Whats a bit wild to me is Google's only selling point for their Pixel phones are increasingly Gemini.

Now that you can get Gemini, operated by Apple (with the Apple privacy features that come along with that), why would you ever consider going Android/Pixel (outside of running GrapheneOS, but I'm talking regular consumers here)?

Google isn't even making anything on the deal with Apple. They pay $20B/year to be the default search engine. This is Apple just giving a $1B a year discount to that to be able to license Gemini.

I switched from iPhone to Pixel after I couldn't stand Liquid Glass and found myself using Gemini more than I expected.

If you're in the Google ecosystem like Gmail and Calendar, it is exceptionally refreshing to be able to use an assistant that uses that ecosystem, instead of iOS requiring you to use Mail or its own Calendar app.

I don't think there's any real gap between Pixel and iPhone on the things that matter: UX jank, battery life, camera. Even the messaging issue in the US has closed with encrytped RCS support between them launching. So now it's just an ecosystem question, which might be why Gemini is mentioned so much with Pixel.

Android phones are also quite a bit more capable than iPhones in a number of ways due to being more open. Plenty of people just straight up prefer the experience (and plenty of others prefer the cheaper prices).

Yes. And there is only one other major phone brand in the West with this kind of clout: Samsung. Who I think will want their own thing that isn't Google's, and who do have some connections to OpenAI.

But given how dependent OpenAI are on Samsung, it's hard to believe they will see a radically better deal in material terms.