App of the Week: Feedly

Developer: Feedly Team

Platform: Android

Price: Free

In an age where we are ever hungry for media – be that film, book, gaming or news – but also on a journey for the consummate paradigm of convenience, it’s only a matter of natural progression that we can get all of our daily news, drawn from any number of connected sources from every far-flung corner of the interwebs, delivered via a single app.

No longer do we have to flit through a selection of blogs and sites every morning, on our daily commute on the train. We can bid farewell to the rushed visits, hurriedly typing in a handful of URL’s and quickly scanning down uninteresting headlines, trying to catch glimpses of news that may offer a scant morsel of something interesting. No more IGN, BBC Sport, Android Central et al.

The concept of an RSS reader isn’t something new or novel – allowing you to simply add as many sources as you wish, and instead of having to visit them, any updates to the site will be fed to the RSS reader where you can read them at leisure. In this respect, Feedly isn’t unique in that it does exactly that, but it certainly is the best of the bunch. It’s wonderfully designed, with a clean and efficient aesthetic that isn’t cluttered or over populated, and the User Interface is incredibly slick – with each swipe away of article initiating an animation reminiscent of the turning of a page.

Whilst widgets are an often forgotten aspect of the Android operating system, they are something that should never be taken for granted, and so many developers neglect them when creating even the most gilded app. Feedly haven’t created anything ground-breaking or funky with their widget, but merely a micro-app that sits on one of your homescreens, and acts as a mini RSS feed. It looks the part, is supremely functional but with the minor gripe that it isn’t infinitely scalable like most widgets.

It may not be as integrated or as user-friendly as Blinkfeed, but until HTC release the apk for stock release this is the best of the rest. I would be lost were it not for Feedly – it is my quick fix for daily news and updates, as crucial to my routine as my double shot espresso on the way to work.

Pros:

• Gather news in one place, in an easy-to-digest format
• Cross-platform functionality
• Widgets
• Slick, ‘magazine’ style GUI

Cons:

• Widget doesn’t resize to ‘normal’ 4x* or 2x* ratio on phones
• Not the easiest app to figure out straight away