Because they produce amazing beautiful hardware that works well with its software, no difficult configuration needed, a best-in-class UX, a high bar for all of its apps to meet (so thus overall UX is quality), an integrated ecosystem, and a marketing machine that makes you feel good and obtain social status for owning it.

What's the mystery?

You say that as if that's some easy, cheap thing to achieve. Those words are also not concrete at all as to what they mean, exactly. All of these things are designed with purpose and are extremely difficult.

>You say that as if that's some easy, cheap thing to achieve.

No, I don't. I say it as if there are more important things to consider in the products you buy.

Maybe for YOU, but considering Apple just posted their most revenue ever last quarter, there are billions of reasons to disagree.

(Their products are also not _just_ sexy/trendy, clearly. They basically invented this entire category of modern smartphone despite many previous attempts by others.)

Logical fallacy. Just because a product is successful doesn't make it the best product - in fact I'd wager that it isn't more often than not.

The question wasn't "what's the best product," it was "Why do so many prefer the walled garden?"

Because to the average, non-technically minded user, they bought the phone for the logo on the back.

Sadly, average, non-technically minded users make up a large proportion of the global populace.

Like Beats headphones?

I've met many musicians who actually prefer Beats in the studio for recording. They argue that they don't care for sound quality that much, but they're much more comfortable on their head than any conventional studio monitots. Personally, I found that for DJing, I don't care about sound quality either - it's much more important to be able to quickly move headphones on and off and how comfortable are they on one ear.

Sound quality is not the only important quality headphones can have. Could the same be true for phones as well?

I'm an IT professional of over 30 years. I can tell you why I prefer the walled garden.

1. It just works+.

2. They have sensible defaults+.

3. I am not the product++.

+ for what I am interested in doing.

++ unlike the inhabitants of the open meadow nextdoor.

> Why do so many prefer the walled garden?

I'd first ask: do people actually prefer the walled garden?

In my opinion, the walled garden has very little impact on the day-to-day experience of most users. Partly, this is because the most popular apps were historically available on iOS first (and perhaps exclusively). More apps gives the impression of more freedom, not less.

This makes the walled garden a non-factor for most people, so purchasing decisions are made based on other qualities: design, hardware, user experience, app selection, familiarity with the platform, brand perception, ecosystem lock-in, etc.

> Why do so many prefer the walled garden

I think that puts the question wrong, the question is actually 'what's the actual downside to the normal person of the walled garden?'

Mobile Safari and the App Store are still gold standards from everything I've seen. Go look at any browser benchmark you want -- Anandtech has a bunch of them in any review article -- and the iPhone running Mobile Safari runs circles around flagship Androids running Chrome (this includes Google's own Octane benchmark). Part of that is the hardware but (1) the magnitude of many benchmarks is larger than the single threaded advantage the hardware gets in say Geekbench and (2) hardware is another walled garden(!!); if the unwalled garden is so much better in theory, why in practice isn't there a single Android phone that can match the iphone in single threaded performance?

I'll tell you why: the ownership experience. I like a lot of things about Android, but the ownership experience is a key differentiator for me.

I've had Nexus phones and iPhones, and I like the software on both. But when I drop my iPhone and crack the screen, as I did several months ago, I can go to one of several Apple stores near me and get a replacement in about 15 minutes from polite, well-trained employees. That service also extends to OS and security updates for many years instead of just one or two.

The new Pixel phones cost more than $600, which puts them roughly in the iPhone price range. I certainly would not pay that much for something that is so important to my daily life if I had to ship it somewhere to get it repaired, possibly being without a phone for several days while I wait for it to come back. It won't run the latest OS after two years, either.

It's the same reason a lot of people buy Lexuses instead of Toyotas -- you are treated better when you need service, you get a nice loaner car instead of a ride home in a minivan shuttle, etc.

In general, as I've gotten older, I have learned that paying for service is just as important as paying for features. I sometimes buy things with features I don't really need in order to access the better service experience.

Since its a status symbol. I recently got a iPad. I initially thought the version was very old since UI looked dated(coming from Android M). Nope it was the latest version. I do not find the UX nor the UI better then Material design of Android. Fantastic hardware though, feels good to hold and has very good battery life.

Because they don't know what computers can and can't do, they never realize the wall is there. Computer course for kids and adults always teach how to write a letter and do a mail merge, not how to use a computer.

Actual walled gardens are very pleasant places to be. It is puzzling that detractors of a thing would analogize it to something that is so nice. Maybe telling? I don't know.