Third-party iPhone apps scored significantly lower than their Android counterparts, according to an analysis of user reviews of 4,400 top mobile apps.

However, that doesn’t necessarily mean that Android has better third-party software. iPhone users simply expect more from their apps.

“The data shows that iOS users are more critical of mobile apps than Android users,” David Kravets, senior content marketing manager for unitQ, the company that conducted the research, said in an interview. with cult of mac.

And after scouring nearly 122 million reviews, unitQ analysts say there’s “lots of room for improvement” in mobile software.

iPhone app reviewers have higher standards

Anyone hesitating between iPhone and Android should compare the quality of third-party apps for each platform. Software is as important as hardware.

And unitQ made a much more comprehensive comparison than any individual could. The company has applied artificial intelligence to millions of reviews on the App Store and Google Play.

Beyond simple “star” reviews, analysts looked for a relationship between negative reviews and positive reviews.

For all Android apps covered, analysts found a score of 78. All iOS apps got a combined score of 61.

Handset prices likely play a big role in the phenomenon, according to unitQ.

“iPhones cost more,” Kravets said. “And so they [the users] are more likely to add complaints in their user comments on the reviews they leave. »

The state of mobile software is “fair”

After an analysis combining reviews for iOS and Android software, unitQ gave an average rating of 75 for mobile apps overall. According to the company’s criteria, it is “satisfactory product quality, lots of room for improvement”.

The analytics company pulls reviews from the App Store and Google Play. Then it uses AI to find complaints in a wide variety of categories, including slow performance, crashes, freezing, excessive ads, and in-app payments.

unitQ summarizes this information and offers it to third-party app developers, saving them the time of reading thousands of user reviews.

Source: unitQ