The beauty of the Android ecosystem lies in its democracy. You don’t necessarily have to spend Rs 50,000 to get a top of the line Android experience. A phone like Motorola G4 Plus under Rs 15,000 gives you a near Stock Marshmallow experience, and almost all the software bells and whistles that Google delivers even in a flagship device. The software experience of the Operating System is quite consistent across price segments. Compare this to iOS, where you are forced to spend whatever price Apple dictates for every new iPhone. Agreed, previous generation iPhones get cheaper with the release of a new model, but they’re still obscenely priced.
There is a reason Apple’s market share in India, the world’s second-largest mobile phone market, is 2.5%. iPhone’s price is what keeps it premium but is also it biggest obstacle to market share expansion.
In the battle of speech-controlled virtual assistants, Apple might have fired the first salvo when it launched Siri. But with incredible innovations in successive generations, Google’s speech recognition is now smarter than ever. Plus, Google Now is way more all-encompassing than Siri. With Google Now On Tap a part of Android Nougat’s bouquet, I am waiting for the brand new range of Nexus/Pixel devices to blow our minds with the level of Artificial Intelligence automation that will be possible. Google India also has an Indian Language Lab, and that is the reason your accented English is still detected almost flawlessly when you use voice to search Youtube videos or make reminders on your Android phone. You can also do voice search in Hindi. Beat that, Tim Cook. Apple’s Siri is miles behind Google’s speech detection, especially for Indian accents.
Brand new widgets, Quick Reply features within Notifications, Multi-tasking, Google Allo, Duo, Now On Tap, Better Doze Mode for battery optimisation; the list is quite hefty when it comes to cool new features in Google’s latest flavour of Android, that will soon be updated on this year’s flagship devices.
There is increasing functionality that third-party widgets are going to bring to the experience, but Android has been doing this for more than a couple of years.
The combination of incredible camera sensor, lens and software on a Rs 22,000 Asus Zenfone 3, Xiaomi Mi5 or Rs 28,000 One Plus 3 makes one seriously question the need to spend double that on an Apple iPhone. Great photography apps? Android has that. Dual lens camera phones, LG G5 and Huawei P9? Got that. Water resistance? Android’s got it.
Snap that, Apple.
iTunes’ content library is still clumsy, its menu interface looks dated, and there just isn’t enough depth of local language content on Apple’s iTunes library. The world of third party OTT players such as HotStar, TVFPlay, Ditto TV, and NetFlix have made great content so accessible that you can very well watch the latest Game Of Thrones, Quantico or TVF Triplings video on a Rs 10,000 Android phone. Of course, all these apps are available on Apple’s iPhones but hey, why spend Rs 60,000 on expensive hardware when the content is easily accessible on a much more reasonable device too?
With devices that focus on bringing local language and regional support for millions of Indians whose first language is not English, Android is making deep inroads into every common man’s pockets.
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