 When you're buying a phone, there are really five things you need to pay attention to. Battery life, camera, app ecosystem, design, and software. Every phone does the basics well. They make phone calls, they send texts, they browse the web. And you really can't get a bad smartphone anymore. But what if you want the best phone? If you want to buy a phone you know you'll be happy with and just not worry about it anymore, you should buy an iPhone 5S. It's just the best all-around smartphone on the market. It's beautifully designed, a little metallic rectangle of a thing that scuffs pretty easily, but is both sturdy and handsome. Its screen is small by today's standards, yes. If you want bigger than a four-inch screen, you're better off looking elsewhere. But the screen is high resolution, viewable outdoors, and generally every bit as good as it needs to be. Two things really set the 5S apart. Its camera and its ecosystem. The 8-megapixel camera is the most consistent, sharpest, simplest smartphone camera you'll find. Other phones offer cool features the iPhone doesn't, but there's just nothing that matches its picture quality and ease of use. And then there's the App Store, filled with hundreds of thousands of great camera apps, games, productivity tools, and pretty much anything else you can think of. Sure, every platform has Twitter and Facebook and Angry Birds, but iOS gets the best apps first, and it gets great apps that no other platform ever sees. And that's all not to mention the huge ecosystem of speakers, Docs, Apple TVs, and cases that only fit the iPhone. It may not be perfect in every respect, but if all you want is a phone that you know you'll love, that you'll never have to worry about, you should buy a 5S. But what if you don't want an iPhone? What if you want a big screen, or really killer battery life? That's when you should take a long look at the new HTC One. It's one of the best designed phones I've ever seen, a truly beautiful object. It's big, big enough to be hard to use in one hand, but it's just gorgeous. It is a 5-inch, 1080p screen that's easily among the best on the market. It has a battery that lasts a day and a half without trying very hard, and it has one of the better customizations of Android you'll ever find. It has great speakers too, and seriously, it's just beautiful. The One has just a single big compromise. The camera. It does a nice job taking pictures in low light, since HTC uses big pixels to take deceptively well-lit shots in dark rooms, but the photos just don't look as good as I'd like. It has some neat features, and a second lens that lets you sort of refocus your shots after the fact, but pictures just aren't what I want them to be. In anything but the most ideal situation, it doesn't hold a candle to the iPhone. If you do want an Android phone that takes great pictures, you have a couple of options. There's the Samsung Galaxy S5, which has a 13 megapixel camera that takes good but unspectacular pictures pretty much all the time. Actually, everything about the S5 is good but unspectacular. It has a good screen, some useful software features, and great battery life. And it's waterproof, which I really like. But it has a plasticky design, which is better than last year's S4, but still not exactly attractive. And it's still too full of overbearing and unnecessary software and bloopy sound effects to really be a great, enjoyable device. There's nothing terrible about the S5, except maybe the design, but there's really nothing to be all that excited about either. I like the Nexus 5, too. It feels a little more expensive than some other phones, even though it isn't. And I like that it comes with pure, unadulterated Android. But its battery life and camera can be spotty at times, and there are some dangers with things like customer service when you buy a phone directly from Google. If you're a picky purist, you won't want anything else, but most people can probably get a little more for their money. Phones really aren't one-size-fits-all. Different things work better for different people. The best example is probably the Samsung Galaxy Note 3. It's huge. With a 5.7-inch screen, it's too big for your average skinny jean and for your average customer. But if you want a big phone or you want stylus support, don't even consider another phablet. Samsung invented this kind of phone, and it's still king. On a similar note, if all you want is crazy, insane, outrageous battery life, you want a splurge for the Motorola Droid Max. I don't like much of anything about the way this phone is designed, but it'll last two days and then some. Now for a slightly smaller phone. The Moto X is designed to be a straightforward iPhone competitor. Simple software, easy to use, easy to understand. Its problem is that it has slightly outdated specs that are only going to become more outdated over the course of your two-year contract. It's a good phone for basic users, and I love the ability to customize it, but you might find yourself wanting a little more. Honestly, that's really the end of the list of phones you should consider. You might find yourself looking at a Windows phone like the Lumia Icon or the Lumia 925, but even though those have good cameras and hugely improved software thanks to Windows Phone 8.1, they still don't have the app selection or general performance that the best Android and iOS devices do. And if you're looking at a Blackberry, well, you either desperately need a physical keyboard or you shouldn't be buying a Blackberry. Honestly though, no matter what you leave the store with, you can leave knowing you bought a phone that will do just about everything you absolutely need it to. What you're choosing among is the details. Which design do you like best? Would you rather have a killer screen or a big battery or a great camera? Do you like iOS or Android better? For my money, the iPhone 5S is an easy choice. It may not be the best in every category, but it's the best smartphone you can buy.