Ready to leave Apple's walled garden and switch over to Android? There's never been a better time to make the jump, and moving all of your data over is easier than ever. We'll walk you through the process of transferring your data from iOS to Android so you can hit the ground running with a few apps and features built right into your new Android phone.
Back up your data
The first thing you should do is back up as much of your data on your old iPhone as possible. Most of the important data that you'll need is going to have a simple way to move your data over to Android, especially things like your photos and contacts.
If you want to keep your photos, we would recommend downloading Google Photos. Google's homegrown photo manager app works extremely well on any platform you're using, but most importantly it can back up every photo and video you have on your device. Simply download the app, follow the instructions through setup, and let it get your photo library backed up to Google's servers. When you sign into Google Photos on your Android device, you'll automatically see all of your pictures and videos, with no additional effort needed. This has the bonus of working on the web and any other devices you're using with your Google account, too.
Backing up your contacts also has a few different options, but the simplest way is going to be to use iOS's built-in file exporter. On your Contacts app on your iPhone, tap the Lists button in the top left, then long-press your iCloud contacts and tap Export. This will give us the option to share all of your iOS contacts, which you can then email to yourself, send your preferred cloud storage backup, or anywhere else you keep data backed up. We probably won't need this with Android's transfer options, but better safe than sorry.
At this point, we would also recommend opening any apps with important data to see which ones will allow you to back up to an account or export data. There are too many apps and services these days to give you a blanket solution for everything, but many games and apps have a way to sync up with an account that will instantly pull your data over when you sign in on a new device. Don't lose that Candy Crush progress!
Google also has a Switch to Android app available on the iOS App Store that's probably worth checking out, too. The reviews are hit or miss, but using this in combination with some of the other methods should give you a fallback option in case something gets missed.
Android direct transfer
The next step is going to happen while you're setting up your new Android phone. After getting your device turned on and connected to WiFi, most devices are going to give you the option to transfer old data to your new device.
Android does do this natively, including allowing you to connect your devices via cable to move things over.
This is by far the easiest step in the process. Your new phone's setup process will let you pick what you want to transfer over if it's available, like your pictures, contacts, text messages, and more. Pick what you want, uncheck what you don't, and let Android work its magic. And for anything that can't be directly transferred over, hopefully, you still have that backup from the last step in the guide to catch any of those exceptions.
Sign in and set up
You'll also be prompted to sign into your Google account during the setup process for your new Android phone, which is a great idea for bringing data over. Your Google account holds a lot of the things we want on the new phone, like your Google Photos library and potentially your contacts, emails, and passwords. This will also allow you to start downloading equivalent apps from the Play Store so you can keep everything that you're used to from your iPhone.
Depending on the phone you have (IE, a Samsung Galaxy device) you may also have the option to sign into an OEM-specific account or use something like Samsung's Smart Switch to pull data over. These days that certainly isn't required, but some of the phone makers have their own spin on the transfer process to try and make things easier for you. Doesn't hurt to explore your options.
Hopefully, this grabs all the important data that you need, but if there's anything left, your last step should be to double-check your newly installed apps and make sure everything is there. If not, see if you backed it up in the first step to get the last few things cleaned up. Enjoy your new Android phone!
