better.
• The Bluetooth icon is already lousy in that awkward oval .. they should lose that shape in this instance. • The WiFi icon spreads too wide and the side angle should match the signal icon angle exactly. And what’s up with the weird arrows in the middle of it sometimes? • The signal icon wedge is too steep • The Battery icon is too wide • The clock shouldn’t have the zero before the hour. • The spacing is off on nearly all icon positions
iOS is not perfect by any means, but as a designer, every time I see this stuff I cringe—wondering if anybody working on this has one lick of design sense. And don’t even get me started on the terrible icons on the bottom.
As for the app UIs … meh …. I have 75 apps that look nicer than those on my phone. Every one of them has amateurish tendencies except Google Now.
Sorry, but you can’t make a case for this, Jamie. The bad rap is deserved and is confirmed every time.
Dave
on 03 Jun 13Any.do. USA Today. Feedly. Pocket. Sprout Social. Evernote. Too bad I can’t get Chrome, when my phone is not even a year old.
Brandon
on 04 Jun 13I’ve used Android before and even some of these apps recently, however this write up does nothing to convince me to go back. There are still as good or better apps on iOS and the iPhone doesn’t feel like it is going to fall apart like most Android’s do.
I do, however, like that your music screen shot included Jurassic 5’s Quality Control. One of my favorite albums.
Ricky
on 04 Jun 13What’s a Lannister?
Kane
on 04 Jun 13One of my biggest complaints with android has been the fragmentation of the devices. While many people seem to love that there are so many different options, it creates a mess when trying to get apps. Many top apps are not available on relatively new devices. If you do not have stock android or a flagship phone, you may never get some of the best apps. I will be getting the next Nexus phone as a second phone to give it another shot. iOS has it shortcomings, but apps are not really one of them.
Anonymous Coward
on 05 Jun 13DHH can give a bunch of reasons why these android phones, no matter how great the hardware is, are not so productive for people that want to live their lives and not be tweaking and talking about their phone and android all the time endlessly….
Alex
on 05 Jun 13Yes, you missed one very crucial – Things by Cultured Code is available only on iOS and Mac… Deal breaker for those who GTD.
Craig
on 05 Jun 13Outside of the 37signals/”creative-type” Apple fanboi microcosm, Android doesn’t really get a bad rap any more. You just have to hear about it so often because you’re at the centre of said microcosm.
This discussion is closed.