alt Hacker NewsExactly this. Once the writing was on the wall that deGoogled / FOSS Android was on borrowed time (at best), a ton of the argument against iOS dissolved overnight. We can argue that Apple's anti-repair policies and anti-user-customization policies are their own evils, sure, but at least my phone works for its core tasks, and works phenomenally well at that. My deGoogled Android phones were mostly hobbled together piles of "it sometimes works, as long as I don't look at it too funny". This tradeoff was fine for fully owning my data and being able to install absolutely anything I wanted on my phone. With arbitrary APK installation disappearing, and unlocked bootloaders to install a less hostile fork of Android becoming such a rarity these days, I may as well at least not fear looking at my phone the wrong way when the moon is in alignment with the wrong star.
Source: about 12 years of Android usage (11 of those on unlocked bootloaders and custom ROMs, ~6? of those deGoogled) -> iPhone 16e.
Yeah, I was a loyal Android user for 15 years.
For the first half, custom ROMs were a massive boost to the experience, but I never really bothered after 2018; You had to install so much of google's stuff to get anywhere near proper experience that it just wasn't worth it, and even then many apps were starting to throw a fit when they detected a rooted device.
And at the same time, the stock android experience from most vendors was now good enough. I didn't even check custom ROM compatibly for my last Android two purchases (both Samsung). But it was nice to have the option of rooting and maybe finding/making a custom ROM Samsung removed that in their last update to One UI :(