I have been having these long discussions with friends and colleagues about android and iOS. Which one is better? Which one has a better future? Which device to buy right now, IPhone or Android device? I have heard so many arguments, arguments from hard core android fans and arguments from apple fans.

I for one, believe iOS is in a very very good state as compared to android. Also, when we say iOS, we can assume the device and the OS as the same because of the integration apple provides. When it come to Android, we have to think of the OS separately and of device separately. But lets see what each of them has to offer.

For Developers?

When we talk about the developer view, we need to take care of 2 things. What all we can do and how easily we can do that?

Android is a clear winner in what all you can do. Being an open source, it provides such an environment that you can essentially do anything if your device permits it.

iOS is a restricted environment. Somethings are not meant to be changed because the OS is designed that way (read Flash, Any app which can be used to run other programs is not allowed). Apple has a screening process, so just because you developed an app doesn’t mean you can put it on App store. You need to follow some strict guidelines only then you can assume apple would approve your app.

iOS is a winner when it comes to how easily can you do something.

To start with, the toughest part being creating the UI experience. iOS development SDK provides you with a tool for interface building. A very easy to use and effective tool. MVC(Model-View-Controller) implementation might be a bit tricky to start with but is very effective as well. The code goes in Objective C which is just another OOP language and you tend to get used to it as you use it. Also since there are only a small set of devices with iOS, building an app on it takes a lot less of thinking as to what all devices you support.

Android lacks heavily in terms of UI experience. Without any standard interface builder, it is a haunting task to get your UI as you want it to look. Writing whole or part of views in XML might not suit all the users. The code goes in Java which is very well known. Also, with so many android devices in market, it might be a painful experience to figure out which all devices you want to support. And since the OS and device are not so well linked, you also have to think about the device specification when you are building an app.

For Users

For users, things boil down to ease of use, User experience and ability to do more.

iOS, for me, is the winner when it comes to ease of use. The devices with iOS gives you an easy feel to everything. Be it accessing things, be it closing things, be it downloading music and videos, be it downloading new apps, almost everything. For a person who is not very technical, iOS is far far easy to use then it android counterpart.

User experience, again iOS. This is true because of the tight integration between the device and the OS. This is an easy one, just try playing a game in android and same on iOS, the difference is visible. Also, android as a platform isnt as stable as iOS is. The apps on android arnt as stable as they are on iOS (read apple`s filtering process).

Ability to do more? This is tricky, mainly because android as a package does provides you more stuff to do. But iOS provides you more app to do search and use from. The difference isn’t very apparent. On the contrary, you can do almost anything on both the OS`s. You would find app for everything on both the platforms. As of now, you have many more devices to select from in android and many more app to select from in iOS. My vote goes to iOS, being more stable and with lot more apps.

Going Ahead

Both the platforms, iOS and android, have great future. iOS 5 has been announced and it includes lot of nice features. Android 3.1 (Ice cream sandwich) is out which is the first in line to supports both tablets and handsets. Though Android is behind iOS right now, i expect it to match iOS sooner than later. With contributions from everywhere, android is developing fast. We have Microsoft “Mango” coming. Mobile field is very exciting right now and rapidly progressing.

What to buy?

My vote goes to iOS mainly because of the tight integration. The iOS devices are high end when it comes to specs. The user experience is amazing as compared to only good for android. Android OS depends a lot on device hardware. Samsung has done some rights with Galaxy series. It basically boils down to

“Freedom of choice OR freedom from choice”

read

“Android OR iOS”