Review: PressReader brings 2000+ newspapers to mobile devices

By Gadjo Cardenas Sevilla

PressReader has done something remarkable. It has brought the world's newspapers into the mobile age where users can download them on the fly and read them in their enteriety just as they would if they got them off the newstand. The best thing about this is that PressReader offers various ways to consume newspapers and has even integrated a search function.

The service is available as an app and works on iOS, BlackBerry (phone and PlayBook), Android and Windwos. We tested both the iPad and PlayBook app and found that they were identical in form and function except for the screen sizes.

With PressReader, you can buy today's issue of your favourite newspaper for $0.99 a copy or subscribe to their $30.00 a month plan that gives unlimited access to all of PressReader's newspapers from 95 countries in 51 languages.

Well Realized Design

With PressReader on the iPad and the BlackBerry PlayBook, we were able to enjoy reading a soft copy of our favourite newspapers in the design and layout that the papers' editors put it together in, adverts and all.

This is unlike other solutions we've seen that just stick a giant .jpg or an Adobe PDF of newspaper pages which, being giant images files, are difficult to navigate and hard to resize. PressReader offers the complete page but also integrates live links, phone numbers and various interactive elements within the page.

For users that prefer an easier mode to read on in tablet devices, PressReader also reformats the text so it is easier to read on a tablet (great on the PlayBook's smaller screen).

Too lazy to read? PressReader can read articles to you with the text to speech mode which does a decent job of reading article back to you in a robotic male (iPad) or female (PlayBook) voice.

Connected to Social Media

With these features, PressReader is becoming something even better than traditional print because it finds various ways for users to consume and interact with the text. The application is also social media savvy and opens up various tools to share and send stories via Twitter and Facebook. Google + implementation is not yet available.

We experienced some glitches with the app on PlayBook OS 2.0 whcih included lack of audio on the text to speec mode as well as the app crashing and shutting off, this may just be a result of the PlayBook 2.0 OS. Everything worked great on the iPad running iOS 5.

For anyone who owns a compatible tablet and loves their newspapers, PressReader is the best of both solution we have seen and used. The software is intuitive and the functionality is everything any user would want.

Rating: 5  out of 5