• A tablet showcases the Android operating system at the International Consumer Electronics Show held in Las Vegas, Nevada.

A tablet showcases the Android operating system at the International Consumer Electronics Show held in Las Vegas, Nevada. (Photo : Getty Images/Ethan Miller)

Many debates have divided society over the past couple of years, but perhaps none have done so quite as much as the debate over Android and Apple operating systems for mobile devices. With both systems coming out with major updates over the past year, it would be interesting to see which one edged out the competition.

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Kicking things off is Android's Nougat OS and its 7.1.1 update, which was released on Dec. 5. One of the major improvements Android made with this upgrade is the ease by which users can now access the applications they have installed on their mobile devices.

Nougat 7.1.1 does this by presenting shortcuts in the main screen. All users have to do now is to long press the app they need and then a list of possible actions they can choose from will pop up, Tech Times reported. For example, users can see the trending videos, search for certain videos, and even view subscriptions using this brand new feature.

Android Nougat now also features gender counterparts for previously exclusive emojis all thanks to this update. The emoji list now includes the likes of female welders as well as male hairdressers.

Not to be outdone, Apple's iOS also released a game-changing update this year. iOS 10.2 was released on Dec. 12 and was considered as a major update over Apple's previous mobile OS.

Although, Apple hoped that this new release would fix the problems that plagued the release of iOS 10.1, their update has seemingly caused some new problems. A battery drain issue wherein the phone will suddenly die even though it still has 30 percent of its battery remaining, according to Forbes.

There are upsides to iOS 10.2, however. For instance, it features gender-sensitive emojis much like Android Nougat 7.1.1.

With this update, users can now save their favorite camera settings instead of having to set them up every time the camera app is booted up. A new "TV app" has also been released with this update, allowing users to handle all of their subscriptions on a single application instead of on separate apps for each.

View a comparison of iOS 10 and Android Nougat 7.0 below: