Art of the iPhone

The New York Times iPhone app (free, iTunes link) has been around for while. In fact, it was one of the earliest apps available for the iPhone. But even after several updates, there were major problems with the app’s stability and how it handled the downloading of news stories. A recent update to version 2.0 has fixed most of the issues, and along with a few nice subtle tweaks, has made it one of the best news reading apps out there. It now has a coveted permanent spot on my iPhone.

If you like to read the New York Times, then you are probably more interested in good news writing than lightning-fast news blurbs (a la CNN.com). Thankfully, the NY Times app focuses on a comfortable reading experience so you can fully enjoy the writing. Tapping any headline will display the article in the typical minimalistic and highly readable NY Times style with plenty of white space and generous line spacing. You can increase the font size with the tap of a button, and doing so has no ill effects on typesetting that often happens in a web browser.

Browsing articles is done in the typical iPhone list style, which is rows of information displaying the headline, the first few lines of the story, and, if available, an accompanying photo. There are 19 news topics to choose from (business, sports, technology, etc) as well as special sections for Most Emailed, NY Times Magazine, Week in Review, and Photos. There is a search function included, but we found it disappointing because it only searches through the most recent articles and doesn’t access the NY Times archives.

Browse the 19 different news topics.

There is a row of buttons along the bottom that you tap to access the various topics. It’s reconfigurable, so if the business section is your favorite, you can add it for quick viewing. Adding buttons is done by tapping the More tab, then the Edit button in the top right. You can then rearrange the topics similar to how you rearrange artist, album, song, etc, in the iPod app, where you use your finger to drag the topic into the bottom bar.

Configure the tab for your favorite topics.

My favorite feature is the ability to save stories for offline reading. Tap the Save button, and the entire story, photo included, will be downloaded and saved on the iPhone for offline viewing. This is particularly sweet for the important articles you might want to revisit or give a second reading to, or if you’re going on a trip without Internet access and want something to read along the way.

There is also a feature that lets you share a story via email. Tapping the email button will send only the first few lines of the article as well as a link to the article. It’s a little disappointing that it doesn’t share the entire story, but times are tough for the newspapers and they need all the ad revenue they can get.

Browse stories by their photos

Also a little disappointing is the Photos section. It displays all the photos from recent articles in a tiled mosaic. Tapping any of the photos will launch the corresponding article along with the full photo. However, it’s pretty lame, as their small size doesn’t do the pictures justice and makes it hard to get a feel for what’s cool. And, the mosaic displays the pictures of the columnists that always accompany their articles, which really just adds noise when you want to see some photographs.

Conclusion

The New York Times features some of the best news writing in the world, and for a while now, it’s been sad that their iPhone app wasn’t up to snuff. But a major recent update has improved it to the point that it’s now one of our favorite news apps. We highly recommend it.

Download the New York Times app for iPhone and iPod Touch.