Android Vs. iPhone vs. Windows Phone

I'm looking for a smartphone to use for business. What are the pros and cons of each operating system, strictly from a business perspective. I'm especially interested in where each one falls down on business tasks. Virtual meetings, docs, presentations,conferences, VPN/security, calendars are all essential. Don't really care about music, photographs or texting. Are there many serious business apps out there?

Thanks!

I had to switch from a Blackberry to an iPhone 2+ years ago. The iPhone sucks at high volume mail handling compared to the Blackberry. The most annoying thing is that you can't quickly select a block of emails you don't care about and delete them. You have to select them one at a time and then delete the selected ones. In a pinch, you can read a .pdf, Word, Excel, or PowerPoint document but it's a toy compared to using the real applications on a real screen/keyboard/mouse. The Exchange server integration is fine. Calendars work fine. The WebEx presentation+VoIP application isn't the greatest for audio quality even with good WiFi connectivity. My conference application broke when I finally upgraded from iOS 6.x to iOS 7.x a month ago and I haven't carved out the hour to figure out an alternative yet.

If you're really on the road all the time in conference calls and doing the usual corporate work flow, tether a small laptop to your 4G smartphone or put a 4G cellular data interface on your laptop.

I like the 6 for enterprise use...

I can look at spreadsheets and powerpoints and get on Webex not a problem.
We use an app from our Sec Admin group that keeps the phone safe and standard.

I do hear that BBY is better at email...

Do you work for a company with an IT department? If so, you might want to ask them what they recommend/support.

bvibert said:

Do you work for a company with an IT department? If so, you might want to ask them what they recommend/support.

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I work for a big company with a big IT department. They support all three; everyone seems to have their own preferences.
I've been looking at Windows Phone largely due to it's high integration into the Microsoft Ecosystem, which our company has embraced wholeheartedly.

I appreciate Geoff and Funky's comments. I have a giga-normous mailbox. The native Outlook integration is attractive as everyone tells me it's really fast with Enterprise mail. It should be! Native office apps, not sure how useful they will be.
Win Phone also has succumbed to pressure and put a file manager on their OS. There are a couple of downsides. Google and MS don't play together, so YouTube is not directly supported (I guess one app writer figured out how to create a native app), and Google Earth/Maps is a non-starter. Another oddity is that you can't forward a message with an attached document. You have to send it from the file manager. I can live with that. I also live and die by PowerPoint, so anything that makes that easier is attractive. Lastly, they have top-flight security, including VPN. My company insists on all that stuff. I've not seen any apps that are particularly compelling, other than to fill in the gaps MS missed. Once it's setup, I need it to just work, all the time and work fast.

I'm surprised the Windows phones haven't been more embraced at businesses since most of them are using Windows desktops. I was surprised when my company went to iPhones. Personally, I like them, but WP makes more sense to me.

Edd said:

I'm surprised the Windows phones haven't been more embraced at businesses since most of them are using Windows desktops. I was surprised when my company went to iPhones. Personally, I like them, but WP makes more sense to me.

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I"m kinda surprised by that too, but I think it's just a case of them being too late to the party

Ive got a note 3 that I use primarily for business.

I think they all have limitations in some form, they just vary by model.

One thing I will say is that if you are using it for business, get the largest screen you can. I did and haven't looked back.

Its also pretty neat that I can sign documents with my phone, like a real signature. But thats just fluff, its the big screen thats useful. Looking over a spreadsheet, invoice, contract etc on a bigger screen will make your work stuff way less of a chore.

I use a Nokia 1520, running Windows Phone 8. Personally, I love it. I can view and manipulate any kind of Office file, though naturally in a somewhat restricted manner, mostly because of the limitations inherent in only being touchscreen. I find the connectedness of Office 365 to be a massive benefit, particularly with One Note, since it shares all my notebooks across all devices. I also use a Surface 3 as my 1 and only work computer, which I think works great.

The native email app is pretty good, though it can be slow at searching the depths of your inbox. I think the integration of Outlook contacts and the People contacts system is a little clunky, but I've never been very good at contact management anyway, so that may be my fault. And really, I think it's mostly in the Surface's native mail app that it's the biggest problem. The phone does a good job of connecting with the corporate address book.

We run Mobile Iron for security, which seems fine. Our IT group is small (1.5 people), and I have the only Windows phone as they test to see if they can support it efficiently (senior folks have iPhones, everyone else uses Samsungs). So far, no problems. Our IT policies are a bit archaic and restrictive, so I don't think I get the full benefits of cross-platform integration, but I certainly see the opportunities.

From a pure business perspective, if you're a Windows shop to begin with, there's no reason at all not to go with a Windows phone. I think at some point with other OSes, you will eventually run into a limitation where it doesn't play well with Office or Windows, and you won't be able to do something you might find useful.

From a daily use perspective, I'm not a power user by any means, and don't care that I don't have some apps, that I wouldn't use anyway. I live in an Office world, and so most everything that I ever wan to do is on the web, in PowerPoint, a spreadsheet, or One note anyway.

Yeah ctenidae I'm with you. I'm not going to try and run a business off a mobile phone anyways. I'm beginning to lean towards Windows Phone. But last night I took a personal spin on this, or shall we say, a ski spin. I started to look at the app list for apps I'd use while skiing. Current weather, ski area webcam. 24-48 hour forecast from different media outlets, road conditions as well as ski area specific areas for things like lifts and trails open, etc. Egads, there are practically no snow or ski apps. This would force me to use mobile websites, if they even exist.


I'll never forget the time before smart phones when we got to Mt. Snow and found it 100% closed when we arrived with no hope of it opening. We decided to zip down to Magic, but were unfamiliar with the roads. Do you think we could find anyone who would give us directions? No paper maps in the car. It was an adventure, but after hitting a couple gas stations (many didn't even know where Londonderry was!) we found it. We tried to make a cell call, but there was no signal. Well, we got there, the snow was awesome and only the truest snow aficionados were there. Ah, the good old days.

billski said:

I started to look at the app list for apps I'd use while skiing. Current weather, ski area webcam. 24-48 hour forecast from different media outlets, road conditions as well as ski area specific areas for things like lifts and trails open, etc. Egads, there are practically no snow or ski apps. This would force me to use mobile websites, if they even exist.

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I can only speak for Android, because that's I use. There's tons of weather apps for current weather, forecasts, radar, etc.. I haven't used it, but there's the OnTheSnow app for snow reports, trail/lift reports, webcams, ski area weather, etc.. The best app that I know of for road conditions is Waze, but it's user driven, so you're relying on someone else reporting ahead of you. Waze was bought by Google, so it's information is tied into the Google Maps app, that means hazards will automatically be displayed on the map if you're using Maps for navigation. There's also apps out there that contain trail maps for ski areas around the world.

Waze is pretty useless on Vermont secondary roads. I report the Woodstock and Bridgewater speed traps as I drive by but it's really unusual for anybody else to do it. Waze is far more accurate on high traffic metro-area roads. I-95 in southern New England? Sure. I-89 in NH or VT, I wouldn't count on it to tell you about speed traps or winter weather issues.

I have bookmarks for the National Weather Service for Killington, South Dartmouth, and the Buzzards Bay marine forecast. That's all I've ever needed.

FYI, Microsoft Office apps are now free on iOS and you don't need a 365 subscription anymore. They limit the features without a subscription but still, pretty cool if you use an iPad full time like I do.

Geoff said:

Waze is pretty useless on Vermont secondary roads. I report the Woodstock and Bridgewater speed traps as I drive by but it's really unusual for anybody else to do it. Waze is far more accurate on high traffic metro-area roads. I-95 in southern New England? Sure. I-89 in NH or VT, I wouldn't count on it to tell you about speed traps or winter weather issues.

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That's the limitation that I mentioned. Still, I don't know of any other app that will give you any information on road conditions, which is why I mentioned it.

Depends on your business a bit too. 75% of my work is done on the water. So I balance performance against ruggedness. I still need to be able to open spreadsheets, Word docs, email, PDFs, etc. But its more important to me that my phone stays alive than how fast I can open these docs. The best phone for me is Casio G'zone (android). Obviously that's not true for most people, but the point is you might have specific work needs that override many other considerations.

There are actually tons of ski and weather apps. I use a combination of several every day: Navionics for skiing and boating. Bluefin for Marine weather forecasts. A slew of others for radar and real time wind.

I got a new toy yesterday a droid maxx so camera picutes should now be a little better in expensive great hopefully anti rubber case . Why get a new computer when I getting a new current computer in a phone got to love that. Maybe I use spell check more often hhah ha na .olo

bvibert said:

I"m kinda surprised by that too, but I think it's just a case of them being too late to the party

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Meanwhile Blackberry which was early to the party, but left after it got too sophisticated for them, is trying to get their foot back in the door. Good luck with that. If IOS can't keep up with Android, where do you think you're going?