Android is struggling to keep its market share in the United States, as Apple continues to take over in the market. But, despite Android as a whole losing ground, Google Pixel phones are becoming a bigger slice of the US market.
Counterpoint Research reports that, in Q2 2023, US smartphone shipments dropped by 24% year-over-year. That includes both iPhones and Android phones, and virtually every brand saw a drop in shipments. Samsung saw US shipments drop by 37% while Motorola saw a 17% drop. TCL saw the biggest decline at just shy of 70% year-over-year, and even Apple saw a 6% drop.
As an iOS user the bloat on android is a huge turnoff for me.
I’d potentially switch to a Samsung if it didn’t have all that stuff pre installed on it.
It may be the second biggest reason I’m sticking with iOS. Of fact, if they got rid of bloat and iMessage was available on Android, I’d jump over in a second.
Well there’s your problem. You’re looking at Samsung phones.
Honestly, they’re one of the worst when it comes to bloatware. They do it because their devices are so popular that they can get away with it. Stick with a Pixel, and you can’t go wrong.
(BTW, what’s with iPhone users’ obsession with iMessage? Google Messages has the same capabilities. Not trying to hate; genuinely curious. If your only experience with texting on Android is with using whatever came with your device, then I understand why you’d prefer Apple’s implementation. That’s the whole appeal of Android: if you don’t like how a component works, you can swap it out.)
To answer the iMessage thing.
I’m from the states but live in a different country. It’s the easiest free way to stay in touch with family and friends.
A number of people have been like “just move to X and if they don’t follow, then forget about them.”
But it’s not really realistic to ask all the people I might contact throughout the year to switch to a new app in case I contact them.
So I truly feel locked in because of that.
Please elaborate further. What’s so special about iMessage that it can be used in other countries, but every single messaging app for Android can’t? Google Messages is free too. Again, not trying to hate. Just trying to understand.
I don’t know anyone who uses google messages and I’m not going to convince the 20 people on my group chat to switch to it since we only catch up a few times per year.
Random acquaintances that I contact a few times per year will also not bother to figure it out as it will just idle 9 months of the year.
It’s just a real roadblock that locked people into the platform.
Can you explain what you mean by bloatware? Do you mean all the apps the phones come installed with, or do you mean something else? Would it be simple to uninstall what you don’t want? Curious bc I have a Samsung phone.
Well here are a few examples.
I don’t like having Facebook and stuff on the phone. If I want the app, ill download it.
Secondly, I do not want multiple calendar apps and browsers on the phone by default.
I don’t need chrome and the Samsung browser.
I also do not think I need to setup a samsung account and a google account and have backups in both places.
I guess it’s just a little overwhelming.