What was the worst phone OS you've used?

[Kazukian]

I found an Amazon Fire phone I'd bought for the free year of Amazon Prime that came with it.

It has the worst interface I've used.

 

[Megatomic]

Probably Android Gingerbread. Going to Windows Phone 7 changed my life.

 

[Commodus]

Symbian. Right up to the end, it was pretty lousy. Most versions would ask you to choose a connection whenever you wanted to do something online (do you want to use cellular for this, or WiFi?). It was never really designed for touch input. And even in later versions, it was chronically unreliable -- it was virtually guaranteed that the OS would melt into a puddle every 2-3 days, forcing a reboot. Nokia may have made a poor choice switching to Windows Phone, but Symbian was really what sounded the death knell.

Runner-up: Firefox OS. The interface was fine, it's the principles behind the OS that doomed it. Mozilla was embracing that Richard Stallman-like FOSS fantasy where free-and-open always solves everything: if we just run web apps on a Linux core, developers will flock to it in droves, right? Well, no. Turns out that web apps kinda suck as a main platform (especially for things like notifications), and developers would rather write with powerful proprietary code than mediocre open code. Firefox OS just didn't have robust built-in apps, and the third-party selection was terrible.

 

[quikah]

Android <5.x

Laggy, horrible battery drain, crashprone. It is a wonder that android was able to get any marketshare with the state of android then.

 

[core2slow]

I'm shocked that there's no Windows mobile reply so far.

We're talking about a "mobile" OS that wasn't optimized for phones! I had an HTC diamond at the time with the stylus and even then it was cumbersome to use. It was neat in a half-baked kinda way like running Windows 98 on a phone, but it was horrid to use.

 

[Zaap]

I'm shocked that there's no Windows mobile reply so far.

Well, there was the caveat... "you've used"

 

[core2slow]

Well, there was the caveat... "you've used"

I can't be that old to have used a Windows mobile phone

 

[Raduque]

I've used "Windows Mobile" the old 98se-style OS. Had a T-Mobile/HTC Wing side-slider. I got pretty good at hacking it up and theming it. It sucked, though.

The worst, IMO, was the old OS from the Motorola RAZR/KRAZR/RIZR. It was pretty terrible.

 

[Zaap]

You were just one of the 6... or was it 7 people that did!

I kid, I kid!

Personally, I can't comment on the topic as I've never used a phone OS I wasn't satisfied with at the time, and I don't count myself as having actually *used* iOS or Windows as a daily driver.

 

[MarkizSchnitzel]

In restrospect, Symbian was really terrible. But at the time, I did not mind much.

Currently, I am very unhappy with W10 Mobile, because it's like 5x slower than WP8.1. So I'm going with W10M. Though, early androids very also pretty bad, I've never owned one.

 

[slackerinabox]

Android circa gingerbread - felt like it was patched together with disperate elements by jr design interns. Web os was pretty buggy but I'll give it a lot of credit for being years ahead of its time. Windows mobile had it's pluses but also many niggling elements

 

[Oyeve]

Had a tab 2 with honeycomb. Hated it so much I gave to my son who hated it and gave to my gfs daughter who doesn't know any better as she uses an iphone.

 

[rumpleforeskin]

I'm shocked that there's no Windows mobile reply so far.

Win CE may have been a poor OS from a user interface point of view. It was still using resistive screens and a stylus to get some accuracy. But from a functionality point it was very good.

Back in 2007 I had a TYTN 2, Android had yet to get a phone on the market and apples original iPhone was an mp3 player with some phone elements (no MMS, no copy/paste, no push email, only Edge connection)
RIMs blackberry's were also pretty slick at this time and their messenger app was a killer feature and great email support. Web browsing was heavy on reformatting pages which sucked, as did media playback due to lack of support for many codecs.

Now there is no practical difference between Usability and functionality between phone OS's if you are buying at the top end.

 

[Commodus]

Win CE may have been a poor OS from a user interface point of view. It was still using resistive screens and a stylus to get some accuracy. But from a functionality point it was very good.

Back in 2007 I had a TYTN 2, Android had yet to get a phone on the market and apples original iPhone was an mp3 player with some phone elements (no MMS, no copy/paste, no push email, only Edge connection)
RIMs blackberry's were also pretty slick at this time and their messenger app was a killer feature and great email support. Web browsing was heavy on reformatting pages which sucked, as did media playback due to lack of support for many codecs.

Now there is no practical difference between Usability and functionality between phone OS's if you are buying at the top end.

The issue, I'd say, was that Microsoft, BlackBerry and Nokia all assumed that they would always have the functionality advantage, and that this would override Apple's interface advantage. They forgot that it's easy to catch up on features -- it's much harder to catch up on fundamental interface breakthroughs. Sure, the 2007 iPhone wasn't what you wanted if you had to have 3G, or copy-and-paste, or enterprise features... but those came quickly. It took Microsoft 3 years to offer a serious response to Apple's UI (even longer for BlackBerry and Nokia), and by that point it was too late.

 

[biostud]

iOS

(I've only owned my current smartphone, so all other OS seems annoying)

 

[core2slow]

The issue, I'd say, was that Microsoft, BlackBerry and Nokia all assumed that they would always have the functionality advantage, and that this would override Apple's interface advantage. They forgot that it's easy to catch up on features -- it's much harder to catch up on fundamental interface breakthroughs. Sure, the 2007 iPhone wasn't what you wanted if you had to have 3G, or copy-and-paste, or enterprise features... but those came quickly. It took Microsoft 3 years to offer a serious response to Apple's UI (even longer for BlackBerry and Nokia), and by that point it was too late.

Which made me think that they were never serious about this whole "smartphone" thing taking off or could never imagine what it has become. I mean, the iPhone didn't pop up over night, it was developed for a good 3-4 years prior to its release so I doubt MS/Nokia/BB didn't see it brewing from afar.

I'll give Apple all the credit it deserves for revolutionizing the smartphone market. They saw all the half-assed attempts on the market back then and go "we can do it better", and they did. Oh how I would love to hear the rationale from those MS/BB/Nokia execs for not further developing their OSes...

 

[ControlD]

I've only really used two, so my answer would have to be iOS. My wife had a Windows Mobile phone, and it was terrible but I won't list that because I only tried it a couple of times.

 

[Anubis]

IOS

 

[Commodus]

Which made me think that they were never serious about this whole "smartphone" thing taking off or could never imagine what it has become. I mean, the iPhone didn't pop up over night, it was developed for a good 3-4 years prior to its release so I doubt MS/Nokia/BB didn't see it brewing from afar.

I'll give Apple all the credit it deserves for revolutionizing the smartphone market. They saw all the half-assed attempts on the market back then and go "we can do it better", and they did. Oh how I would love to hear the rationale from those MS/BB/Nokia execs for not further developing their OSes...

I'd say that they had a lack of imagination. Microsoft and BlackBerry saw smartphones almost exclusively as business tools -- they genuinely couldn't grasp the notion that these devices could help everyday users. Nokia's phones weren't so limited, but they were clearly designed for enthusiasts and power users (the N95 was the quintessential gadget hound's phone).

The rationalization is pretty simple: all three companies were certain that they had an insurmountable edge over Apple, and were doing well enough in the market that they didn't feel a sense of urgency. Remember, this was the height of Steve Ballmer's myopic view of technology. He was focused on protecting the cash cow (Windows on PCs) at all costs, and was convinced that everyone on Earth was biologically preprogrammed to love Windows. Why wouldn't you want Windows on your phone? Well...

 

[Trader05]

Windows Mobile 6x was completely horrible so another vote for that.

Current OS's..maybe Windows 10 Mobile, its not horrible but the app gap and quality is still a major issue. One of the only things W10M gives that no other current OS has is dark mode.

 

[Midwayman]

Win mobile for sure. Pre ICS android was pretty terrible as well.

 

[Dulanic]

WinMo 6 was pretty bad.

 

[DeathReborn]

Symbian without as doubt.

 

[shortylickens]

Most proprietary OS's from the early 2000's.

Nokia was a joy, when I finally discovered it.

 

[fr]

Blackberry