I don't like that it's made by an advertising company, like the other commenter said. But more than that it's that it's wildly unpolished and inconsistent.

OEMs and carriers shove in their own apps (Samsung is especially bad about this: I don't want two apps for photos, and files, and messages, and calling, and browsing, etc etc). You can (sometimes) disable or uninstall them, but they can pop up again after updates, and I don't want to have to clean up my device just to use it.

And visually, apps look and feel radically different, all over the place. There are apps that still look like they're running on Jelly Bean, apps that use modern material designs, apps that roll their own UI, and web apps in wrappers. Every new app I have to learn how to use it. This is an occasional problem on iOS, but it's very rare compared to my experience with it on Android.

you should try an AOSP distro like GrapheneOS or CalyxOS

Operating system made by advertising company is why it's a deal breaker for me

GGP mentions "user experience" being "infinitely better". I don't think Android being made by an advertising company has much if anything to do with it.

I also don't see iOS and Android having much of a usability gap. At this point, they have very similar feature sets, and the UX is fairly well-polished, even on Android -- where yes, it took them a lot longer to get there. For the most part, if you think that either platform has bad UX, it's probably just because you've used the other one for so long, and you're used to it. (I don't think iPhone usability is bad, but on the rare occasion I do something on my wife's iPhone, I find it frustrating because it just works differently than my Android phone.)

At this point I think most (US; can't speak for other countries) iPhone users are there mainly because they've always been there, and there's fairly strong lock-in and switching costs. And iPhones are still something of a status symbol, not to mention unnecessary Apple-created problems like the "blue bubble envy" nonsense.

> iPhone users are there mainly because they've always been there, and there's fairly strong lock-in and switching costs

Or perhaps it's because we like iPhones?

shocker huh? After owning a few iPhones since 2007, I used and developed for Android for years after release in 2010. I despise it. I switched BACK to iPhone and fully embraced the ecosystem years ago (macOS, iOS, ipadOS) and haven't regretted one second of it. I AM an apple fan boy. Why? because i love using my devices and working within this ecosystem a hundred times more than any other options available. The anti-Apple cult is obnoxious. Just don't use them if you don't like them.

Agreed, for me it's idealogical not strictly technical. They both seem pretty functional

Don't search for "apple ad business" or you'll be very disappointed. :)

I am of course, but at least they have revenues not tied to spying. I'm not a corporate fanboy so all of this stuff disappoints me, just not going to make the perfect the enemy of the good