Why I’ve stopped using Google apps on my iPhone 6 Plus

“While compiling the list of apps on my iPhone 6 Plus I realized something — I’d listed not a single one from Google,” Rene Ritchie writes for iMore. ” It was something of a shock. Previously I’d had Gmail and Google Maps, Google+ and Hangouts, YouTube and Google Search.”

“I’d even been using apps they’d acquired, like Snapseed,” Ritchie writes. “After setting up my iPhone 6 Plus as new, however, and downloading apps only as I needed them, after close to 3 weeks, I still hadn’t needed a single Google app.”

” I’m sure some are still as hooked on Google apps as ever, but three weeks later, I’m not missing a thing,” Ritchie writes. “Apple’s apps are doing everything I need, in a way that fits how I want them done.”

Read more in the full article here.

36 Comments

    1. Still use Google Maps regularly. Apple Maps still use very old images, and actual road information is years behind what actually exists now. At least here in Edmonton, AB, CA.

      Even my reports about obvious errors have taken more than a year to actually be fixed [only some of them, the rest have yet to be fixed].

  1. Better late than never… De-googling yourself is eminently sensible, and surprisingly easy.

    De-googling should be followed with de-facebooking and de-twittering (if you ever bothered with Twitter).

    And then you will have a life and perhaps even some real friends.

    1. Been Google free for a very long time..
      Block everything Google on my macs, iOS now uses DDG (Was using Bing though)

      When I do visit Youtube on iOS, it’s in Safari. Majority of the time I visit youtube, it’s on the mac.

  2. Yup. I haven’t “needed” a Google app on my phone for a couple of years since getting my iPhone 5 and doing the same thing you are now. And Apple apps just keep getting better.

    1. What is wrong with using iTunes? You can get all your tv shows and movies without seeing Google’s draconian “Removed For Copyright” notices. iTunes is clearly the winner here.

      1. Yeah, following the law and paying content creators is really “draconian”.

        (Though on the other hand, the prices for individual episodes on iTunes is a LOT.. That’s not being a hypocrite, I just record off TV or use other services like Amazon Prime.)

  3. YouTube is the only Google App I have. Just watch crazy vids occasionally and good for how to’s. If there was as good an alternative to YouTube I would do away with that also.

  4. I do still use Gmail and Google Maps. Gmail purely because I have my work email on it and I like to keep it completely separate from my personal email and I rarely use it for work email anyway. Maps because on the few occasions I’ve used directions, Apple was wrong. I tend to compare both, then if they’re the same use Apple. In general use though I could easily do without. I do have the youtube app, but again rarely use it directly.

    1. Agree with your Maps assessment. I prefer Apple Maps (cleaner UI), but sometimes the directions don’t make much sense. I keep Google Maps installed for a second opinion JIC and compare them often. Apple Maps is definitely getting better. The other day Google Maps sent me on a wild goose chase while Apple Maps took me in the right direction.

      1. Same here: Apple Maps always takes me to the right place. Issue I have with Apple Maps is finding the location by name. Perhaps 5% of the time, it has no idea of a business or location name which google can find right away, so I have to cut and paste the address from google.

  5. Snapseed is one app I’d have a hard time deleting from my iPhone. I’ve tried many different photo editors, and I still believe Snapseed is the best. The UI is great and it offers a ton of different options. I really wish Apple would have snapped them up before Google.

  6. I use YouTube and Google Maps. Apple Maps has directed me wrong too many times and furthermore, Apple still does not offer bicycling directions, transit directions, avoid tolls, avoid highways or avoid unpaved roads.

  7. Use both Google apps and iWork.
    With Google apps I can collaborate with others, not so with iWork.
    With Google apps, if I accidentally delete a document it goes in their trash, in iCloud it is completely gone.
    iWork apps are more feature rich than Google documents. Example cannot Google documents does not handle tables for inputing information such as forms provided by others.
    iWork Pages can handle tables within forms. The county and state provides us forms they want used, cannot bring them in to Google without them becoming discombobulated. With iWork Pages the forms come in perfectly.

    Use the tool that works best with the job at hand. Over silliness and emotion do not cut your own throat.

    Both

  8. Unfortunately I am still using Google Maps.

    I always try Apple Maps first but in 90% of the uses I need to switch to Google Maps because Apple Maps can’t find what I’m looking for. Google then finds those searches instantly for another 90% of my searches. Only for the last 10% of when I turn to Google Maps I need to do my search in a different way because also Google Maps can’t find it. All this is valid for my way of searching things mainly in Europe with a large part of that in Germany.

Reader Feedback

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.