I recently went back to an iPhone 6s while my iPhone XS was in for repairs. Boy, did I miss FaceID (though some of the pain was also due to the change in certain key combinations and gestures between home button and notch iPhones, I had to go back in time and re-learn some old habits).
Why did I miss it? Because FaceID will unlock the notification area and its associated actions before I perform any action or even touch the phone.
Let’s say I get a text, my phone is on the night stand. I just look at it and it already unlocks, no reaching.
It lets you skip a step and start interacting with the screen before the phone has unlocked. Perhaps less of a big deal with the back-mounted fingerprint sensor, in that case I could interact with the thumb simultaneous to unlocking the back.
Using password managers was another big one. Instead of tapping the auto fill button, then tapping the fingerprint sensor, it was all one click. Opening bank apps, same thing. FaceID is always one less finger motion.
Mask wearing has thrown a wrench into it but Apple has added logic to quickly bring up the pin pad when it detects a face mask. Also, sometimes it seems to learn my masked face, but that’s less reliable.
I don’t know how this compares to Pixel face unlocking at all, admittedly.
And I never understood why Apple didn’t use the rear mounted fingerprint sensor. But I do understand why they think the benefits of face unlocking outweigh the drawbacks.
Some examples not related to the action of unlocking: when your alarm goes off, the noise gets quiet when you look at the phone. Also, the screen won’t time out and turn off while your eyes are looking at it.