I read a lot of news, partly because I like to keep up on current events, but mostly because I’m a nerd. PressReader is an excellent app to help you read and digest a huge number of newspapers from around the world.
What Is PressReader?
PressReader is an intriguing news app – it offers a fully digitized version of almost every newspaper (from almost every country, and in a ton of languages) you could imagine – but what separates it from other apps is its excellent blending of the traditional and modern. While it effectively captures the look and “feel” of traditional newsprint, it also makes it easier to research, select, and forward news to others, as well as combining so many news sources into one place.
Overview
In the past, I have often had difficulty rifling through the several paper newspapers that I sometimes read. PressReader has come to the rescue by gathering up almost all of the newspapers that I like to read, and then organizing them in a useful, searchable, and compelling format. Being able to bring the newspaper – the real newspaper – to my iPad had made all of the difference, and I have enjoyed every moment of it. PressReader is a great app, but as with all creations it has both positive and negative aspects. Here are some of each that I came across:
Pros
- Includes a free 7-issue trial.
- Looks and acts just like a real newspaper.
- Can work around the paywalls of certain newspapers.
- Offers both a la cart and subscription options.
- Easy to navigate, looks great, well-designed.
- Includes unique and intuitive features such as text-to-speech, bookmarking, etc.
- Newspapers are easy to find, are great quality, and download quickly.
- Integrates well into social networks and email.
Cons
- Doesn’t have every newspaper I wanted to read.
- Requires sign-up and subscription at an external website (PressDisplay.com)
Features
If PressReader is anything, it is feature-rich. You’d think that there wouldn’t be much to browsing a digitized newspaper – but PressReader has made it easier and more compelling that imaginable. The digital papers look like real papers, but you can search through them, click into specific articles to get full, selectable text – and PressReader will even read the paper to you.
The subscription and auto-delivery settings are easy to figure out, and readily changeable, and PressReader can help you manage old editions by filing them away, or you can remove them from your home screen yourself with ease.
Performance / Ease Of Use
PressReader performs exceptionally well, providing a thoroughly useful and enjoyable user experience. In my experience, newspapers were easy to find, downloaded quickly, and were of excellent quality – very easy to read, looks just like the print edition, yet has that technological advantage of being fully searchable, email-able, and sharable on social networks, or via email.
The headlines are “clickable,” allowing you to view a larger version of each article with selectable text in a hovering window. You can select bigger or smaller text sizes, can have your iPad read the news story to you, and can bookmark particular issues for later retrieval. Browsing through a paper is as easy as swiping from left to right. I browsed through the store and was actually amazed to find newspapers I never knew existed!
Selection, Indexing, And Finding What You Want
PressReader has thousands of papers in tons of languages, from countries all over the world. The app has a built-in search feature that will help you search by region, language, or even the title of the publication You can favorite papers so you can quickly find them again, and you can download issues about two weeks back (depending on your subscription) from the current issue. PressReader also gives you the option to automatically deliver new issues, so you will always have the latest edition in your library.
Subscriptions
There’s a couple of subscription plans available starting at $29.99/month, and you do have the option of purchasing individual issues for $0.99. What type of subscription plan you would use would depend on your reading habits, but I would like to see some more subscriptions options available in the future.
There are really two subscription options for individuals – you can either purchase newspapers a la carte for $0.99 each, or you can download an unlimited number of papers of all types for just $29.95 per month – in all reality, a really good deal for what you get, especially considering the news stand pricing.
Conclusion
In the era of iPhones and iPads, lugging around a newspaper feels antiquated. Luckily, PressReader comes to the rescue in all the best ways. The more I used PressReader the more I really enjoyed reading newspapers from it.
It was a nice change to get the “feel” of reading a real newspaper with the convenience of reading it on a digital device. It does an excellent job of bridging the gap. PressReader is feature-rich enough to satisfy even the pickiest of app consumers, yet is simple enough that anyone can get started using it without having to “learn” the app.
PressReader might be one of the most well-designed apps I have ever navigated, and sets the bar quite high for other apps that offer anything similar.
Wrapping It Up
I really enjoyed using PressReader – it has a massive database of newspapers (which is growing all the time), is easy to use, fully-featured, and does its job exceptionally well. New users to the app can try everything out with 7 free issues, and once you do, I’m sure you’ll decide to subscribe.
Although other newspapers have their respective iPhone/iPad apps, I have yet to see one as well-balanced as PressReader, and of course PressReader has the advantage of being able to access many thousands of newspapers, enabling you to find the local papers of places your traveling to and so forth.
Rating and Information
For its many merits and very few negative points, I unquestioningly award PressReader a 5 out of 5. The app itself is free, and available from the iTunes store (iTunes Store Link), while subscriptions must be managed over at PressDisplay.com
You can read all about the subscription plans (or sign up) here – I recommend creating an account before downloading the app – you’ll need the account once you launch the app the first time at any rate.
Quite frankly, I think this, more than anything I have yet seen, is the future of newspapers, and wholeheartedly encourage you to give it a chance.
