If you are planning to get a new Android phone or something geekier to flash a custom Android ROM on your phone, here we share some useful insights into which of these three flavours, among stock Android, CyanogenMod and MiUi, will suit you the best.
Most of the Android Phones we buy these days ship with some customizations on top of the core Android system. Different brands customize look and feel as well as features on their Android phones based on the regions/ countries where these phones are sold. Over the years, big players have made some of these skins fairly popular like the TouchWiz from Samsung and Sense UI from HTC. But there is a parallel community based ecosystem of Android flavours, which exists by the people and for the people rather than the ones developed by brands.
Two most popular flavours are CyanogenMod and MiUi which can be used on almost any phone brand and has support for custom ROMs. It is similar to installing any OS on a PC.
These community developed flavours or skins of Android variants are much more capable and user-oriented. And interesting part about these flavours is that they are free to use, more like an open source community project. However, they have parallel business models like selling premium themes and customizations to support the developers and those who are committed to these projects. Some of these UIs are so popular that some brands ship their phones with these software pre-installed, like the OnePlus ships with CyanogenMod and recently, Indian mobile phone giant Micromax also announced their parallel brand Yu, which will sell phones with CyanogenMod pre-installed. MiUi on the other hand was developed by Xiaomi, thus all phones sold by Xiaomi are loaded with MiUi. However, just like any other community UI, MiUi can also be installed on on-Xiaomi phones as well.
If you a contemplating to buy a new Android phone or flashing an existing phone with one of these ROMs or UIs, we will help you make an informed decision and help to pick one among these three- stock Android (not-customized pure Android by Google), MiUi and CyanogenMod.
Who Should Pick Stock Android And Why?
If you are a user who is very concerned about data security, phone's stability and doesn't bother too much about doing really complex tweaks to your phone, you should pick stock Android. Stock Android is tested by Google's Android team rigorously before release and comes with stable, smooth, well-tested and secure software with minimal chances of your phone becoming unstable. It gives you simple, easy and smoother user experience, but at the same time, the level of customization in terms of themes and skins is close to nil which is deliberately done to prevent any external piece of software breaching into the security and stability of the stock Android system. It is highly smooth, comes with almost all default Android's Google services, and is fairly easy to use with much less options to play with.
Who Should Pick MiUi And Why?
MiUi, on the other hand, is a very different eco-system, which comes with fairly user friendly features. But contrary to stock Android, the development cycles of MiUi are much more frequent, probably fastest among the three UIs we are discussing. With such fast development cycles, these UIs are always prone to some bugs and vulnerabilities. Also with fast changing codes and features, things change at a great pace and you need to keep yourself abreast with these improvements to make the best use of it.
So, if you are someone who is not bothered much by some level of instability, and doesn't keep top-secret information on your phone (as it may be affected with security vulnerabilities more often than competing UIs), MiUi is the ROM to go with. It is rich in features and we have played with it on some of the Xiaomi devices. It is a very intuitive UI, but as I mentioned earlier, there are some trade-offs which you have to live with.
Who Should Pick CyanogenMod And Why?
CyanogenMod is among the most capable and most power-packed UI among these three as it gives user more privileges and flexibility compared to the other two UIs. Also the options of tweaking with settings and capabilities, and advanced configurations of the phone are much more doable on the CyanogenMod compared to other two UIs. But with the strengths, there are also some weak points which include: a steeper learning curve and un-noticed features of the CyanogenMod, which many users would never know of.
CyanogenMod is not as intuitive and simple as MiUi, which have more user-friendly interactions with the users on visual and functional level. It best suits the users who are power-users and thrive to do more advanced changes and customizations to their phones. It is more stable compared to the MiUi and offers much more advanced controls.
