You said there was a huge delta between what was possible with the iPhone and without and that it was growing, but haven't show anything that fits that category.

Apple hardware is impressive, no doubt. But if a CPU is already fast enough to do anything you need, does making it even faster matter? Based on the latest benchmarks, there is a huge different between the iPhone and S8 when editing and rendering 4k video. I would suggest if you are editing and rendering 4k video on a phone, especially one who's display is incapable of showing that resolution, you are doing it wrong. ARCore is the Google equivalent of ARkit, and it also uses the entire platform. There really isn't a difference in capability between them.

Service and support certainly aren't only available on the iPhone.

What third party apps aren't available on Android and only for the iPhone? MS Office apps, which you specifically mentioned, have been available for Android since 2015. They are probably even easier to use on the S8, since you can get a dock that uses the phone as a computer and hooks it up to a monitor, keyboard, and mouse with the Samsung Dex Station.

Apple only apps are replicated on Android. It is silly thinking Android Pay is less secure than Apple Pay. Google Photos does the same thing as PhotoStream, but isn't limited to just iOS devices, and it is free unlimited storage if you have a Pixel. The biggest difference in chatting with somebody in iMessage from an Android device is your name shows up in green. Yes, that was one journalist's reason for not switching, so I guess it is a big deal (for some).

Google Drive does the same thing as iCloud, but again, not limited to just iOS devices. It allows access across all your devices with Drive.

Android also has wearables, so again it isn't exclusive. Even better, the watch face isn't limited to one form factor. So, not only is it not exclusive, but there are more choices if you don't use iOS.

How does iMessage matter, especially a lot? What does it do that can not be done on other devices?

Quote:
Perhaps most important, a wide swath of humanity finds the iPhone to be useable and accessible. For many it is their primary daily computing device. People love their iPhones. And it rubs off on the people around them.

I'm not sure if you noticed, but your own link shows that Android is a larger swatch of humanity.

Everybody says there are so many things that can only be done with Apple devices, but I haven't seen it.