Gadgetory

if you're looking for an aluminum clad smartphone you're probably looking at two of the best that are available today hey it's Joshua regard from Android thority of what's going on everybody and this is the HTC One m8 versus the iPhone 5s now in the Android world the HTC One m8 and its predecessor are probably the closest you'd get to matching the build quality of the iPhone 5s both feature metal bodies with the iPhone favoring a much more angular design compared to the curves and now the very smooth corners and sides of the HTC One m8 the iPhone comes with its signature physical home button this time with an integrated fingerprint scanner as well while on the other hand HTC has done away with the capacitive keys that used to be a big part of the front face of HTC smartphones entirely and now are going for software keys you do still get that big black bar across the bottom of the phone and above the speaker this time housing just the HTC logo but apart from the similar build quality these are obviously two very different smartphones especially when it comes to the size and screen real estate speaking of those screens there really isn't anything wrong with the IPS LCD display of the iPhone 5s as it does have accurate color reproduction has good brightness and great viewing angles but even the one-inch difference in size makes the display of the HTC One m8 a much higher pixel density and of course vivid colors and fantastic viewing angles in that 1080p screen and considering that smartphones nowadays double as media consumption devices it's a little difficult to get over how small the display of the iPhone 5s is along with it's much over lower overall resolution to boot and of course that additional display real estate obviously is a big plus in our book as far as performance goes iOS is known for its fluid animations impressive optimizations and is generally a starter free experience and while iOS 7 did have its issues with performance things have seemed to have gotten better with the recent 7.1 updates now the HTC One m8 features the best processing package that is currently available in the smartphone today and with HTC Sense getting even lighter sleeker and better performance is as smooth as ever on this new iteration with both smartphones overall performance is one area where there should be no issues which is nothing short of what you would expect from flagship smartphones anyway and when we move onto hardware we will find that a by-the-numbers breakdown of the specifications is quite unfair as the HTC One m8 obviously has the better specs with the faster processor more RAM and a much larger battery but these two devices cater to completely different ecosystems and in the end the lower specs of the iPhone 5s don't translate to poor performance overall but one benefit that the HTC One m8 does have is its inclusion of expandable storage which is always a welcome addition and something that HTC has decided to reintroduce after a while and then of course the HTC One m8 also comes with that dual front-facing boom sound speaker set up making the HTC One one of the best media consumption devices available especially since the sound coming out of those speakers is actually very surprisingly and very welcoming leak rate and then in the camera as we find that the eight megapixel rear shooter of the iPhone 5s has been widely known for taking some great quality images while the HTC One m7 from last year did somewhat have a few issues with its camera but that should be a lot better now with the current version just released both smartphones feature dual LED flashes and the HTC One m8 also gets a second rear shooter made for a hardware based solution to depth of field shots not only does that duo camera take the depth of field data from a picture it is also a very fast performance that eliminates the processing time that software based solutions cater to the HTC One m8 camera also does come with a lot of software features as well such as Zowie and while it's probably not as feature packed as let's say the Samsung Galaxy line it definitely offers more than you would get with the iPhone 5s and it's more rigid and less feature pack design HTC's updates to the front camera as well I'll provide an even better experience which now comes with a 5 megapixel sensor and an 88 degree wide angle lens now iOS received an important overhaul last year with the introduction of some key changes like a quick settings menu and an overall upgrade to the design aesthetics resulting in a brighter more colorful UI granted the basic idea still hasn't really changed what the icons still being available just on the home screens and there are real no customization options available but with sense 6.0 an HTC scamp blinkfeed makes a return as a second screen when you swipe left and over all the icons and colors are still about the same with the generally more flattened tone down design a couple years ago the sense knew I was incredibly bloated but with sense 5 and now 6 the company has done a lot to get it back on track a number of different gesture based enhancements are introduced in the HTC One m8 such as the ability to double tap to wake the device or swipe to directly enter blink feet or even some apps overall sense does bring a more simplistic outlook to what is still a very full-featured experience and you can say the same about iOS as well however when it comes to the flavor of Apple iOS or Android that is a decision that is up to you to make and so there you have it for this quick look at the HTC One m8 versus the Apple iPhone 5s you do have two very different ecosystems here but if you're looking for just a metal clad phone well these are the two that are probably the ones to beat and when you put them head-to-head you find that the experiences are a very robust on either one depending on what you really want you can find probably a great experience in either camp the HTC One m8 is a very exciting release indeed and we can't wait to put it through its paces especially when it comes to that camera so keep it tuned to Andrew 30 for all of that and the best coverage available because we are your source for all things Android