1 00:00:00,000 --> 00:00:03,520 Show them what you did. I bought an iPhone 17 Pro Max. 2 00:00:03,520 --> 00:00:07,240 Yeah, and the worst part is the reason. For what? 3 00:00:07,240 --> 00:00:11,120 So Zoomer streamers wouldn't make fun of you when you go to exchange contact information? 4 00:00:11,120 --> 00:00:15,240 That is not the only reason. It was the biggest one. And the worst part, 5 00:00:15,240 --> 00:00:18,480 is he pulled the trigger on this thing just two weeks 6 00:00:18,480 --> 00:00:21,880 before Google announced that Pixel phones will be supporting AirDrop, 7 00:00:21,880 --> 00:00:24,960 making it more convenient than ever to socialize cross-platform. 8 00:00:24,960 --> 00:00:30,360 Adding insult to entry, just weeks later, the Samsung trifold 9 00:00:30,360 --> 00:00:33,360 that he waited four years for finally dropped. 10 00:00:33,360 --> 00:00:37,920 Dude, the look on your face was, yeah, that one. 11 00:00:37,920 --> 00:00:41,760 But as crazy as it sounds, I actually don't regret my decision. 12 00:00:41,760 --> 00:00:45,120 I know many of you out there may not love Apple's business practices. 13 00:00:45,120 --> 00:00:50,960 And to be fair, yeah, neither do I. But I find myself really appreciating 14 00:00:50,960 --> 00:00:55,760 some of the quality of life features. And I wanted to give you guys my personal perspective 15 00:00:55,760 --> 00:01:00,520 on why the social aspects of the iPhone go a lot deeper than bubble colors, 16 00:01:00,520 --> 00:01:04,160 and why it's gonna be really hard for Android to win me back. 17 00:01:04,160 --> 00:01:09,000 Again, even if I did buy this like one month before my dream Android device was announced. 18 00:01:09,000 --> 00:01:12,640 Man, I really did buy this at the worst time, didn't I? Yeah. 19 00:01:12,640 --> 00:01:16,240 But it's the best time to segue. Not quite. 20 00:01:16,240 --> 00:01:20,000 Oh. You could have done it in August. Oh. That would have been slightly worse. 21 00:01:20,000 --> 00:01:24,480 That's true. But it's the best time to segue. 22 00:01:24,480 --> 00:01:27,600 To our sponsor. No story is complete 23 00:01:27,600 --> 00:01:32,880 without the who, what, where, when, and why, though. Let's talk about all of that, just not in that order. 24 00:01:32,880 --> 00:01:36,200 See you later. The TLDR is that I was looking for something fresher. 25 00:01:36,200 --> 00:01:40,440 My OnePlus 11 was fine, but I really did miss being on something cutting edge, 26 00:01:40,440 --> 00:01:45,000 whether it was because of a better camera or even some fun gimmick like my Fold 4 had. 27 00:01:45,000 --> 00:01:49,720 But the biggest thing that actually pushed me to iPhone was the social experience. 28 00:01:49,720 --> 00:01:54,000 Last October, I got to go down to TwitchCon for the first time. And as dumb as this is going to sound, 29 00:01:54,000 --> 00:02:00,480 to many of you, my Android device actually held back my networking efforts multiple times. 30 00:02:00,480 --> 00:02:05,080 Oh, hey, I'd spark up a conversation. We'd talk about a collaborative effort in the future. 31 00:02:05,080 --> 00:02:08,480 We'd hold out our phones to AirDrop, and I had to be the awkward, 32 00:02:08,480 --> 00:02:12,280 hey, can you just actually type your number into my phone? Thanks. 33 00:02:12,280 --> 00:02:16,240 Well, no one refused to give me their number. I could immediately tell, though, 34 00:02:16,240 --> 00:02:20,000 that I was kind of coming across as a bit of a burden. 35 00:02:20,000 --> 00:02:25,760 Thanks. I did find some techie workarounds. I actually set my wallpaper to my Discord QR code. 36 00:02:25,760 --> 00:02:31,040 But sometimes people had issues with that, too. QR codes are a little less ubiquitous in North America. 37 00:02:31,040 --> 00:02:35,520 And let's face it, us Zoomers aren't exactly known right now for being super tech savvy. 38 00:02:35,520 --> 00:02:39,680 Of course, that wasn't enough to convince me to join the herd. 39 00:02:39,680 --> 00:02:43,360 It was all of the other boxes that Apple also ticked. 40 00:02:43,360 --> 00:02:46,480 This generation of iPhone, even Linus admitted, 41 00:02:46,480 --> 00:02:50,560 is an incredibly complete package, pretty much top to bottom. 42 00:02:50,560 --> 00:02:54,560 So after that trip, I did it. I went out and bought this phone. 43 00:02:54,560 --> 00:03:00,280 And I was actually so excited that I also picked up a base 17 as a birthday present for my wife 44 00:03:00,280 --> 00:03:04,440 to replace her aging 12 mini. Then I got home, grabbed some dinner, 45 00:03:04,440 --> 00:03:08,440 and some hard to swallow pills. Because it took me, I kid you not, 46 00:03:08,440 --> 00:03:13,440 over 48 hours to finally get this device fully set up. 47 00:03:14,240 --> 00:03:18,080 And this is where the what comes in. Because I was constantly asking, 48 00:03:18,080 --> 00:03:22,800 what the fuck is Apple doing? Just like Linus, I struggled to get the move 49 00:03:22,800 --> 00:03:26,520 to iOS app to do anything. And it wasn't for a lack of trying. 50 00:03:26,520 --> 00:03:32,720 One time, my Android overheated and it shut down. Other times, it took so long that both phones died 51 00:03:32,720 --> 00:03:39,120 mid-transfer. And then there was the time that it got stuck at the one minute remaining mark for several hours. 52 00:03:39,120 --> 00:03:42,920 When I complained about this on Twitter, I had several people saying I was either fabricating 53 00:03:42,920 --> 00:03:46,120 this story for clicks or this was a skill issue. 54 00:03:46,120 --> 00:03:50,360 Well excuse fucking me. All I did was follow the app instructions 55 00:03:50,360 --> 00:03:53,680 and at the time, I had no intention on this being a video. 56 00:03:53,680 --> 00:03:58,880 So why would I fake this for my own personal device? I did get some helpful comments saying, 57 00:03:58,880 --> 00:04:04,240 it's just broken on certain flavors of Android. And honestly, if that's the case, I get it. 58 00:04:04,240 --> 00:04:09,400 The fragmentation of the Android ecosystem is one of the greatest weaknesses. 59 00:04:09,400 --> 00:04:13,600 Which I'm gonna get into a little bit later. But Apple should be the one telling me. 60 00:04:13,600 --> 00:04:16,840 If I open the app and it knows that it might not work, 61 00:04:16,840 --> 00:04:22,360 Apple should pop up a little warning. Eventually I had to give up and set everything up manually, 62 00:04:22,360 --> 00:04:26,920 which took about four hours. But it was kind of a blessing in disguise. 63 00:04:26,920 --> 00:04:31,440 Because during that time, I started to understand where people are coming from when they speak 64 00:04:31,440 --> 00:04:35,880 so highly about the iPhone. For starters, it's really easy on the eyes. 65 00:04:35,880 --> 00:04:40,160 And whether you like it or not, the smooth transitions and the fun little animations 66 00:04:40,160 --> 00:04:45,800 that come with liquid glass really do make the device feel luxurious, even if it can make things 67 00:04:45,800 --> 00:04:49,800 take a little bit longer. The display is also incredible, 68 00:04:49,800 --> 00:04:53,040 especially with how dim it can get for some bedtime doom scrolling. 69 00:04:53,040 --> 00:04:56,600 And the battery has lasted me multiple days, 70 00:04:56,600 --> 00:05:00,560 multiple times. But it charges so fast that I basically 71 00:05:00,560 --> 00:05:04,240 don't really think about my battery during the work week when I can charge it in my car. 72 00:05:04,240 --> 00:05:09,080 Also, despite what I have been told for years about Apple, the customization seems on par, 73 00:05:09,080 --> 00:05:12,080 or even better than some Android devices that I've used. 74 00:05:12,080 --> 00:05:15,360 Which doesn't mean it can do everything that Android can though. 75 00:05:15,360 --> 00:05:20,960 A big one is it can't side load. I often hear people talk about how terrible it is 76 00:05:20,960 --> 00:05:27,040 that you can't do this on Apple devices. But then I realized I have never side loaded on Android. 77 00:05:27,040 --> 00:05:30,680 I just haven't needed to. And while there are tons of great reasons 78 00:05:30,680 --> 00:05:34,560 to side load something, not being able to has never held me back. 79 00:05:34,560 --> 00:05:38,200 And it probably won't hold me back in the future. And I found the same thing was true 80 00:05:38,200 --> 00:05:43,320 for most of the techie people in my life. So I concede that it is a selling point for Android. 81 00:05:43,320 --> 00:05:48,240 But I don't buy the narrative that not having it is a limitation of Apple. 82 00:05:48,240 --> 00:05:53,160 The second big one is the keyboard. To put it simply, Apple has the worst default keyboard 83 00:05:53,160 --> 00:05:57,320 I have ever used on a mobile phone. The amount of wasted space that could have been used 84 00:05:57,320 --> 00:06:00,560 to have larger keys or more functions on the top layer 85 00:06:00,560 --> 00:06:05,120 drives me nuts. And my Canadian homie Justin Bieber nailed this one. 86 00:06:05,120 --> 00:06:11,840 The fact that they put the dictation key in the exact same spot as the send button 87 00:06:11,880 --> 00:06:15,640 in a text message is downright unacceptable. 88 00:06:15,640 --> 00:06:20,200 I know it's such a minor thing, but the amount of times that I have hit it by accident 89 00:06:20,200 --> 00:06:24,920 tells me for certain that if anyone at Apple actually uses this keyboard, 90 00:06:24,920 --> 00:06:29,000 they must know that this is a problem. And I know that I could probably download 91 00:06:29,000 --> 00:06:32,440 a third party keyboard to get some of the functionality I'm missing. 92 00:06:32,440 --> 00:06:37,400 But I never felt like I needed to replace Gboard. So I think this is a fair criticism. 93 00:06:37,400 --> 00:06:42,800 Another thing that drives me nuts is having three separate actions for swiping down. 94 00:06:42,800 --> 00:06:46,600 The middle pulls down apps and search, top left handles notifications, 95 00:06:46,600 --> 00:06:51,360 and top right brings down the control center. Really, you couldn't have just like moved one of these 96 00:06:51,360 --> 00:06:55,920 to a swipe up function. And even more annoyingly, if I swipe down the control center, 97 00:06:55,920 --> 00:06:59,280 I either have to swipe back up in the top right, 98 00:06:59,280 --> 00:07:03,560 which is not ergonomic, or tap. And I'm sure I'm gonna start a firestorm here, 99 00:07:03,560 --> 00:07:07,780 but it's the one place in iOS where tap is the gesture to go back. 100 00:07:07,780 --> 00:07:11,220 Instead of the other million back gestures that they have. 101 00:07:11,220 --> 00:07:16,260 It's so confusing. On a brighter note though, the camera is incredible. 102 00:07:16,260 --> 00:07:20,180 This right here is why these phones dominate 103 00:07:20,180 --> 00:07:23,820 and will continue to dominate the social media-dicted teen demographic. 104 00:07:23,820 --> 00:07:27,300 It's just easily the best camera I've ever used on a mobile device. 105 00:07:27,300 --> 00:07:32,700 No question. There are things I don't like. The default camera app feels too bare and not customizable 106 00:07:32,700 --> 00:07:36,860 and the camera button feels useless. And I press it on accident more times 107 00:07:36,860 --> 00:07:40,220 than I'd like to admit. But the third-party camera apps unlock layers 108 00:07:40,220 --> 00:07:43,580 of compatibility for this thing that is just hard to compete with. 109 00:07:43,580 --> 00:07:49,580 A huge part as to why the camera can be so much better on an iPhone is simply down to how iOS interacts 110 00:07:49,580 --> 00:07:53,060 with the hardware. And the very nature of Android 111 00:07:53,060 --> 00:07:56,420 makes this kind of hard to replicate. Android is incredibly versatile 112 00:07:56,420 --> 00:08:02,060 and works across thousands of devices. Maybe even tens of thousands of different devices. 113 00:08:02,060 --> 00:08:07,000 But that means developers of each flavor need to work on bridging the gap between the various 114 00:08:07,000 --> 00:08:12,600 physical camera integrations and Android. This can lead to extra overhead, poor image processing, 115 00:08:12,600 --> 00:08:16,320 and maybe most importantly, an extremely inconsistent look 116 00:08:16,320 --> 00:08:21,240 and feel across the ecosystem. You can say Apple phones have good cameras, 117 00:08:21,240 --> 00:08:25,600 but you can't say with certainty that Android phones have good cameras. 118 00:08:25,600 --> 00:08:29,800 And I think that's a big problem, especially when we go a layer deeper 119 00:08:29,800 --> 00:08:33,280 and look at how third-party apps use the camera. 120 00:08:33,280 --> 00:08:36,800 A perfect example is this one. Compare these two Twitch streams that I did 121 00:08:36,800 --> 00:08:40,520 when I was down in San Diego. On the left, you can see Tubbo's POV 122 00:08:40,520 --> 00:08:44,300 where he is using his front-facing camera on his iPhone. 123 00:08:44,300 --> 00:08:49,160 It's pretty clean, right? And on the right, you can see my rear-facing camera, 124 00:08:49,160 --> 00:08:53,640 which in theory is a much better sensor than any selfie cam. 125 00:08:53,640 --> 00:08:57,160 It's okay, especially for a couple-year-old device. 126 00:08:57,160 --> 00:09:01,080 But my footage is the full-quality file 127 00:09:01,080 --> 00:09:06,960 that I downloaded off my phone. And Tubbo's is after Twitch compression 128 00:09:06,960 --> 00:09:11,760 and uploading it to YouTube. Somehow, his still looks better, 129 00:09:11,760 --> 00:09:16,080 even after passing through multiple dog-s**t encoding steps. 130 00:09:16,080 --> 00:09:19,280 And this leads me to the biggest reason that I bought an iPhone. 131 00:09:19,280 --> 00:09:23,400 It's the social experiences. You can say what you want about Apple's walled garden, 132 00:09:23,400 --> 00:09:27,720 but when people have been fully converted to it, it truly feels like magic. 133 00:09:27,720 --> 00:09:32,920 Whether it's the tapping to add people as context, seamless transition from AirPods to speakerphone, 134 00:09:32,920 --> 00:09:38,920 sharing locations with friends in iMessage, going from phone call to FaceTime in one button press 135 00:09:38,920 --> 00:09:42,440 without having to start a new call. And of course, AirDrop. 136 00:09:42,440 --> 00:09:46,880 Stop, stop, stop right there. I know you are gonna fire up your fancy, 137 00:09:46,880 --> 00:09:50,940 resizable, superior ducking keyboard and type, but Android has QuickShare. 138 00:09:50,940 --> 00:09:54,680 Wait, wait, wait, wait, wait. The difference is how Apple treats AirDrop 139 00:09:54,680 --> 00:09:58,320 versus how Android handles QuickShare. QuickShare's an afterthought, 140 00:09:58,320 --> 00:10:03,120 whereas Apple makes it a central part of their platform. And this kind of awareness matters. 141 00:10:03,120 --> 00:10:06,360 Even decade-long Android users will often struggle 142 00:10:06,360 --> 00:10:10,520 if I ask them to QuickShare a file with me. Almost all Apple people I know 143 00:10:10,520 --> 00:10:16,420 can immediately find AirDrop. Another key element of Apple's superior social experience 144 00:10:16,420 --> 00:10:20,980 is the apps. Brand new apps will often launch exclusively on iPhone. 145 00:10:20,980 --> 00:10:24,840 And even for well-established apps, iPhone users will often get new updates 146 00:10:24,840 --> 00:10:28,560 and features before the Android plebs. I found this to be especially true 147 00:10:28,560 --> 00:10:33,640 for content creator-focused features. Linus famously spent years calling out YouTube 148 00:10:33,640 --> 00:10:38,240 for supporting stories on iPhone, but not on many Android devices. 149 00:10:38,240 --> 00:10:43,840 And Instagram has a feature called Trial Reels, which allows you to post Reels to non-followers 150 00:10:43,840 --> 00:10:47,360 to get performance data before you share it with your followers. 151 00:10:47,360 --> 00:10:52,220 That's been out for a year, but on my OnePlus and even some Samsung devices 152 00:10:52,220 --> 00:10:56,320 still don't support that feature. I could go on and I could probably even go on 153 00:10:56,320 --> 00:11:01,400 for a whole separate video with examples like that. But I think what I've covered so far 154 00:11:01,400 --> 00:11:05,800 points to one big question. Who is this device for? 155 00:11:05,800 --> 00:11:10,320 And in my view, it's for two people. The first is the person who just wants a phone. 156 00:11:10,320 --> 00:11:14,280 They don't care about side loading. They don't care that Apple has them in a chokehold. 157 00:11:14,280 --> 00:11:17,880 They might even like it. I won't judge. We're all into some weird stuff. 158 00:11:17,880 --> 00:11:22,840 But when you look at it from that perspective, it makes sense why Apple's keynotes focus on things 159 00:11:22,840 --> 00:11:27,160 like the camera, the body, the colors, or even liquid glass, 160 00:11:27,160 --> 00:11:30,760 and leave only 30 seconds to talk about real tech shit that matters, 161 00:11:30,760 --> 00:11:33,860 like how fast the USB-C port can transfer data. 162 00:11:33,860 --> 00:11:37,200 The second is for people like me, a content creator. 163 00:11:37,200 --> 00:11:40,800 And before you get mad, I'm not saying that content creators can't 164 00:11:40,800 --> 00:11:45,120 get their work done on other devices. It's just that between the apps getting new features first, 165 00:11:45,120 --> 00:11:49,160 sharing video files easily with Airdrop, tapping contacts at a quick meetup, 166 00:11:49,160 --> 00:11:53,200 the iPhone prioritizes the features that people like me need it for. 167 00:11:53,200 --> 00:11:56,200 So then, when am I going to be switching back 168 00:11:56,200 --> 00:12:00,560 to an Android? To be honest, I don't think I ever will be. 169 00:12:00,560 --> 00:12:05,160 If anything, I'm actually kind of upset that I put off on getting an iPhone for so long. 170 00:12:05,160 --> 00:12:08,580 The only thing that might win me back is the Samsung tri-fold, 171 00:12:08,580 --> 00:12:12,940 which I finally got hands on with recently. And if Linus doesn't end up keeping it, 172 00:12:12,940 --> 00:12:16,540 maybe he'll let me do a 30-day review of it. And I'll tell you guys my thoughts. 173 00:12:16,540 --> 00:12:19,800 That might win me back. But that's gonna have to wait until I'm at least done 174 00:12:19,800 --> 00:12:25,200 telling you about our sponsor. If you guys enjoyed this video, go watch Linus's review of the iPhone 17 175 00:12:25,200 --> 00:12:29,680 to see where we agree and where we disagree. All you need to know is that I'm right. 176 00:12:29,680 --> 00:12:31,880 He's wrong. So like the video.