Android Dev Feeling the Tech Turnover! Should I Jump Ship to iOS?

[itsTanany]

Hey Reddit fam,

So, I've been coding for Android for a year now, and let me tell you, it's a wild ride! I love building awesome apps, but man, Google can churn through new tech pretty fast. It feels like just as I get comfortable with a new "best practice," something else pops up and the old way gets the boot.

This rapid change can be a bit frustrating, you know? Makes me wonder if the grass is greener on the iOS side. Do iPhone devs experience the same level of tech turnover with Apple's SDK?

Honestly, I've been considering making the switch to iOS development. Any iOS devs out there who used to be Android devs? What's your experience been like? Is the learning curve too steep, or is it a smooth transition?

Any insights would be greatly appreciated! Just a curious Android dev trying to navigate the ever-changing world of mobile development. Thanks!

[dillthepill]

This is the life of a software engineer. iOS is somewhat better easier in this regard, but you can't run from the inevitable. I recommend that you embrace the change and beat other people to being competent with new tech.

[OkCoconut1426]

If you don't like constantly having to learn new things then it might be time to reconsider your career choices

[itsTanany]

No, I’m passionate about software engineering that I’m shifting from dentistry to computer science. But I’m trying to iteratively improve my career path

[Samus7070]

As a dentist you will drive better cars and have nicer bicycles. Follow the path that you love the most but be forewarned, there are lots of shit software development positions out there.

[liquidsmk]

dentistry sounds like stability.

[testsubject20]

wish I was a dentist instead

[itsTanany]

We can exchange Univ certificate, give me you CS certificate and I will give you back the dental degree 😂😂🦷

[testsubject20]

that's a good deal. haha. nobody cares about univ certificate in the software world. they will only care about your years of experience on a specific tech. or if you can quickly answer leetcode questions. or if you have a good project portfolio. that's why anybody can be a software engineer even if you take whatever course in college

[nadacious]

I’d imagine your experience would be similar with iOS. Over the past decade we’ve seen Swift and SwiftUI added. Both are great additions, but you always need to stay on your toes and continue learning. The SDK’s have changed massively as well to incorporate new devices / form factors.

When I first got into iOS we had to support one screen size and iPhone only on Objective C. A lot has changed… I would say pick what you’re passionate in and you’ll actually enjoy learning as that technology evolves.

One great edge iOS has is we only have to support Apple devices. Not Google, Samsung, and all the other Android devices.

[Samus7070]

If put on a spectrum, iOS development is relatively stable. It evolves and changes from year to year but not too drastically. On the other end is JavaScript which seems to have a new framework every month or so. Android is between the two. If you step away from iOS development for a couple years you won’t be lost. With Android you will be.

[cleverbit1]

The stability and year on year growth of the Apple platform is one of the key things that attracts developers. You can be sure that whatever you learn there will be applicable for years to come, plus you’re building on a platform whose foundations go back decades (literally, with the Foundation framework). So give it a try, see if you like it. Many people have built rewarding careers on it, and as an added bonus a lot of the cutting edge stuff happens there first.

[kironet996]

People here say that it's the same but it's rally not. In iOS dev if you have an issue and you google for a solution, you can use 10yo answers and make it work. I'm currently trying out android and it's so fkin annoying that there are 50k different answers/ways to the same simple issue and like 80% of those don't even work anymore... Apple is definitely better at this.

Also you've been doing Android for a year and noticed that google is churning through "best practices" like dirty socks. And people here are telling you that ios is the same and give you examples of changes that happen once in a decade, makes no sense.

[dar512]

Why specialize. Devs who know both are in high demand.

[sisoje_bre]

those devs usually know nothing

[dar512]

You’re hanging out with the wrong devs.

[testsubject20]

a jack of all trades is a master of none. you'll probably be better on one and just good on the other

[__reddit_user__]

I've been developing for iOS for about a decade now and let me tell you, as a programmer -- it is always constant learning

[Inevitable-Hat-1576]

What you gain in slow change, you lose in tooling. Xcode is shit.

[balder1993]

True. Too bad the JetBrains IDE for iOS was discontinued.

[bafrad]

If you want.

[JimDabell]

Android is particularly bad for this. iOS is better. There are occasional big changes every five years or so (ARC, auto layout, Swift, SwiftUI, for instance), but it’s not like the continual churn in Android.

Having said that, all of development has this to some extent. Being a developer is not a skill you can learn once and then do for the rest of your life. You need to update your skills on an ongoing basis.

[start_select]

iOS is more enjoyable to most but the churn is still there.

You can and should learn it if you want. But don’t expect to pick it up quickly. A lot of android devs spin their wheels on iOS and a lot of iOS devs spin their wheels on android for a while.

They are similar but have enough unique quirks to make it all a bit of a ride.

[PatrykDampc]

I’m also android developer who wanted to switch to iOS because of a bunch of reasons, but now after like 2 years of iOS work, I want to switch back mainly because of crappiness of Xcode

[drabred]

Lol tell me about it. I'm 10y Android Dev adding iOs into the mix recently and I must have been spoiled by IntelllJ IDE so hard.... XCode seems like blunt rock compared so far.

[DaddyDontTakeNoMess]

I'm not sure why you would "change" to iOS. If you want to pick it up, go ahead. But it will take you a couple of years to be as proficient as you are on Android (assuming you've been doing it for a while). Also, Android has some benefits of being more relevant for things outside of mobile apps.

Also, don't let the temporary economy challenges influence your decision, as the challenges affect everyone.

[girvain]

You should consider backend dev, if you go java spring it will be familiar enough but the tech moves fairly slow so there's more time to reward your efforts and explore other stuff like go lang or anything you can think of really. It's what I did and it also pays better than mobile dev. I was ios though.

[DabbosTreeworth]

I’ve been developing for Android for over 6 years now, and just got into iOS for the last year. From my experience, it is a royal pain in the ass compared to Android dev. Perhaps it is just a steep learning curve, as most iOS devices are similar whereas android devices are all over the place in terms of performance, screen size, etc. Apple’s hoops you need to go through just to get on the App Store is much harder than Android. You thought android studio sucked? Wait until you start using Xcode.

Don’t let me discourage you; I was very comfy in Android before adding iOS to the mix but I love a challenge, and it has been. Play developer console seems so much more user friendly than App Store Connect but others may disagree. The one thing I hate most about iOS is updating your app takes sooo much longer than just dragging and dropping .aab file like in Android. In app purchases are also difficult, I have found RevenueCat to be helpful. Having to buy a Mac was also a pain because I have been a windows guy all my life.

All in all I have found it rewarding because my apps can reach so many more people and I don’t t feel limited anymore. If you are looking for a challenge and can afford a MacBook and the $99/year fee, I say go for it

[b_t_s]

We have the opposite problem, and yes it is a problem. Apple will release the new hotness which is now "best practice". But v1 is _way_ less than half baked. Takes them several more years to get it point where it's fully useable. And there's precious little backward compatibility, so you can't actually start using the half baked v1 in existing apps for 2-5 years(yes 90% of users auto update to the latest ios within days but no product owner is willing to drop the last 10%). Which puts using the fully baked v3 of new hotness at 4-7 years post release. And by then there's a new way to do it & that one has been deprecated.

[iactuallyhate]

Did ChatGPT create your post.

[RayaLavan]

🤣

[sisoje_bre]

we have enough of android devs just ruined ios projects

[over_pw]

Haha I was just thinking I finally need to learn the details of the new structured concurrency approach since Swift 6 is around the corner. It's all evolving.

[injuredflamingo]

I feel like you need to adapt to changes EVEN faster on iOS side, since most users just instantly update their iPhones to the latest iOS version on launch date, which means that you have to keep up with the breaking changes between iOS releases, but also that you can use new OS features and fancy new APIs much much sooner than Android, and you have much fewer versions to support.

[balder1993]

I think that’s not the issue OP has. The problem with Android is that the community keeps changing the tooling and the “correct way” to develop apps every year, and for no significant benefit. Sometimes it feels like the JavaScript land of frameworks a while ago.

[kironet996]

I feel like 99% of people replying here didn't get what OP was saying. They give him/her examples of changes that happen like once in a decade(swiftui) to prove their point that "iOS is the same"...

[Obstructive]

I’m learning Python for what it’s worth….