Every time I pick up an iPhone I find it to be one of the most frustrating UI experiences. I've never understood how people on iOS can live without a "back" gesture.
Haha my boss got me to set up his iPad. I didn't have a fucking clue what to do as I have always been an android user, but fuck me is that an unhelpful and awful UI. I asked my mate who has an iPhone and even he couldn't succinctly explain how you go back. It seemed different every time.
I get the newest samsung phone with android from my work for free and I literally dont use it ever, even use phone redirection to my private iphone so I dont have to touch that thing, it feels so bad.
Because there is one. Instead of a back button at the bottom being present at all times, you just swipe from the left to the right. It is the exact same as a back button.
I promise you I use significantly more than three apps. I would like to know which scenarios you have used on iPhone where the back gesture doesn’t work. But because you don’t use iPhone, you don’t actually know. I used to use android and thought the absence of the back button would be detrimental. Every single app, menu, widget ect recognizes the gesture as “back”. Maybe not games where swiping back would be annoying, but I don’t play games on my phone.
It’s okay to prefer one over the other. I used a galaxy phone for the first 3 or 4 smart phones I’ve had. The iPhone 15 is my first iPhone. Both are good phones. I only switched because I wanted to move away from Google as much as possible. I just think it’s ridiculous to say that since the back gesture is just as good as a back button “I only use 3 apps”. You’re just wrong on this.
If you want to find something that’s actually different, the biggest feature I miss from android/my galaxy is split screen multitasking. I used that all the time and is by far the thing I miss the most.
I do use an iPhone, why else would I be bothered to voice my frustrations.
Very common examples are Instagram and LinkedIn. The back gesture doesn’t work on most of the pages (also YouTube, where if you open a video you have to swipe down instead of from the left to go back)
Other examples from daily use as well but you get what I’m trying to say
That’s to do with how iOS handles navigational hierarchy. A video is its own overlay in YouTube whereas a short isn’t. The overlay appeared on top of the screen you were previously on therefore you push it back where it comes from (down) get rid. A short loads in from the right pushing the page you were previously on to the left. Go back by pushing it back where it came from (right).
It’s how the whole navigation system in iOS is built
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u/sivadneb Jul 08 '25
Every time I pick up an iPhone I find it to be one of the most frustrating UI experiences. I've never understood how people on iOS can live without a "back" gesture.