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iPhone user to Pixel 3 - Let's talk phones
Hello, ~tech!
I've been really interested in the Google Pixel 3 (non XL) for quite some time, mainly due to my boredom of the Apple ecosystem. I've been primarily an iPhone user since 2014 (currently stuck on the iPhone 6S) and I've recently been eager to make a switch to Android. The Pixel 3 seems to be exactly what I'm looking for. Stock Android experience, a beautiful camera, modern device, and I'm already pretty integrated into Google's ecosystem of services, and I feel the transition will be very smooth.
So, for any Google Pixel 3 users, non XL or otherwise, what do you love and/or hate about your device? Were you in my shoes as well?
The pixel 3, like most high-end phones, doesn't differ too much from other high-end phones other than the camera. If you care about the camera on your phone, the pixel 3 is the best phone on the market, hands down. The major hardware differences between your phone and the pixel 3 is the lack of a headphone jack, USB C instead of whatever port the iPhone 6S uses, and a large notch at the top of the display (many people aren't a huge fan of this).
Other than this, the major differences will be in software, but in my opinion, there isn't a huge difference here either. The play store has equivalents for nearly every iOS app available, all at a similar level of quality (although iOS apps have a propensity to be more polished). If you care about control over your device, android has a much better selection of apps. F-Droid, for example, is an alternative app store that only has FOSS apps. The pixel 3 has a relatively controversial (within the android enthusiast community) gesture control system, which isn't disable-able iirc.
My recommendation would be an S9, as it has more software control (ironic, given the fact that stock android used to be the best for this), and has a headphone jack. However you can't really go wrong with any premium phone, in the end, you're just going to be comparing small differences that probably won't be affecting your experience too much.
I have played with an S9 and S9+ and both of those phones feel really good in the hands and the screens look amazing. My biggest concern with the Galaxy phones are the bloat, specifically the loads of software and even hardware features they add. For instance, the Bixby button on the side of the phone seems redundant to me. Its hard-coded to Bixby only, and Bixby itself isn't the most reliable smart assistant, from what I heard.
Software-wise, it seems overloaded with little features, which is by no means a bad thing, I just personally don't see myself using a lot of them. The customization piques my interest, solely because that's one of my biggest complaints with iOS.
Admittedly, the camera isn't my biggest selling point for a phone. Though with one like Pixel 3's, I may find myself indulging my inner photographer a lot more.
Thanks for the insight! Really useful information you provided. I'll definitely keep a close eye on the S9 phones and do my research.
If you're okay with getting a bit more advanced than the average user, you could always root the S9, install a custom ROM and have whatever software you want. I personally recommend lineage OS. It's very close to stock with a few extra useful features (one of my favorites is built in support for using the volume buttons to move your cursor), runs well and it's open source.
Is the S9 actually rootable? I moved over from the S4 to google phones because after the S4 nothing was rootable at the time or took ages for a root to come out.
Here
It's the 3 XL that has the notch, not the regular 3.
Something about the Pixel phones that often gets ignored in discussions is how it feels. It's one of the secrets to the iPhone always feeling more high end than their spec sheets have historically suggested, and it's a lesson Google learned when they first launched the Pixel line. There is care put into how the hardware and the software work together to create a feeling of cohesion that, generally, isn't found in most other Android phones. I would dare say the iPhone always felt better than Androids until the Pixel released.
That's not to say any other manufacturer doesn't do it well either, but until you get your hands on these phones, you'll always be missing a rather important aspect of consideration. For example, someone on reddit recently posted a video to show that the OnePlus 6T has the lowest touch latency out of any phone, and it was in direct comparison to the Pixel 3. And yes, the 6T did respond to suddenly switching from swiping up to down slightly faster, but what was also apparent was that the Pixel had a much smoother motion and feeling of inertia to it.
Also, I can't really say enough about the stock Android experience. I've toyed with a few different manufacturer's versions of Android and, outside of maybe Motorola's or OnePlus' implementations, I've found them all unacceptable. For example, I really dislike Samsung's TouchWiz, and Bixby, and that they lock certain applications to the OS (like Facebook), and it's the only reason why I can never bring myself to go back and try Samsung back out. Stock Android (and some lightly modified versions of it) are always smoother, snappier, and more upgradable when the new versions roll around, than OEM modified versions. A year old Samsung feels much slower to me than a year old Pixel. I enjoy stock Android to the point where I refuse to consider any OEM version anymore. In my experience, I've always wound up burned by their slow updates two years down the line.
I've been planning to go to my local cellular provider store or to Best Buy/Target to play with the Pixel 3. From video reviews I've watched and otherwise, almost all say the phone feels very good in the hands and the user experience is pretty well handled. Which is a main issue I have with my iPhone 6S. It's 3 generations old and it FEELS like it too. I've wanted to move to Android for a while and I think stock Android is the best place to start, and Pixel phones, obviously, are much snappier in terms of performance.
What you said about the Samsung phones is actually my biggest worry about considering those phones. From what I've been shown and told by friends with these devices, they slow down pretty significantly after about a year and usually are way out of date with Android security updates.