posted by 433 Spaceman, 6/25/2018

Android Zello vs. iOS Zello vs. PC Zello

I'm a big Android user. I have several Android drvices. However, I also have a PC, and a couple Apple devices.

And now that I've had a chance to play with Zello on all 3 platforms, I will take a step back and give you the pros and cons of each platform:

(Overall, I dig Android's version the best)


PC version of Zello

Pros:

  • Seems to be the best at "getting the button" in a busy channel
  • VOX works REALLY well

Cons:

  • Awful interface


iOS version of Zello

Pros

  • Has a nice camouflage skin that the android does not have
  • able to easily swipe through recent channels/contacts very quickly
  • Can add custom sounds like squelch or motorolla radio sounds before and/or after each transmission including your own
  • Seems to be better on the battery than Android's version
  • Has cool extra built in custom alert sounds that Android does not have

Cons:

  • interface looks good but is not laid out very well. Does not flow well going from screen to screen
  • No VOX option
  • NOT able to map volume buttons as PTT button (not Zello's fault. This was a request from Apple)
  • Bluetooth button mapping doesn't work very well - if at all at times
  • Not exactly sure why, but I'm not able to keep Zello running in the background steadily, no matter how I have the system set up. I seem to be the only one with that problem though.


Android version of Zello

Pros:

  • Great interface - well thought out in comparison to other versions
  • Able to map device buttons as the PTT button
  • Able to map various Bluetooth devices as a PTT button, such as a VR remote or camera remote
  • Can add custom sounds like squelch or motorolla radio sounds before and/or after each transmission including your own
  • If you have android with split screen, you can do things like THIS
  • With Android, you can clone the Zello app and run more than one instance of Zello and have more than one account logged in at the same time. Great for being able to handle certain channels differently - like go in Busy mode for one set of channels while being available for another set of channels.
  • Able to modify Zello

Cons:

  • NOT able to easily swipe between recent channels like you can in iOS
  • No camouflage skin like in iOS
  • Hard on the battery (although, it seems to be better these days - edited: 1/4/2019)