We looked at some of the things, and little neat tricks that make newsstands apps stand out from each other, more specifically - we went over the things that can help our own apps stand out from the crowd.

But, sometimes that is not enough, and maybe we feel like we need to learn a little bit more, to better understand what are the things that work, and what are things that are just there for the sake of it. With that in mind, we’re going to be looking at a few top newsstand applications on the market now, and see what is it that they’re doing right.

You could argue that copy catting someone is not the wisest of ideas, when in reality; most of the applications we see today is some sort of copy of something that was once already built, new technology emerges once in a while, and when it does - a given portion of people / businesses are going to try and rely on that technology.

Without any further introduction, lets take a look at what people think a good newsstand app looks like, and how we can take that data to amplify our own newsstand apps for years to come.

NYTimes

This is the most popular newsstand app on the App Store, but is it really the features that make this app stand out from the rest, or is it the fact that the magazine itself is so popular? NYTimes by default is minimal (ever since their revamp, plus it’s also a web design trend), responsive and very light color based.

After having experimented with the features of this app, I have come to a conclusion that these three features are the ones that really stand out from the rest:

• Watch Breaking News as They Appear (Notifications)
• Automatic Refresh of Pages is a Time Saver (In the Background)
• Allows to Save Articles for Future Reading

There are a couple of more, but these are the ones that really come together to make news reading very easy and accessible. You can visit a single article, and not worry about having to refresh for new updates, and whenever you run out of time - you can save the article for later. This is newspaper done right.

Businessweek

Businessweek is a website that’s run by the Bloomberg media outlet, it’s a quite popular magazine, and their mobile newsstand app is quite sought after. Why is that, and what makes this app the one to go to? Surely, the news they publish can be read elsewhere.

Giving a spin to this app made me realize a few similarities, but also the advantage of having a newsstand app to deliver news. Here are the top three features for Businessweeks app:

• Easily see market news for companies mentioned within articles.
• Social integration makes sharing seamless and obvious.
• Search all previous issues, by keyword or company name. (epic!)

Businessweeks approach is slightly different, because they’re a business website, but it’s still amazing as to how versatile a newsstand application can be, and I think the fact that they really outline the ability to search all the previous versions of their magazine issues is what makes this app so good.

Not everyone is signing up to get the latest scoop, and many people signup only to work on their research for a couple of months, then pull the plug.

Forbes Magazine

Truly unique among magazine apps, the Forbes app acts as your gateway to the ultimate Forbes experience by combining the power of the print magazine with the dynamic and content-rich Web site — all of which is enabled for easy sharing.

Forbes have also grasped the essence of how a good newsstand app should work and operate, like for example:

• Interactive content can be shared directly by tapping on it.
• Real-time comment system makes for good discussion.
• Modern and flexible navigation for finding content easily.

these are definitely the features that sold the application to me, I don’t want to be just reading good news, I want to be able to interact with that content in any way I like, and being able to have a live comment feed means that I can easily focus on two tasks at a time, without having to spend time on waiting for a reload.

Great Newsstand Features from Top Magazines

We could look at every single newsstand application that there is, but after a while the features begin to repeat themselves, and because of that; the ones I’ve mentioned in this post are the ones that are being utilized the most, at least in my research.

What are some common features you enjoy from a newsstand app, and what do you think is missing in this market?