48 PCWorld JANUARY 2020REVIEWS iPHONE 11 VS ANDROID’S BEST
crazy speeds, even if you
won’t notice
them much.
Winner: iPhone 11SOUND
After Apple famously
dumped the headphone
jack with the iPhone 7, the
rest of the industry has slowly
followed suit. First Google
took it away from the Pixel 2,
then OnePlus removed it
with last year’s 6T. And once it’s gone, it’s not
coming back.
The Galaxy S10+ is the sole phone in the
bunch that retains a 3.5mm headphone jack.
You even get a very decent pair of AKG-tuned
earbuds in the box. But Samsung axed the
headphone jack from the Note 10 and Galaxy
Fold, so you can see the writing on the wall.
You’ll get a pair of Lightning EarPods with the
iPhone 11, but neither the OnePlus 7T nor the
Google Pixel 4 XL includes a pair of buds, nor
a USB-C-to-3.5mm dongle. The phones’ own
speakers also deliver solid volume (the Pixel 4
loses its front-firing speakers, which gave it a
serious sound boost last year).Max decibels
Galaxy S10+: 100
Pixel 4 XL: 98
OnePlus 7T: 97
iPhone 11: 94Along with their loudness, every handset
but the Pixel 4 boasts Dolby Atmos spatial
sound. While it’s debatable that you actually
need Dolby Atmos support on a phone, it’s
nice to have. Supported music and movies
definitely feel slightly fuller (though you’re not
going to forget you’re listening on a pair of
smartphone speakers).
Winner: Galaxy S10+BIOMETRICS
We’re at something of a transitional period
when it comes to biometrics. OnePlus and
Samsung replaced the physical fingerprint
sensor with an in-display scanner, while the
iPhone 11 and Pixel 4 both use 3D facial
recognition. The Galaxy S10+ has a better
scanner than the OnePlus 7T, and the iPhone
tops the Pixel 4 XL with facial recognition, but
there’s more to the story than that.
The Galaxy phones used to have an irisThe headphone jack is going away, but the Galaxy S10+ still has one.