Popular tech YouTuber finds the iPhone beats out Android in a head-to-head comparison, but says it's impossible to declare an 'objective winner'

• Prominent tech reviewer and YouTuber MKBHD weighed in on the age-old Apple vs. Android debate.
• Apple came out on top, but he also noted the true "winner" varies depending on one's preferences.

Popular tech YouTuber Marques Brownlee, better known as MKBHD, conducted a head-to-head comparison to find the "definitive" answer to an age-old debate: which is better, iPhone or Android?

Spoiler: There was an overall winner, but there wasn't. That's because Brownlee was quick to clarify that while one did edge out the other in his comparison, it's impossible to crown a true best option that applies to everyone and their varying preferences.

Luckily, he had a solution for that.

"We know that one winner doesn't automatically apply to every human on earth," Brownlee said in the first minute of the video. "I'm actually gonna give you a system, a rubric, to help figure out the real answer for yourself."

The idea for the comparison may have been sparked by a response to a post Brownlee made on Threads earlier this summer, in which he asked to hear people's best tech-related hot takes. Instagram head Adam Mosseri responded by stating that "Android's now better than iOS."

Brownlee broke the head-to-head showdown into seven categories: customization, features, ease of use, updates/support, apps, excitement, and ecosystem. He discussed how the iPhone's operating system, iOS, and Android fare in each category, and declares a winner in each of the seven — Android wins in customization, features, and excitement, while iOS wins in apps, updates, ease of use, and ecosystem.

The iPhone was the overall winner out of the seven categories, winning in 4 of the 7 head-to-head comparisons, but Brownlee returned to the caveat he began the video with.

"There is no objective winner to a decision as personal as this one," he said.

To figure out your own personal winner, Brownlee suggested viewers give each of the 7 categories a rating from 1 to 5 based on how much they care about it. Then, based on the earlier head-to-head, viewers should add up the scores they gave all of the iPhone-won categories and the scores they gave to the Android-won categories. The OS with the higher total score is the winner.

Following this weighted system, Brownlee found his personal winner was Android, which he said he uses as his main device while also using an iPhone. He even suggested that viewers add in their own categories depending on what's important to them.

"It turns out that buying a phone is one of the most personal decisions you make," Brownlee says. "It's the thing you spent your money on and carry everywhere you go. At the end of the day, the real winner is us, because they're competing against each other to get better and hopefully win you over."