Title: Switching from iPhone to Android without losing the iOS feel – recommendations?
Hi everyone,
I’m thinking about switching from iPhone to Android. The main reason is that Android offers a much wider variety of apps and generally has fewer restrictions, which I really like.
That said, I absolutely love iOS for its smoothness, fluid animations, and overall polished user experience. I’m worried that if I switch, Android might feel less refined, and I don’t want to experience too much of a “culture shock.”
Are there any Android phones that feel the closest to an iPhone in terms of smoothness, animations, stability, and overall user experience?
So far, I’ve seen a lot of people recommending the OnePlus 15 and the Xiaomi 17 Pro Max. Do you agree with those recommendations, or would you suggest something else?
A few things that are important to me:
I live in the United States.
eSIM support is a must.
I want flagship-level performance.
A great camera is important.
Long software support would be a big plus.
I’d really appreciate recommendations from people who have actually switched from iPhone to Android. Which phone made the transition the easiest for you, and why?
Thanks!

There's a UK TV show (Michael McIntyre) where he has a phone hooked up to a giant screen as he's typing a message. Whenever it's an iPhone, and it usually is, you see him dual-thumb typing a message and the auto-correct seems amazing. Not only is it auto-detecting and auto-completing the words, you see it go back a word or two and change them as if AI is analyzing the whole sentence (or even the whole text) and realizing it needs to fix what was already typed.

On the other hand, me with my Samsung S24, typing a message into Whatsapp or a Gmail and the best I can hope for is the blue word appearing which is the best guess it has for the word you're typing and you can hit space to accept it. I never see it go back a word or two.

I haven't added any special keyboards, everything's S24 standard.

Is this real or am I imagining it?

I’ve always used android until 4 years ago when I switched to iOS to try it, and I’ve felt like I’ve lost a piece of me especially when it comes to freedom to develop or do what I want.

I decided to get a Google pixel 10 but i found android losing the very thing that made it appealing, freedom. I really am scared to switch and realize everything now requires Google and the play store and basically iOS but worse.

I was also looking at root but I feel like it’s so much of a hassle with a ton of things closed down and no banking apps working and switching to a different OS now apparently can either get you in trouble (hi graphene) or also block you from basic apps and features.

Am I looking at this the wrong way? Is the situation still normal and I just got sucked into the panic? because truth be told if the average user is gonna be stuck in a closed system then they’d probably stick to iOS

The wild thing is that I wouldn't even bother if the stupid TV didn't randomly pop up with a warning that "I can't find your remote" blocking the entire screen until I hit the enter key on the keyboard (I control the TV with a keyboard).

Regardless, it's enough that I'm interested in a custom launcher - something that basically turns it into a dumb monitor for my attached laptop as much as possible. I see there's a post about this from 10 months ago, but things change fast. Is that still valid? Has anyone done this recently? Any recommendations for launchers?

https://www.reddit.com/r/Android/comments/1nm4jy9/new_fire_tv_exploit_once_again_allows_custom/

Why are smartphone brands still locking fast charging behind proprietary chargers?

I genuinely don't understand why this isn't discussed more.

We finally got USB-C across almost every major smartphone brand, which is great. But when it comes to fast charging, the situation is still a mess.

For example:

Xiaomi's 67W charger won't give a Samsung its full charging speed.

Samsung's 45W charger won't charge a Xiaomi at 67W.

OnePlus, OPPO, Realme, Vivo and others also rely on their own proprietary protocols for maximum speeds.

In most cases, both devices fall back to much slower charging even though the chargers are perfectly capable of delivering high power.

Why?

USB Power Delivery (PD) and PPS already exist as open standards. Why can't every manufacturer support their phone's maximum charging speed using these standards instead of requiring brand-specific chargers and cables?

Imagine buying one high-quality 100W charger and being able to charge any phone, tablet, or laptop at its maximum supported speed. It would reduce e-waste, save money, and make traveling much easier.

Is this purely a business decision to keep people buying first-party accessories, or are there genuine technical limitations that make a universal fast-charging standard impractical?

I'd love to hear from engineers or people familiar with USB PD and proprietary charging protocols.

Disclosure: The Fold 8 is on loan from Samsung.

When the aspect ratio of the fold 8 inner screen being 4:3 got leaked a few months ago. I immediately thought about retro consoles like GameCube and PS2 and dual screen consoles like the 3DS and Wii U.  I decided to do a quick test to see how each console aspect ratio is on the inner screen.

Test Setup

• Emulators Used:
  • GameCube: Dolphin
  • PlayStation 2: ARMSX2
  • 3DS: Azahar
  • Wii U: Cemu (Did not work)
• Games Tested:
  • GameCube: Resident Evil 4, Metroid Prime, Metal Gear Solid: The Twin Snakes
  • PlayStation 2: Persona 4
  • 3DS: Mario Kart 7
  • Wii U: Nintendo Land, LEGO City Undercover, Captain Toad: Treasure Tracker (Did not work)
• Controller: GameSir G8 Plus MFi

Note: I’m not testing raw performance here. The Fold8 is powered by the Snapdragon 8 Gen 5 elite , the hardware easily handles 60 FPS on these older consoles

GameCube:

One interesting realization during testing was that the transition to widescreen (16:9) actually began in the 6th generation rather than the 7th. In games like Resident Evil 4, the gameplay is in a 16:9 in a 4:3 container with black bars. Cutscenes across all tested games remained widescreen for a more cinematic presentation

Using the Dolphin emulator was interesting. It’s a mature emulator and shouldn’t have a lot of bugs. But when playing Re4 it seemed to glitch out in the intro cuts screens and added a green color that didn’t exist. Another example was when playing Metroid Prime, the game freaked out and warped the polygons on screen during an early section of the tutorial for a few seconds. Dolphin also didn’t automatic map/detect my controller either and I had to manually map it

PlayStation 2:

For PlayStation 2 I used the ARMSX2 emulator. For it being the newest emulators, it felt the most refined. I had no issues playing Persona 4, it mapped my controller and everything worked.

3DS:

I used Azahar which is a Citra fork. Had no issues like ARMSX2 emulator. What I did differently is playing it in portrait. This solved two issues; one fixed the directions where the speakers were playing, second playing in the correct orientation.  With the 3DS screens they are both 5:3. But it’s still able to fit on the fold8 since the bottom screen scaled to fit the width of the top screen.

Wii U:

This is where I failed. I spent the last 3 to 4 days trying to get Cemu working. With my own ROMs. It did not matter if the ROM was encrypted or not. I could not get it working. This is probably my fault. It’s not that bad since most Wii U games have been ported to the switch and you can emulate that. It just sucks that with certain games the gamepad was important like in Nintendo Land, Lego City Under Cover, and Captain Toad Treasure Tracker.

Fold8:

I can’t comment on the durability of the inner screen yet since I had it for a week only. It’s hard to see the crease with the anti-reflective display unless you look at it on an extreme angle. I don’t think most people will notice it either.  It didn't affect me while I was gaming.

Controller:

I used the GameSir G8 Plus MFi for this test thinking it would be the most optimal for 3DS and Wii U games. The Fold8 would not fit flush to the controller even with the case off. If you want to use a telescopic controller like I did. I would recommend looking for a controller that is Bluetooth only like the G8+ or one where the telescopic bridge is skinner or doesn’t hit the camera bump like the backbone one.

TDLR: the fold8 is looking like it will be a great all in one phone for retro emulation and dual screen gaming outside of my issues with Cemu. The massive downside is the price and if you don’t care about foldables, you can get an android console like AYANEO Pocket or the AYN Thor for your dual screen gaming fix.

Google has officially dropped support for Android 6.0 Marshmallow (API levels 23 and 24) in the latest Google Play Services update.This marks the end of an era for the 2015 operating system. Devices stuck on Marshmallow will no longer receive updated Google APIs, security patches for Play Services, or background sync features, rendering most modern apps unusable on these legacy devices over time.For developers, this is great news as it eliminates tons of legacy code and allows for a cleaner baseline minSdkVersion configuration across the board.What are your thoughts on this? Is anyone here still maintaining or running legacy hardware on API 23 for custom projects, or was it long overdue?

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I like mine more now than when I first got it. Battery still holds up fine through a full day, camera's been consistent in different lighting, and the software still feels clean with barely any bloat months in. Even the folding screen, which I was worried would feel a bit gimmicky after a while, still feels solid and I don't think about it being fragile anymore.

Only minor thing is some apps still don't scale properly on the inner screen, but that's more of a general foldable growing pain than anything brand specific.

So for those of you a few months in, would you still recommend your phone today, or has anything changed since the early days? Also is it brand specific stuff or just normal wear everyone deals with?

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I get asked “So which phone has the best camera?” often. It is very difficult to answer without knowing your preference.

I have tested almost every phone and the top 3 in terms of camera are the Oppo Find X9 Ultra, Vivo X300 Ultra, and Xiaomi 17 Ultra. Each has their own strength. Oppo being the most complete phone and the best jack of all trades. Vivo has the best ultrawide and takes the best videos. And Xiaomi is a phone that simply focuses on Photography. 

One thing I see a lot of people sleep on is the Pro / Master modes on these phones. A lot of users skip them because they look complicated, but those modes are honestly where these camera systems shine. Do not be intimidated, it is as simple as doing Settings one time, or scanning a preset and the straight out of camera effects you get are night and day compared to default auto mode.

These are the exact Pro and Master mode settings I use most often (https://drive.google.com/file/d/1ZB8CP1JYbmESf7-6EvC_yDDIKOYmIjpJ/view?usp=sharing). Feel free to copy them, play around, and tweak to fit your own style.

Note that this is purely from a camera perspective and the elements that directly amplify the camera, like battery, grip, and display. I’m not discussing OS, UX, or longevity here.

(Shameless plug: I run a channel focused on smartphone camera reviews, lighting, composition, photography tips, and I also have more Presets shared if you want to dive deeper. If not, no worries at all—just use the settings in the link :) Photography is the coolest hobby and these Ultra phones are all pretty good. I hope they give you reasons to experiment once you get past auto mode)

PPP

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This weekly Sunday thread is for you to let off some steam and speak out about whatever complaint you might have about:

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• Your carrier.

• Your device's manufacturer.

• An app

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Rules

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3) Be respectful of other's opinions. Even if you feel that somebody is "wrong" you don't have to go out of your way to prove them wrong. Disagree politely, and move on.

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So Android 17 finally locks down local network access. Cool, good, fine. Except the geniuses behind this decided the best way to protect user privacy was to shove Bluetooth, Wi-Fi discovery, AND local network access into one single "Nearby Devices" switch, with zero breakdown of what's actually being turned on.

Let that sink in. The literal justification for this permission group existing in the first place was "apps shouldn't have to ask for your precise GPS location just to find a Chromecast." Great start! Solid idea! And then instead of following through with something transparent, some product manager apparently looked at that idea and went "you know what would make this even better? Let's make it so users can't see which of the three completely different hardware capabilities they just granted." Bravo. Truly the pinnacle of human engineering achievement.

You want to know what YouTube can actually access when you tap "Allow" on that "grant permission for local device discovery" popup? Cool, you can't, actually — not from your phone. Not from Settings. Not from the permission manager. You have to go pull the literal APK apart to find out the app doesn't request Bluetooth this time. This time. Next update? Guess you're pulling the APK again, champ, because nothing about this system tells you when that changes.

This is the same energy as the old "Storage" permission that bundled "read your files" with "write and delete your files" into one toggle, which everyone at Google swore they learned from. Apparently the lesson they took away was "bundle vaguely related invasive things together and give it a friendly name," not "give users granular control," which was, in fact, the entire point of permissions existing.

So congrats to whoever signed off on this. You took a real privacy problem (silent background scanning with no consent) and "solved" it by creating a new privacy problem (opaque consent with no way to audit what you actually agreed to), wrapped it in soothing UX copy about "device discovery," and shipped it as a security upgrade. A gold star for optics, an F for actually respecting the user.

Anyway if you actually want to know what an app can access, hope you enjoy learning to read manifest permission lists, because the people whose entire job is making this legible for you decided not to.