It is, of course, personal preference but AD wouldn't be for me. DH drives to AD 4 times a week- not ideal but he doesn't mind it too much and listens to podcasts from radio at home or keeps up to date on calls to home. We live the right side of town for the commute, the Marina, and cannot imagine trading what we have here for AD. But each to their own.
it depends on where you go first, if you come to ad first you prefer it as you get used to having to drive from here to there, whereby dxb is different, it has many more malls etc and more to do so people that land in dxb usually prefer there.
I moved to AD as my DH's job changed. Similarly to Bella I was in DXB for nearly 2 yrs and made lovely friends who I think will be life long and was blessed that this happened relatively easily and early on. I loved the area we lived in in Dxb and had found a great school for my DS.
Moving to AD has been a mixed bag. I like the proximity but again like Bella doctors and dentists I found harder to locate recommended ones. I also struggle with the malls and need to trapse to a number to get what I need and with kids in tow can mean a week activity from one mall to the next.
I do love where we live but have been slow and slack making friends.... overall it's good tho and at least DH is half awake at the end of the day rather than being a zombie!!!!
I moved for work in August and I really love my job so it was definitely worth the move. However, I do miss my Dubai friends as I was there for 4 years so had finally made 'real' friends and then I had to start all over again and meet people in AD. Finding Doctors and dentists in AD seems to be more of a challenge as well.
AD in general is fine, not as glitz and glam but everything is closer so you can get places in a taxi easily and there are plenty of places to eat and drink. The only thing I will say that I hate is that the shopping malls here are garbage compared to Dubai, and I can't stand it that I have to go to 4 different malls to cover the key shops I would get in one mall in Dubai. But in general my life is much better here so I can make my peace with the malls and just go to Dubai when I need to shop.
I considered the commute and am very glad I didn't, other people in the office do it and I prefer to have that extra 2-3 hours a day to do something for fun or at least functional like laundry, lol!
my hubs had to drive along that highway when it was only 1.5 lanes wide, and used to take 3 hours from 13th st in ad to the border interchange..! the road is so much better now. but ad and dxb are different. there is more to do in dxb but people with families prefer the slower pace in ad. it really depends on your family and what you want, you will need to be more specific in your questions. people commute because of the rent prices, in dxb there has always been more housing stock and in that case the landlords are more flexible, also since they opened up the housing to expats the landlords are not all locals, which can make a difference.