Any Android phone as smooth as Windows Phone?

[stateofjermaine]

I've always avoided Android prior to ICS, because I thought Froyo and Gingerbread were extremely ugly UI's. My smartphone experience/history is as follows: Nokia N95 [mine] ? Original iPhone [mine] ? iPhone 3G [mine] ? iPhone 4 [my wife's] ? iPhone 4S [my officemate's] ? Samsung Focus [mine] ? Galaxy Nexus [mine, current]. Let me start off by saying that I love my GNex, and I will probably just buy a new chassis for it when it gets scuffed up, and keep it for a long time. That said, I see no reason to pretend that it is flawless, or "always zippy," or any other crap.

Pros:

Screen resolution

ICS UI

Screen size

Gorgeous updated Google apps

Ergonomics

Battery life [at times]

Customization

Cons:

Laggy, choppy UI [i.e. swiping quickly between pages in the "Widgets" menu]

Screen size [can be awkward to reach things at times]

Battery life [on heavy use/gaming days] ? I just keep an extra battery in my wallet now, so NBD]

Laggy, choppy browser [although it is still amazing]

As you can see, I love my GNex, but it has its flaws, much like a wayward child. Haha. You'll get no fluff or BS-ing from me. My Windows Phones [plural, as in 3?all the Samsung Focus] all died of battery/power-related issues, suffered a very limited app ecosystem, were not terribly customizable, had a so-so camera, and by the end of the affair were the bane of my existence. BUT?make no mistake about?their UI was always buttery-smooth. I could swipe to my heart's content, and never hit a snag. As others have mentioned, there were loading issues, and other crashing issues, sometimes, but no UI lag. I even use my daughter's Focus every once in a while to do something quickly, because it's nearby, and I'm again floored by how quick and snappy its UI is. No question, my Galaxy Nexus lags. My wife's iPhone 4 doesn't suffer from pervasive lag issues, but is occasionally victimized by iOS system updates [much the same way my iPhone 3G buckled under iOS 4]. Still, it's much snappier than my Galaxy Nexus. My co-worker's iPhone 4S is unflinching in its navigation screens. The only time I feel a hint of lag is sometimes swiping to the 'Search' screen after a long absence. But that will be alleviated if I go back and forth again. In short [somewhat]: 1. iPhone 4S/Samsung Focus; 2. iPhone 4; 3. Galaxy Nexus.

tl;dr: The Galaxy Nexus is the best [or at least my favorite] smartphone I have used to date, and more than makes up for its lag issues with customizability, slick aesthetics, Google apps, and that beautiful screen. But no, it is not as smooth as a Windows Phone, or an iPhone 4/4S. From reviews I've read, the HTC One X appears to have alleviated much of the infamous Android lag.

[neo158]

Galaxy Nexus

Agreed, I have a Galaxy Nexus and it's probably the smoothest experience I've ever had with Android and yes, I do have a Windows Phone as well.

[neo158]

I've always avoided Android prior to ICS, because I thought Froyo and Gingerbread were extremely ugly UI's. My smartphone experience/history is as follows: Nokia N95 [mine] ? Original iPhone [mine] ? iPhone 3G [mine] ? iPhone 4 [my wife's] ? iPhone 4S [my officemate's] ? Samsung Focus [mine] ? Galaxy Nexus [mine, current]. Let me start off by saying that I love my GNex, and I will probably just buy a new chassis for it when it gets scuffed up, and keep it for a long time. That said, I see no reason to pretend that it is flawless, or "always zippy," or any other crap.

Pros:

Screen resolution

ICS UI

Screen size

Gorgeous updated Google apps

Ergonomics

Battery life [at times]

Customization

Cons:

Laggy, choppy UI [i.e. swiping quickly between pages in the "Widgets" menu]

Screen size [can be awkward to reach things at times]

Battery life [on heavy use/gaming days] ? I just keep an extra battery in my wallet now, so NBD]

Laggy, choppy browser [although it is still amazing]

As you can see, I love my GNex, but it has its flaws, much like a wayward child. Haha. You'll get no fluff or BS-ing from me. My Windows Phones [plural, as in 3?all the Samsung Focus] all died of battery/power-related issues, suffered a very limited app ecosystem, were not terribly customizable, had a so-so camera, and by the end of the affair were the bane of my existence. BUT?make no mistake about?their UI was always buttery-smooth. I could swipe to my heart's content, and never hit a snag. As others have mentioned, there were loading issues, and other crashing issues, sometimes, but no UI lag. I even use my daughter's Focus every once in a while to do something quickly, because it's nearby, and I'm again floored by how quick and snappy its UI is. No question, my Galaxy Nexus lags. My wife's iPhone 4 doesn't suffer from pervasive lag issues, but is occasionally victimized by iOS system updates [much the same way my iPhone 3G buckled under iOS 4]. Still, it's much snappier than my Galaxy Nexus. My co-worker's iPhone 4S is unflinching in its navigation screens. The only time I feel a hint of lag is sometimes swiping to the 'Search' screen after a long absence. But that will be alleviated if I go back and forth again. In short [somewhat]: 1. iPhone 4S/Samsung Focus; 2. iPhone 4; 3. Galaxy Nexus.

tl;dr: The Galaxy Nexus is the best [or at least my favorite] smartphone I have used to date, and more than makes up for its lag issues with customizability, slick aesthetics, Google apps, and that beautiful screen. But no, it is not as smooth as a Windows Phone, or an iPhone 4/4S. From reviews I've read, the HTC One X appears to have alleviated much of the infamous Android lag.

What version of ICS do you have on your GNex, anything prior to 4.0.4 was laggy and had poor battery life.

[Boz]

any newer Android phone running ICS is very smooth. I have Galaxy Nexus and it's really smooth. if your Android phone feels glitchy or laggy it's really not Android but the stuff that the OEM put on that phone. Just use an alternate launcher. Almost every single launcher I've run on my Android phones was buttery smooth. They run at 60 fps and are just super super slick not to mention they bring you tons of features on top of the Android standard launcher. It's super easy to install.

Also, on ICS you make sure you turn on force GPU hardware acceleration in Settings (Force 2D Hardware Acceleration under Developer Options) because it's turned off by default. This will force the whole OS to run in GPU mode. They turned it off by default because they wanted to make sure maximum compatibility with older phones that might be running ICS but don't have proper GPU (or strong enough) to run everything on it.

It's really a huge benefit. Ask yourself, what will you do when you get tired of tiles and honestly, after using WP for a while tiles is already getting stale on me and the thing hasn't even properly took place in smartphone market?

[Noir Angel]

Just go with any ICS phones. And if you're really that touchy about it just disable the animations, every Android phone I have owned was perfectly smooth once I turned the animations off.