Counterpoint: I have a rather good experience with Samsung. I bought flagships devices some time after their releases (I had S2, S4, S8 and now a S10e from work

Counterpoint: I have a rather good experience with Samsung. I bought flagships devices some time after their releases (I had S2, S4, S8 and now a S10e from work) and they lasted me a long time (S2 and S4 both lasted for four years). The big advantage is that they were powerful devices with a removable battery and a SD-card slot. Downside was a tendency to overheat a bit (this was particularly bad on the S2 at some point, though I recall subsequent software updates helped a lot). In all cases, the devices kept being updated to the latest android while I was using them. The Samsung Android additions are pretty much useless except maybe one or two good ideas, but they also don't get in the way. I just spend 30 minutes to disable things when I get my phone. Also I don't know if you've looked at real stock android (e.g. fire an emulator from Android studio for instance) but that stuff is real ugly (shouldn't be a big consideration - it can be themed quite easily, but I felt I needed to make this point).