With Windows Phone 8.1 Microsoft’s OS
finally became as full featured as its rivals,
which along with its stylish, unique design
means it’s a very tempting alternative to iOS
or Android.
But with Android 4.4.4 KitKat Google has
improved on its OS in numerous ways too
and while it’s since gone even further with
Android 5.0, it’s KitKat which is still running
on most Android phones.
Both operating systems have been
thoughtfully designed and undergone years
of polish to reach the point they’re at now,
but there are numerous differences
between them, so if you’re wondering
what’s different and where each excels,
we’ve got the answers.
The Look
Windows Phone 8.1 is arguably the most
stylish mobile operating system around and
it certainly stands out, with its vertically
scrolling interface full of Live Tiles, each of
which is essentially a miniature widget. It’s
colourful and has far less empty space than
Android, which could risk leaving it looking
cluttered but as the tiles all line up neatly
and are generally colour coordinated it
never does.
Many Windows Phones apps and the stock
ones in particular are also designed to fit
with the look of each other and of the
interface as a whole. Menus tend to consist
of white lettering on black backgrounds
and everything has a clean, minimalist look.
Android on the other hand has a more
conventional interface. Or at least it’s more
like other mobile OS’s, notably iOS. There
are rows of tiles along the home screen
with quite a lot of space between them,
there’s also a bar at the bottom which
displays the same tiles no matter which
screen you’re on and it scrolls horizontally
rather than vertically.
The apps in Android are static icons but
there’s also proper widget support, which
means that you can have for example a
large clock or calendar on your screen, or
perhaps a news feed. It makes it a lot more
customisable and in fact almost anything on
Android can be changed or altered, from
the keyboard to the entire look and
operation of the interface.
So you can make it look and work more or
less however you want if you put the work
in, but stock Android 4.4.4 KitKat is less
stylish and distinctive than Windows Phone
8.1.
Android apps are more varied in their
appearance than on Windows Phone,
especially when you consider that different
manufacturers put their own overlay and
apps on the phones, but the stock apps
tend to have a fairly unified look. They’re a
little more cluttered than their Windows
Phone counterparts, but still have a clean,
simple design, so they’re rarely confusing to
use.
The Apps
There’s no getting around it, Windows
Phone 8.1 has an app problem. The number
of available apps has been steadily growing
and includes many popular ones like
Facebook and Instagram, but there are still
well under 400,000 available apps
compared to over 1,300,000 Android apps
So if you’re happy to stick just to big names
then Windows Phone will for the most part
serve you well, but if you want a wide
selection of apps then Android still has an
advantage. Although as you'd expect
Windows Phone has native support for
Microsoft Office products with greater
features which is something business users
should consider.
Ke