Tomorrow, September 21st, 2026, I will buy my first iPhone. For something that is just a normal, exciting purchase for most people, it comes with a surprising amount of baggage for me.
For many years, I have been a huge advocate for Android. I have owned the flagship phones, followed the technology, and really enjoyed watching how quickly Android advanced. Every year after an Apple event, I would inevitably laugh at some feature Apple was introducing that I’d already had for five years. I would make fun of people paying so much money for phones that, from my perspective at the time, seemed strangely behind.
Some of my old reasons for disliking Apple don’t really exist anymore. Apple has changed, Android has changed, and I have changed. Some of those reasons still exist, but when I think about the last few years, those differences aren’t what kept me from switching, and they aren’t what made me decide to jump ship either.
The reality is ~90% of how I use my phone today is platform-agnostic. I need my applications, messages, email, camera, maps, social media, banking, and music. As long as the phone is fast, has a good screen, takes great photos, and runs my apps properly, most of my daily use is going to look exactly the same.
There is still that other 10%, and I know there are things I am going to miss.
One of the biggest is Android’s on-screen translation. I can translate almost anything inside almost any application without leaving what I am doing, which I use all the time (estoy aprendiendo español). I’ll also miss the freedom to download an APK and install an application from anywhere, or swap out my launcher to completely change the look and behavior of my phone. I could generally mess around with Android in ways that Apple simply doesn’t allow, or at least, not easily.
There are things I will gain, too. The camera quality of recent iPhones is excellent, a lot of apps push their new features to iOS first, and yes, I need Flighty. But none of those factors really explain why I’m doing this.
This year, on September 9th at 10:00 AM California time, I sat down with a best friends (hi Jason 👋) to watch the Apple event. Afterward, I watched highlights of previous keynotes, and an idea I’d been turning over for a few months got it final approval stamp.
A big theme of these events is showing how everything exists in harmony. There is a massive emphasis on how the phone, the watch, the Mac, and the earbuds all feel like parts of the exact same environment. (The smooth transition on the Duo this year is a great example of it!)
I think this is what I have overlooked for years. I was always evaluating individual devices: Is this phone more advanced than my Android? Does it have a feature Samsung had four years ago? Can this watch beat that watch?
But when you zoom out, Apple is telling a different story, and I don’t really see another company executing it at the same level. Samsung may be close, but this is not Korea. I could replicate almost all of the things Apple showed me using Android, but I wouldn’t actually get the same experience.
With Android, you’re dealing with different companies, manufacturers, software versions, and communication protocols. My television might run LG webOS, my phone could be Samsung, my computer might be Windows. They communicate somehow, but versions change, one gets updated while another doesn’t, and occasionally they just stop talking to each other the way they used to.
When I switch to an iPhone, my phone naturally becomes part of my MacBook Air (amazing laptop, by the way). I can receive an OTP code in Messages and use it directly on the Mac without picking up my phone. I can move files between devices without thinking about how it’s happening, cast to the Apple TV effortlessly, and my earbuds just move with me. Messages behave identically wherever I am, and seeing an actual photo reaction instead of a text saying someone “❤️ an image” contributes to the feeling that this is all one unified system (greentext-problems).
The real value is the experience created when they all work together. Watching the event this year, I think I finally understood what Apple has been trying to sell all along: the possibility that all your technology could become a single environment.
I still like Android. I still think it does some things better, and I am probably going to complain the first time I try to do something on my iPhone that took two seconds on my Pixel. I will probably watch an Apple event three years from now where they proudly announce a feature Android has had since 2024, and I will roll my eyes.
I am okay with that, because I’ve spent years looking at Apple strictly based on what each isolated device can do, while Apple has been designing around what happens when all your devices belong to the same world. Right now, that world is something I want to experience. So tomorrow, I am going to Portland to buy my first iPhone. It feels strangely significant for what is ultimately just a phone, but I suppose that’s the point: I’m not just adding another piece of hardware to my life, I want to see what happens when the phone actually becomes part of everything else.
P.S. It is a Thought-provoking coincidence how a decision like this mirrors the broader season of my life right now. I am coming to understand more and more how much power there is in making peace with boundaries and recognizing that my energy and cognitive effort are finite resources.
There is a quiet sense of security, and a profound sustainability, that emerges when we step back and regain perspective. It is so easy to become preoccupied with managing every isolated piece of our lives that we lose sight of the larger design. Lately, I have been trying to step back and experience that bigger picture.
Letting go of the need to constantly tinker with everything, and instead allowing a thoughtful, structured system to carry some of the load, is a skill worth developing. It frees you to become the author of the parts of your story that matter most to you.
🪜 Fun Fact: My favorite cardio machine is the step machine. It's a great mixture of strength and cardio and engages many core muscles!