If the mountain does not go to Muhammad, Muhammad goes to the mountain. One of the reasons why I am an Apple user, it is because of its ecosystem. Although I have a second Android phone, there are two elements that continue to tie me to the apple: the Apple Watch (which seems irreplaceable to me) and AirDrop. The twist is that Android is turning that upside down, and OPPO with O+Connect has given me a slap of reality.
If Apple is jealous about something, it is its ecosystem. Their devices work great with each other, but with Android/Windows they cut features or don’t work at all. In recent months, Chinese brands have set out to break that barrier, with Xiaomi and OPPO being the leaders when creating Android devices with “native” support of Apple devices.
From OPPO they have already shown the AirPods working perfectly on an Android mobile and they have plans for the same thing to happen with the Apple Watch, and Xiaomi with HyperOS 3 allows you to use your iPad and Mac as floating windows. The theory is fine, but now I have seen first-hand that it works perfectly.
And O+Connect is a missile to Apple’s AirDrop… which works even better than AirDrop.
OPPO busting AirDrop
OPPO has been arguing for a few years that we should be able to interconnect devices regardless of their brand and operating system. In 2022 they launched Connect to allow you to easily control and send files with Windows, but a few months ago announced the evolution: O+ Connect.
This app was presented from the beginning as the tool for an OPPO device to communicate not only with a PC, but with a Mac and, also, with iOS devices. Translation: a way to transfer files between the two that emulates the operation of AirDrop.
Due to technical issues, it is something that has been implemented in OPPO, OnePlus and Realme phones little by little with the latest system versionsand it basically works like this:
- On the iPhone/iPad, we download O+ Connect from the App Store.
- On the OPPO, OnePlus or Realme device, we choose the “Share” option and click on the “iPhone or PC” icon. Literally, the icon is an iPhone with its Dynamic Island and everything.
- The Android creates a Wi-Fi hotspot and, from the O+ Connect app, the iPhone detects that connection point.
- We send the files and they are transferred over that local connection.
- When the transfer is finished, which is very fast, the hotspot is automatically deactivated.
Recently, I have had two cell phones from the group in my hands. First, the Realme GT8 Pro with which I went to China to take photosand a few days ago the OPPO Find X9 Pro for analysis. With both I have used this function a lot – a lot – to transfer photos to both the iPhone (from where I upload them to Instagram) and the iMac (because it also works on macOS), and the experience has been fantastic.
I share a lot with AirDrop and it usually works well, but there are many times where either the transfer fails or it doesn’t set up in the first place, having to turn AirDrop off, turn it back on, and repeat the process. It’s a bit tedious, but my experience with both the OPPO and the Realme has been spectacular.
Not a single mistake, good transfer speeds (even scrolling through very heavy photos and videos) and, in general, a very good experience. I think it’s not as fast as the native AirDrop feature, but set to burst the ecosystemI consider AirDrop and full support for AirPods to be very good touchstones.
As I said at the beginning, that ecosystem is the only thing that keeps me in the apple brand, and the moment I can use my Apple Watch Series 10 on a mobile phone with the photographic capabilities of a Xiaomi 17 Profrom a Vivo X300 Pro or the OPPO Find X9 Pro itself, it is more than likely that I will return to Android as my main system.
Images and photos | Xataka
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