iOS 7 Vs Android 4.2 Vs Windows Phone 8 Vs BlackBerry 10 Comparison

Apple officially released iOS 7, and declared it to come with “Biggest Change Since the Original iPhone”. By checking what’s new in iOS 7, we could easily get the right point of iOS 7, like the multitasking preview, Control Center, AireDrop, etc. iOS 7 is creating a great buzz for it in the gadgets’ world as the redesigning of the OS has not only excited the Apple users, but the competitors of the operating system too are feeling the threat. These changes are more cosmetic and iterative than they are groundbreaking.  

While some say that iOS is an explicit copy of Windows Phone OS as well as from Android’s Jellybean OS, it has become tough for Apple to give out clarification. With Google keenly looking at the iOS 7, it seems like the next version of Android will surely be different from what we saw till now. 

Rumors are doing the rounds that the next version of Android will also be supporting the low end devices. In recent Android OS version, Jellybean 4.1 – 4.2.2 didn’t see many changes in terms of UI /UX and almost looked same.

Below, you'll find a list of the iOS 7 features that Apple focused on today, and next to that, a brief description of how that trait exists on Android, Windows Phone, and BlackBerry rivals (or at least one manufacturer's take on said platform). Read on below for more detail about how iOS 7 stacks up.

iOS 7	Android 4.2	Windows Phone 8	BlackBerry 10
Control Center	Varies by Manufacturer	No Settings Menu	Access to System Settings is Possible
Notification center	Detailed notifications	Live tile badges	BlackBerry Hub, badges
Multitasking preview	Recently Used List	Multitasking preview	Active Frames grid
Surfaced camera modes	Varies by Android skin	Third-party lenses	Video, Time Shift modes
Photos grouped by years, location	Albums, other filters	Albums, date	Albums, recent
Shared photo stream	Select Android Devices have it	Share one by one	Share one by one
Peer-to-peer sharing (AirDrop)	Android Beam (NFC)	Tap + Share (NFC)	NFC sharing
Unified browser bar	Yes	Yes	Yes
Personalized radio/discovery	Google Play Music All Access	Nokia Music	Third-party app
Voice access to system settings	Samsung’s S Voice	No systems access	No systems access
Automatic app updates	Update All & Individual App Update option	‘Update all’ option	Individual
Password-protected reset	No	No	No
In-dash integration (iOS for cars)	Driving mode/S Drive	Nokia Drive	Third-party apps
iCloud Like Service	No	No	No

Actually, there's a lot in iOS 7 that we've seen before in other mobile platforms, in similar if not identical forms. There's absolutely nothing wrong with that so long as Apple executes well and brings value to the user. The difference is that Apple's most advertised iOS 7 software additions either play catch-up or are relatively minor, like a way to filter apps for kids or surface camera settings in the app's top layer.

Apple does push the industry forward with some capabilities that are all its own -- like iOS 7 for cars and using Siri to toggle system settings. (Samsung's S Voice does the latter, but not Android Voice Actions.) Even with driving modes for individual handsets, such deep car integration will be tough for the others to beat and even match without strong automotive partnerships.

iTunes Radio may not be a new concept, but I like that it's free for everyone, and integrated into a native app that people already use. Google Play Music All Access does about the same, but costs $10 per month, and Nokia Music is free, but only on Nokia's Windows phones.

Once again, Apple's advantage is that iOS 7 will be unified across most Apple smartphones and tablets, unlike Android, which varies greatly by phone-maker and has a notorious track record for timely updates across devices. Even Windows Phone has two flavors; that profits Nokia, the originator of most extra features, but also makes Windows Phone's benefits uneven across the entire portfolio.

Apple may not have bowled us over with headline enhancements, but iOS 7 will continue to formidably challenge Google, Microsoft, and BlackBerry with its eye-catching visual design and its total haul of features, new and old. Like many things worth admiring, iOS 7 is greater than the sum of its parts.