IPhone 6S Plus versus Note 5: my experience side-by-side and dilemma

[burwil]

I don't hold to the idea that the iPhone is bug free. It isn't by my experience. Most aftermarket browsers don't work or don't work for long (before they crash). Some apps simply don't open (Quicken for example). My keyboard would often disappear, almost always related to a lack of memory. Clearing all apps fixed things. BTW while I owned my Plus you couldn't close all apps at once. You could do at the most three at a time....depending on how dexterous you are. I had to restart my Plus several times. I have a feeling that adding 1 GB of memory to the Plus fixed some things. The Plus in its original form was definitely more laggy than the Note 5. But......Apple wanted to create an upgrade path (for $$$$ of course) to future phones so they gimped the Plus with just 1 gb. Not just my opinion as evidenced by all the complaints on the iMore and MacRumors boards.

 

[EnemiesInTheEnd]

It's no surprise that the Note 5 doesn't perform as well during games and the battery life doesn't last as long as the 6S Plus because the Note 5 display is pushing twice as many pixels than the 6S Plus.

 

[wlonsdale]

If you're talking about performance, you should go with the Windows phone.

 

[chaos88dragon]

I found your post to be quite interesting. I've never owned an Apple device, always been with Android. I agree, Android has had some growing pains that needed to be sorted out throughout the years. Even today, there are issues that need to be addressed. I currently own a Note 5. I recently bought it and was tempted to finally own an iPhone, but for the fact that you mentioned, Android is more open and provides more options. There's a device practically for everyone. You want front facing speakers, go with an M9 or Nexus 6P. Want productivity, go with Note 5, want to customize your phone and truly make it your own, go with Moto X, etc. I digress, Android gives the user the possibility of making their phone their own. I have played with my Wife's iPhone 6s Plus and found it to be a great device that is optimally created well to run almost flawlessly. But, I just can't get past the fact that Apple will only let you go so far till you reach the wall and have to play nice with their software. I can't truly differentiate my phone from the next iPhone user. I also agree, the Note 5 and the Galaxy S6 (which I previously owned on T-Mobile, now I'm on Sprint) have bad some serious battery drain issues. Many are most likey attributed to bloatware for sure. I disabled some of the bloatware that I dont need and I guess with time my phone was optimized to my use and haven't seen huge draining anymore. Obviously, everyone is going to have a different experience since people use their phones differently. But this does not represent Android as a whole. You want the latest and greatest, try a Nexus 6p. The RAM issue that plagues many Android devices has now been resolved with Marshmallow update. Why it took Google this long, not too sure, but at least there's a fix. The performance is another thing, you are basing your experience through a Note 5 with tons of bloatware, that can also be the culprit. I have owned many Nexus devices and the "pure stock" performance has never failed me. I don't think the performance problems you mentioned are because of Google's "bad programing." Remember, when you have a non-nexus device and add more on top of Android, no matter what RAM or processor you put in the device you're bound to see some sort of issue or even minor nuisances. So far, I have been having great performance and average battery life on my Note 5. My guess is, if battery and performance is that much of a concern, I would stick with iPhone 6S Plus. Each Android device is different and will run differentluly. This is why people say fragmentation is a problem, but I see it as options being presented to the end user. You have a plethora of devices that can suit your needs. Personally, if you want to still give Android a shot, try out the Nexus 6p.

Posted via Carlito's Note 5

 

[RC51 RIDER]

I purchased the 6s plus and my girl had the Note5 and my issue with the 6s plus was

The screen was not as bright
The back button was on the top left
Gmail had no colored icons
It didn't have a full keyboard
Despite being a longer phone it has huge bezels that take up the screen
The battery was so so

I ended up getting a NOTE 5

Posted via the Android Central App RC51 RIDER W/ NOTE 5

 

[Chris Vizzini]

I think you mentioned that had the Verizon variant of the Note 5. I would agree with you on almost all counts. They simply did a terrible job at optimizing.

After happily using the N5 on AT&T since launch, I thought I'd give Verizon a chance. I was running back to AT&T within a week the performance was just that bad on Verizon. Cell standby being the number one drain? Never had any lag or battery drain on AT&T. That was insane to me. And disabling all the features the make a smartphone a smartphone is not a good answer.

I wish you had gotten to try out the Note 5 on carrier that did better with optimizations. I think you might have had a much different experience. I understand the T-mobile version runs very well too.

 

[Sinistry]

Be very cautious and do your research before trying to root. I have an AT&T variant and recently discovered that it can't be rooted at the moment. Apparently the AT&T & Verizon variants have an additional mechanism that doesn't allow the device to boot if rooted. I've spoken to a t-mobile variant owner who has rooted successfully and have seen several online videos of the process for that variant. This was a huge bummer for me that I hope gets resolved soon but has turned me off of samsung. I previously bought strictly iphone and do prefer the note 5 to Apple products because of the ability customize out of the box but I still don't have "admin" control over my device and that irritates me to no end.

Posted via the Android Central App

 

[sp44]

The reason I picked the iPhone 6s Plus was the efficiency of the OS and battery life. I've had many Android phones of late. I don't understand having a high res screen and making the battery smaller. I don't understand removing bloat and adjusting everything to get better battery life. I don't understand why it takes so long to get updates. Take the damn carrier out the equation! Having a fast charger is great but not if I have to use it a lot.

 

[kj11]

The one thing that keeps me away from iOS is their terrible keyboard. How come no one notices an extra tap required to enter a punctuation! This can be somewhat circumvented by a third party keyboard but still on certain apps the default Apple keyboard still manages to pop up. I type a lot of stuff on my phones/tablets and this particular issue just drives me bananas.

Right!? And I installed SwiftKey on my iPad thinking that would help as I prefer to swipe, but that's garbage too

 

[Dukins]

Right!? And I installed SwiftKey on my iPad thinking that would help as I prefer to swipe, but that's garbage too

The keyboard doesn't switch on iphones when switching to 3rd party keyboards. You have to go to Settings > General > Keyboard > Check Keyboard > Edit > Remove English Keyboard. Swiftkey will be your default for all apps. The original iphone keyboard can be returned at any time.

I picked the 6s+ over the Note 5 primarily because the battery on the Verizon version is horiffic and the screen is too saturated. Colors are off. Ill check for the Note 6.

 

[dpham00]

The keyboard doesn't switch on iphones when switching to 3rd party keyboards. You have to go to Settings > General > Keyboard > Check Keyboard > Edit > Remove English Keyboard. Swiftkey will be your default for all apps. The original iphone keyboard can be returned at any time.

I picked the 6s+ over the Note 5 primarily because the battery on the Verizon version is horiffic and the screen is too saturated. Colors are off. Ill check for the Note 6.

I get good battery life on my Verizon Samsung Galaxy Note 5. The iPhone 6s Plus does get a little better battery life, but in my experience also kicks active apps out of memory, which is very annoying.

 

[burwil]

The keyboard doesn't switch on iphones when switching to 3rd party keyboards. You have to go to Settings > General > Keyboard > Check Keyboard > Edit > Remove English Keyboard. Swiftkey will be your default for all apps. The original iphone keyboard can be returned at any time.

I picked the 6s+ over the Note 5 primarily because the battery on the Verizon version is horiffic and the screen is too saturated. Colors are off. Ill check for the Note 6.

Swipe implementation on iOS is quite bad. Read: inaccurate. No matter which variant you try. You might as well just stick with stock. BTW, I tried a 5 as part of T Mobile's free trial. I have no idea how they gained the skill to peck at that tiny keyboard. At least the 6 Plus was a big target.

 

[mayconvert]

Unless you just don't want to spend money to own two phones. having both is the best thing ever.
email on iPhone smokes anything any android phone offers. and you don't have to have 2 separate email apps on iOS.
Both have some good and bad. I do agree apps are simply better on iOS. I have both iPhone 6 and Note 5.
When you get bored with one, throw sim in the other and go. I have both of mine active and carry both.
If you don't like the over saturation, samsung has multiple settings for the screen that sets it very color accurate.

 

[Almeuit]

Unless you just don't want to spend money to own two phones. having both is the best thing ever.
email on iPhone smokes anything any android phone offers. and you don't have to have 2 separate email apps on iOS.
Both have some good and bad. I do agree apps are simply better on iOS. I have both iPhone 6 and Note 5.
When you get bored with one, throw sim in the other and go. I have both of mine active and carry both.
If you don't like the over saturation, samsung has multiple settings for the screen that sets it very color accurate.

On my 6P I have only one email (Gmail) and to be honest it functions the same for me on iOS as it does on my 6P. The Note has dupe apps due to Samsung wanting their own on the phone.

 

[dpham00]

Unless you just don't want to spend money to own two phones. having both is the best thing ever.
email on iPhone smokes anything any android phone offers. and you don't have to have 2 separate email apps on iOS.
Both have some good and bad. I do agree apps are simply better on iOS. I have both iPhone 6 and Note 5.
When you get bored with one, throw sim in the other and go. I have both of mine active and carry both.
If you don't like the over saturation, samsung has multiple settings for the screen that sets it very color accurate.

I find that the apps may be more refined in ios , however they are also more limited, for my needs :
[ ] Sometimes it takes a while after reading an email for the count tag to be reduced on the home screen*
[ ] Swiftkey keyboard cannot be resized,no number row,some security switches back to stock*
[ ] Gmail cannot be set to auto jump to the older email after deleting current email*
[ ] Stock email app can only be set to 15 minute fetch at the quickest for Gmail
[ ] No button to delete email in the in box in the stock app, must long press the archive button spps
[ ] Kick*apps*out of memory when running in the background . for example when downloading pictures from amazon photos, it will stop every 60 to 100 pictures or so and I would have to open the app again,youtube uploads stop when app isn't open.
[ ] No double click to open camera*
[ ] Gpm streaming stops occasionally*
[ ] Using Swiftkey,sometimes you can't see what you are typing as the keyboard blocks the screen where you are typing*
[ ] Cannot set the iPhone to switch to vibrate automatically when in a certain area(note 5 can do this with Tasker or similar*
[ ] If you use a lot of*apps*then the system would start to get laggy and crash prone . you can force close allapps*once in a while to help mitigate this,as well as shut off and re start the iPhone.
[ ] Also with a lot of*apps*in memory, background usage for uploading and downloading is severely limited. For example, Amazon photos or youtube can do some uploading in the background when all*appsare cleared from memory or when few*apps*are in memory. But once you have a lot of*apps*in memory, the*apps*need to be in the foreground to do uploading.*
[ ] Both amazon and Google photos has the option to upload only while charging on the note 5,but not on the iPhone.*

 

[burwil]

Quick note on apps... They are more expensive in iOS than Android, on the whole I don't think they are of better quality, and NO refunds. That last one really stinks since you are lucky if you get a freebie to see first. For example wish I never bought Dark Sky. Expensive. Like many iOS apps, style over substance. For the price you should be getting a complete weather app. You don't. Tough luck you bought it, no returns.

 

[onlysamsung6]

I have the note 5 i dont like iphone as you cant really do much i tend to download youtube videos music and paid apps for free straight to my phone and iphone you cants launchers widgets it limits you so much it sucks

 

[burwil]

Another note on apps on iOS. Sales are few and far between. Alot of apps ' go free.' Well after people have lost interest in them. Customer friendlessness.... A couple times in the days of the 15 minute review. I made an app purchase that normally isn't refundable. A quick call or email to Google, and they treat their customers well. Try that with rigid society iOS our-way-or-the-highway approach to customers. Good luck!

 

[dpham00]

Another note on apps on iOS. Sales are few and far between. Alot of apps ' go free.' Well after people have lost interest in them. Customer friendlessness.... A couple times in the days of the 15 minute review. I made an app purchase that normally isn't refundable. A quick call or email to Google, and they treat their customers well. Try that with rigid society iOS our-way-or-the-highway approach to customers. Good luck!

Google currently has a 2 hour return window. Also some times if you contact the dev, they will refund you if you go beyond the window, rather than risk the 1 star feedback.

https://support.google.com/googleplay/answer/2479637?hl=en

 

[dennisharrison]

Quick note on apps... They are more expensive in iOS than Android, on the whole I don't think they are of better quality, and NO refunds. That last one really stinks since you are lucky if you get a freebie to see first. For example wish I never bought Dark Sky. Expensive. Like many iOS apps, style over substance. For the price you should be getting a complete weather app. You don't. Tough luck you bought it, no returns.

I agree with you here. A note on Dark Sky, In southeast US it's 'simply useful', which is always a nice find for me. I will tell you that I feel nothing beats weather timeline on Android though, and the wear integration is fantastic. Both are powered by forecast.io (though weather timeline can also pull from other sources).