Android

I think there's a setting to bring back the buttons, if you want that.

Settings -> System -> Gestures -> System navigation

Definitely try gestures.

Being able to "go back" from a gentle swipe at any height is a blessing for the small hand. The rest of options are really, really intuitive.

Unless you have some mobility issues, you'll never come back after a week.

Pretty sure you can still enable 3 button navigation in settings. I still use it

I had that for about half an hour, but I wouldn't want to switch back. Gestures all the time

Took me awhile to get used to gesture, but can't go back now. The only thing that still bothers me is the old UX of the slide out side menus was clearly overlooked with gesture navigation and is really awkward.

It's possible to adjust it so you have three little buttons but you can also use gestures from those buttons. Not the sides. I used to use that setup for a long time but know I'm just using the regular gestures for now. By the way I'm on a Samsung Galaxy S20.

I'm so used to gestures I can barely use a phone with button navigation. When I have to help my parents/grandparents with their smartphones I take longer just because they use buttons lol.

Also the 3 button navigation is not gone afaik. All OEMs I've used have it buried in the settings somewhere.

I really wanted to like gestures. I used them for over a year.
Even after all that, switching back bottom navigation immediately felt right.

initially I didn't like the gesture controls but they really are better than having buttons wasting space and burning in the screen

I used a phone without gestures the other day and had such a hard time with it, it was crazy how unintuitive the buttons felt in comparison to the gestures!

The simple fact is, neither is actually all that intuitive, they're learned, but gestures definitely get to be very convenient and a much quicker form of navigation.

I would definitely not want to go back.

Nah, I love gestures. It's so quick to go back just by swiping left or right.

I like both but use gestures because I don't want to lose screen space on the bottom. I like full screen apps

Haven't used the 3 buttons navigation since 2016 or 2017

I prefer gestures. But if you like buttons just go to settings and turn them on.

Try gestures. They get easy after a time. Pro tip: to open hamburger menus tap and hold left edge of screen for 0.5s and pull it out to the right. Works every time and no accidental back swipes.

Nah, I jumped to gestures the first chance I did. 3 button navigation is old school, and on large screen devices, it's not good. Gestures have a larger surface area for activation and require less precise input to active. I also use one-handed mode+ of samsung, so I have the entire 3 sides of the screen to activate as desired. They are just that much intuitive and convenient for me.

For me it's the opposite now. My boyfriend still uses the 3 bottom buttons and I am so used to gestures by now that whenever I use his phone I am always a little thrown off. To me it just feels more intuitive to swipe rather than to go to the bottom of the screen to tap a button.

I don't know about your phone, but there is probably a setting yo enable button navigation.

However, I was in similar situation when I bought my phone, I even enabled the buttons at first. Then I thought to try gesture navigation for sometime, and now I love it. It's much easier and faster in most cases.

gesture navigation is fine for me. but i more want stacking recent tasks back

Gesture all the way

I really miss the 2 button navigation bar. using the pill to switch between apps felt intuitive. however I don't think I could go back after using gestures.

Had the same initial reaction to Pixel. But its really grown on me. The swipe to go back is awesome. Having said that, there is a setting to get the buttons back, in case this doesn't grow on you

It's just too easy to accidentally swipe back. A massive massive flaw in my opinion. The amount of times I catch my self entering a screen scrolling vertically and then accidentally exiting only to lose my place when I return.

Having said that the speed of doing actions has increased for me. It's just the accuracy has decreased at the same time.

I very quickly got used to the gesture controls, and now appreciate the extra screen space.

Past two phones I've had (Galaxy Z fold 3 and OnePlus 7 Pro) I've had the option for gestures or buttons.

I always pick gestures, I get more screen real estate and the gestures feel good and intuitive.

If you don't like them, change it, that's the benefit of Android, you can do what you want.

You're looking for settings --> navigation bar

Gestures are great and intuitive, definitely give it a bit more time before changing back imo!

I love the gestures themselves. I hate that they "try" to follow device orientation.

It's a guesswork if the screen is rotated or if the media itself is just so. Also i've had multiple cases where the gesturebar is on the portrait bottom but the gestures are on the landscape.

Oneplus did it correct when they had their own gestures. The gestures were always on the same spot regardless of the device orientation. You always knew where they were. Also i think they worked in fullscreen apps without first swiping the gesture bar out.

edit: just wanted to add that i'm on android 12, i don't know if they are less finicky now.

Just changed back to buttons thanks to a comment on this post. I had been using gestures since I got my new Pixel mid-July (since my carrier stopped supporting the 3a and gave me a 6a for $50). Never got used to it, constantly kept accidentally swiping to go back while doing other things.

This isn't quite as good as the 3a, which had buttons for back and home, but swipe up for the app switcher, but it's definitely better than 100% gestures

Fuck gestures! And people, can't you understand other people like buttons instead of gestures? If you don't have an answer to what OP asked, why bother to "give advice"?