Not being an Android user, one of the negatives that was often talked about (maybe no longer true?) is that a lot of phones could not upgrade to new versions of Android. Is that still a thing, or was that limited to the lower tier phones?
But imagine if Windows worked the way Android does. You buy a Dell Windows laptop and then you receive all your OS updates directly from Dell, they limit you to only 2 years of updates (if that), and put some bloated skin over the whole OS.
I don't know why Android users accept this.
Biggest advantage is that it's a pure Android with no bloatware from the manufacturer. Also you get a guarantee IIRC to have at least two versions upgrades for the phone (my Xiaomi came with Android 8, so 10 should be the last one), and most of all security updates.
Also what bothers me about Android devices: I got a Galaxy S8 to do development for work, and not all manufacturers are created equal in updates of course; IIRC I waited almost a full year after the Google flagships to receive Android 9 — in fact I think I got Android 8 around the time Android 9 came out.
All iOS is pure iOS. That’s the selling point for me, at least.
I don’t want iOS on my random experimental project laptop, for that I have Linux or windows, or vms. But, cellphones are not something I need to hack around on.
You can also choose to jailbreak an Apple device if you really want to be unpure, and luckily doing so won't prevent you from updating your phone in the future.
Different strokes for different folks. I like having the ability to sideload apps and flash a different OS to my phone
Android puts much more emphasis on backwards compatibility, with Google moving more and more functionality into app libraries rather than system frameworks. Our app still supports Android 4.4 (released in 2014!).
iphoneOS 15 will be supported by iPhone 6S: this was released in 2015. If app supports iOS 12 (which most do, as it is only one version below the current iOS 13) it means they support iPhone 5S: which was released in 2013.
And Apple users are likely to update: 92% run the latest version, and 7% are on the iOS 12.
$200 G7 got Android 10 about 3 weeks ago.
4 years is much better than current Android phones, though it's true it doesn't quite live up to the current Apple lineup where iOS 14 is going to support the 6S which will be 5 years old by the time it launches.