The war between iOS and Android is as old as Time itself. But, we’re not here to end that debate. To do that, we’d have to be naive enough to assume that we (or anybody else) has the ability to do that. But, we could do the next best thing, which is to help rival factions find a middle ground.
There are a lot of good apps for iOS that are not available on Android. And vice-versa. So here’s a list of third-party applications that work equally well on both the platforms. Let there be peace!
1. The King of Messaging
There’s no doubt that Apple’s native iMessage is leagues ahead of Google’s native messaging app. There’s also no doubt that hell would probably freeze over before iMessages came to Android.
Facebook Messenger is a good compromise.
- The Good: Everyone’s already on Facebook. You don’t have to convince anyone to get a new app.
- The Bad: Too many notifications ruin the fun.
- The Ugly: It’s a real drain on the battery.
Other alternatives: Of course, it’s Whatsapp!
2. Stalk Track your Friends and Family
A good alternative for iOS’ tracking app ‘Find My Friends’ is Familonet.
- The Good: Apart from the current location, it gives you various others options such as history and the amount of time spent at each location.
- The Bad: The other person will know you are tracking them.
- The Best: Supports both Android Wear and Apple Watch!
Other alternatives: Glympse provides many of the same features as Familonet.
3. Keep your photos safe!
Although it is not a third-party app, we’d still like to recommend Google Photos. Propelled by the insane power of the search engine overlord, this is a must-have app for both iOS and Android users. And it works seamlessly on both.
- The Good: Unlimited storage! You’ll have to let Google compress your photos a bit though. Small price to pay, we say.
- The Bad: Google is a data junkie. It’ll ask you all sorts of permissions. iOS users in particular might not be comfortable.
- The Scary: It’s really frightening how accurately their image recognition works. For example: You just type “food” in the search bar and it’ll pull up all the (and only the) photos of food from your library.
Other alternatives: Dropbox and OneDrive (from Microsoft) are quite good with photos as well.
At the end of the day, each platform is only a means to an end. Their goal is to make lives easier and hassle-free. Let’s stop quibbling which of them is able to do that better
Peace out!
