I've had to pay thousands of dollars on Android devices I don't want in order to test my website and fix shitty Chrome bugs. I sucked it up. You can too.
If the cost really is an issue for you, I'm sure you know that you aren't forced to pay $500 to Apple. You can easily find hand-me-down Apple devices that still runs a current operating system for a pittance -- or free if you have a network of friends or family. No need to pay Apple anything.
Well that's some nonsense. You can install the Android emulator on MacOS, or whatever OS you use for developing - you can't do that with iOS. You have to purchase a mac to do it.
And I can't even buy only an iOS device, because the iOS device has to connect to a laptop/desktop version of Safari to use its debugger - so I need to purchase two Apple devices!, just to debug the mobile device.
I wouldn't be complaining if I could install the iOS simulator on any other platform - but even on iOS the iOS simulator sucks badly, and it only works on MacOS. It doesn't "simulate" touch events correctly, as they function differently on a real iOS device.
Tell me you're not a web developer without telling me. Many of the Chrome/Android bugs I've had to deal with are touch/swipe/drag interactivity issues which cannot be reliably tested in simulators, especially because the fix often involves experiencing the affordances with your own finger tips. Real testing requires real access to real devices used by real end-users. This is as true for Android and Windows as it is for iOS and macOS.
Nobody says you need to pay Apple anything. Apple devices can be incredibly cheap on the second-hand market -- potentially free if you have friends or family. An older Mac and an iPhone 11 are all you really need. If that is still too much for you, then what can I say? I don't see Microsoft giving you a Windows PC or Google giving you an Android device for free.
I suppose you can quit your job and become a chef, but you'll still have to buy your own set of knives and an apron.
No shit, shelock. Of course a real device is better. But 99% of iOS problems I've been able to solve using Browserstack (paid for by my work). It's the 1% of iOS bugs that they had to buy me an iPhone and a Macbook to fix. I don't get to use those devices to debug my own projects. That requires me to spend a lot of my own money. I've never had any problem with any touch events on android browsers - but I'm sure I would if Safari were on Android, because Apple is the only one that does crazy shit with their mobile browser because they tHiNk DiFfErEnT.
No, you're just an Apple shill. "Incredibly cheap" is not cheap, it's still quite a few hundreds of dollars - I have to buy an iOS device and an Apple desktop/laptop to run the Safari debugger to debug the iOS device... so it gets expensive really quickly to debug a shit browser that is intentionally hobbled by a greedy company.
Tell me you're not a web developer without telling me you're not a web developer. And if you are, you must be new here, or really bad at it. I've been developing websites for 30+ years, so I have no doubt I've been in this game and paying attention way longer than you have. Go have a seat over there, this pointless internet interaction is OVER.
If the cost really is an issue for you, I'm sure you know that you aren't forced to pay $500 to Apple. You can easily find hand-me-down Apple devices that still runs a current operating system for a pittance -- or free if you have a network of friends or family. No need to pay Apple anything.