Do you test on real devices or just rely on browser dev tools for responsive design?

Genuinely curious how thorough people actually are with this.

Browser dev tools (Chrome’s device toolbar, etc.) are fast and convenient, but I’ve run into cases where a site looked fine in dev tools and then had actual issues on a real phone — things like:
– Touch target sizes being too small in practice, even though they looked fine on screen
– Font rendering differences between the simulated view and the real device
– Actual scroll/tap behavior feeling different than expected
– Notch/safe-area issues on real iPhones that dev tools don’t always catch

My current process is dev tools for quick iteration, then a final check on 2-3 real devices (a budget Android, a newer iPhone, and a tablet) before calling anything done — but it does slow things down.

At WebLynx (https://www.weblynx.us/), this final device-testing step has caught more real issues than I expected, especially on client sites where users mostly browse on older/budget phones.

What’s your workflow — do you test on real hardware, use device farms/BrowserStack, or trust dev tools most of the time?

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