Anyone else get bored and randomly try built in Samsung apps?

[Dooki]

every time there is an update to the phone I try to see if the samsung apps got improved on. Email, messages, touch wiz, notes. Even the downloadable ones like S note are just not good enough. They get better but still seem a few generations behind.
Email has terrible sync problems and can't delete from notification bar. Gmail just works.
Messages has gotten a lot better but still isn't as good as Textra. I can't remember why I keep going back to Textra but it takes about a day of using messages for me to go back. It's almost there.
Notes is way to basic and can only be shared between Samsung phones, so I use Keep. Simple and it works good.
Touchwiz has gotten better but it still seems like they keep the designers in a box and only allow them to test against iphones. No continuous home screen scrolling. Can't resize home screen beyond 4x wide because a lot of widgets can't be resized. It is, however, very stable. I loaded the S8 TW apk and it is a HUGE upgrade over the S7. But it is still not Nova.

Samsung has absolutely gotten better but after using other phones it seems like they don't have any designers that have an imagination. My Moto G5+ has a far better fingerprint scanner, twist to open camera, shake to turn on flashlight. Doesn't block OK google from a lock screen. You can change the options to remove the on screen buttons and swipe left on the FP scanner to go back and right to open multi window.

This isn't a knock on Samsung because they have come a LONG way since my Note 3 and S5, a very long way. Sometimes I wish Samsung would stop trying to be apple and start being android. If I could use Samsung pay on a different phone and have wireless charging I might jump ship. Google pixel software in an s8 frame with samsung pay, yum.

 

[rcrew9]

Even the apps designed with a specific Samsung version suck. Photobucket for Samsung sucks far worse then the regular Photobucket app. Same with CNN.

 

[Dooki]

photobucket is still around? I wonder if my account is still active. Two samsung apps I do like are calender and internet. Calender has a nice widget and interfaces perfectly with google calender and internet is faster plus it has fingerprint login.

 

[stmax]

Have to agree... I really want to use stock apps to try to keep my device clean. I do use the messages app but that's it.

I think now part of the problem is that inter-integration amongst Google products is almost unbeatable... Eg. I now get an email from my airline and it is automatically showing in my Trip bundle in Google Inbox and full flight details in my calendar.

I use Google Assistant to set myself a reminder and it shows up in Google calendar.

One reason why I still try the Samsung apps though is that I like the subdued look and feel. I wish google products weren't so cartoony.

 

[L0n3N1nja]

Samsung used to support the continuous home screen scrolling, S3/Note2 had it, they removed it at some point.

I use the browser, keyboard, calculator, that's about it.

 

[Inders99]

I use the browser, I find it easier and faster than Chrome.

 

[b.mike]

I have tried a few calendars and like this stock the best. other than that and messages, I use mostly blackberry hub and associated apps.