SmartNews: Local Breaking News App Reviews

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App should be named MSNBC2. Being fed up with pretty much all media outlets having a noticeable political bias and wanting to JUST k ow what happened, not someone’s analysis of it, I’ve been looking for an app that just gives the news. Let me figure out what it means. an app that I can open up, see what happened in the world today and close it. I gave this app about 4 months. Every time I opened it it seemed to get worse. If there was a Trump/Republican bashing article anywhere on the net, you’ll find it on the front page here. You don’t even have to read the articles to see that everything on this site is for liberals. The titles are hilariously liberal. Don’t think I’ve seen a single article pertaining to the US government or the White House or republican that wasn’t a negative liberal opinion piece. I scrolled through about 5 minutes ago and it was ridiculous. Finally decided to delete it. This isn’t a news site. If you really just want to know what happened in the world today, this is not the site for you. Update: Based on the developers feedback, it’s obvious that anyone who points out that this is a liberal leaning site is told to try Fox News for your conservative views. I’m not even a conservative. Just someone looking for unbiased news and this poser is telling everyone that points out their obvious bias that they’re a conservative and need to look elsewhere for their conservative views. This won’t be around long.

The Era of dumb apps continues. After reading an article and going back to main screen, the application reloads the articles and jumps you to the top. Thanks for losing my spot for two new articles that are actually days old and I’ve already seen, you think. Then begin to scroll through the articles again to try to find where you previously were. With no help at all from the app, this will happen over and over. So you open up the settings believing the creators would give you the ability to prevent such a thing, applications used to provide customizations for almost everything, surely there is a way to prevent this madness. Unfortunately, you only find a couple of unhelpful options and details about the app and/or how to leave a review. The creators appear to know exactly what we want, so I suppose there is no need to let us configure anything. If you’re thinking, all the other iOS news apps do the same thing, you’d be exactly right. Now you know this app does it too and will hopefully save you time from trying this app thinking you’re going to get something better. Which I guarantee is what they want you to think based off their unique name.

The best news aggregator in history, but….. I love smartnews. I love it to bits and pieces, but the advertisements make it impossible to use properly. If i’m scrolling through an article, the app freezes for minutes at a time, and the only thing the app has to show for the time it just wasted is that the ads are now loaded on my article that IS ALREADY supposed to be cut down and easy to read. This happens with every single article, no matter the source, no matter my internet connection. It’s impossible for me to actually read the news because the app freezes or crashes entirely because the advertisements need seven business days to load so i can scroll through my article. I love smartnews and i love the team behind it and i understand the need for adverts (especially in this economy) but for the love of god, if you’re gonna have ads, please make them not break the app. Thank you guys for making the literal best news app i’ve ever used <3

Really?. Fair and balanced? It is not! Primary stories are from Huff Post, NYT, Washington Post, NBC, etc. Really? Fox News and just a handful of more conservative media is at the very very end of the list. Any use who gave this app a high rating must be a very progressive liberal. Very despicable of Smart News people to try to deceive the public. This app does not fairly display the stories from ALL media outlets. It just doesn’t. I tried it so I could see for myself. And I will delete this app. Note to the Smart News responder .. “if you want a more conservative view you should add add Fox News, blah blah .. “. why didn’t you program it in there to begin with, so that the app would appear as you advertise it will be on your lame commercial? Why should CONSERVATIVE people have to tweak the app? It should be FAIR to begin with. You see, a very liberal person will think this is great and will continue to believe they are getting fair news. THEY ARE NOT! Shame on YOU! I received an inadequate reply from Nathan telling me exactly what I thought he would say .. same as above. They just don’t get it. What I’m saying is that they should set up a FAIR sampling of media outlets in the first place. Instead, they are setting up LIBERAL publications, and then I have to change my selections. Why can’t you be more fair?

Advertising everywhere!. If this app didn’t have ads literally everywhere, it would be a much better app. Scroll through news headlines? Watch out, advertisements will pop into your feed and will move the headlines. Read a news article or two? Watch out, advertisements might pop-up and block the entirety of your screen. Want to try reading a news article? Watch out, advertisements will force the article to be three times longer because every other photo will be an advertisement. Oh, and one of the worst things about all the advertisements? They are often all the exact same ad, so you see it 500 times. It’s even more terrible when those ads are gross (pictures of infections or rotten teeth for example). Oh, and while there’s a “report this ad” option, you have to do it for each instance of the ad (remember how I said you see the same thing 500 times??). So reporting the ad doesn’t help. I would be much more willing to use this app if I wasn’t subjected to an avalanche of advertisements Hey devs: Maybe consider “$5 no advertisements”?

A couple bugs and a suggestion. I recently reset my iPad’s settings and content, and upon reinstalling SmartNews, the app’s notifications won’t push anymore. It misses the scheduled update notification times and doesn’t display breaking news notifications. Stories aren’t even being put in the inbox. Also, for a long time, some stories featured on the app are unable to display the full article text in “smart mode”, either omitting paragraphs or not being parsed at all or correctly to display the complete text featured in the original source page. Oddly, the notifications were still working properly when I upgraded my iPad from iPadOS 13.7 to 14.0 after the latter OS was released, with the most recent SmartNews update installed. Also, I’d like to suggest changes to the weather page to include a summary of the current weather observations (adding dew point, wind, barometric pressure, “feels like” temperature, visibility and humidity, along with sky conditions and air temperature). The current format of putting just the current temperature and sky conditions in the hourly forecast panel just doesn’t make sense, given that the weather page provides more detailed information on the forecast while only providing the bare minimum when it comes to current conditions.

Customizable news. SmartNews allows the user to select news by topic (business, science, entertainment, politics) or by source (CNN, Fox, Huffpost). Any one who says the stories that are presented are “too liberal” or “too conservative” need only select sources they like so they can stay in their echo chamber and never hear another opinion. Pros: wide variety of topics and sources; stories can be viewed on the Web tab or the Smart tab, which eliminates some of the ads and clutter found on the Web tab; allows the user to see news from sources they might not usually visit. Cons: recent update now allows full page pop up ads and also allows some ads to play music while viewing the selected news item with no way to turn off without exiting the page. REALLY ANNOYING, and has the effect of wanting to never buy a product advertised in this manner; most stories aren’t dated, and can hang around for days; some sites are clickbait/fake news but get tossed into the mix with reputable sites; the Local tab isn’t always local news and can show news from places on the other side of the state. Would have given four stars but the new ad policy cuts it to three.

Would give 5 but.... First off, to anyone complaining about it being “left leaning,” use your head for more than five seconds and control your emotions. I mean that seriously. The app is customizable to allow you to choose the exact news sources you want to see, provided they are in the app. Even if (not saying it is), the app is “left leaning”, do what I do. Just read from sources you trust, just add the right leaning channels. Or, get a bit of balance and have both sides presented before you when you open the app.. which is kinda the point of the app if you’ve seen the commercials. Anyways, I would give 5 stars if there’s a bit more customization. Customization on notifications, frequency of notifications, notifications for new stories from specific channels, etc. And, I would love a “Save for Later” feature. I often find myself opening the app, scrolling through, and seeing several headlines that sound interesting but I don’t have the time or just don’t want to read them at the time. Atm I’m just saving the link to those articles in Notes. I’d much rather be able to tap a button or two that saves it within Smart News itself in a “Save for Later” tab.

Close to perfect, I’m sure they can get there though.... So let’s address the complainants about bias - out of the box, the app may appear to have a slant - but that’s also because the majority of the news outlets have a slant - can’t help that if you are a new aggregator - that being said, the devs have provided a library of sources that spans the spectrum of ideology and you can easily tweak the app to your own bias or neutrality or whatever you want to call it. In other words, customize the app, do not expect the app to read your thoughts. The single item of improvement - I get everyone needs to have a revenue source and SmartNews is no different - in their case, ad revenue is their source. Give us the option to opt out of ads by purchasing an ad-free subscription - monthly/annually/one-time - give us the option to either deal with the ads or remove them. Keep producing a solid product - doing great overall.

Great News App. This is an aggregator with a pretty comprehensive collection of sources. The basic presentation strikes a good balance as well. You can see five or six stories at a glance so that you can quickly find one that interest you as opposed to apps that fill the screen with the picture and require more scrolling. With the addition of topical tabs that allow you to organize by theme, smart news has taken a big step forward. You can also select specific sources for tabs. Being able to follow news by both topic and source put SmartNews in a category by itself. The “top” News has a fair bit of fringe stuff, and isn’t as good as it used to be. There are two UI improvements I would like to see: First, make it so that one can swipe from story to story without going back to the main page. Second, get rid of the new full screen pop-up ads. They’re really quite annoying.

Smart News, Bias Notifications. I downloaded this app because I heard good things about it. Let’s face the facts here MSN is dominated and ruled by liberal bias. You can scream and shout and say otherwise but don’t let that cognitive dissonance get in the way, it is. Conservative/Republican MSM is Fox News and A.M. radio. Thats it. I have to admit, when I first downloaded this app, The homepage was almost split with different news sources. I’d say 40-60 split with liberal news still dominate. But fair. I really enjoy the food and wine pages and some of the entertainment. It’s good to see the contrast for political stories as well. The issue is with the push notifications. Why am I constantly getting news sources pushed to me that are anti-GOP, anti-Trump, and bias news favoring the left? I mean Jesus Christ...I got a couple notifications from sources like Huffington post...they’re nothing more than a glorified blog with bias points of views and zero fact. I like the notifications on my iPhone and watch. But I’m turning them off. I’ve never seen one pro conservative news story pushed to me. There is still a bias here and it’s obvious.

Content is tabloid trash.. **Update regarding the developer's response below. The app does allow me to remove high level topics, none of which are "celebrity gossip". They talk about the app being a news aggregator, but then say I would have to manually add different tabs from various news sources. Well, if I have to switch between numerous tabs to look through the news then it's not doing much aggregating. Seeing all my preferred news sources on one tab would be aggregating. Finally, the links to contact the developer don't work! I wanted to clarify their comments and ask for support, but was unable to. And I've tried emailing my questions to the address provided, but with no response. Downgrading my rating to one star. Original review: The layout is nice, but that's the best thing I can say about this app. I like that I can see multiple news headlines on the screen at once. Other apps gave large photos or text so you can only view one or two without scrolling. But - there are way too many junk tabloid articles and over the top partisan hate pieces. I just want factual news which I might be able to achieve if this app let me block certain "news" sources. But it doesn't. I'm tired of wading through all the junk.

Been Using This App for 7 Years. Pros: This has always been the best news app in terms of algorithm and finding the articles most important days ahead of the regular news cycle. Absolutely love that about this app. Cons: What I do not like, are the pop up ads. Would much rather prefer a subscription option that costs, say, 5 dollars a month. No ads? Would 100% pay for that. Maybe even 10 dollars. I use the app less now because some pop up ads cannot be dismissed, or play sound automatically, which is great when I’m laying in bed late at night and get blasted with some obnoxious ad for an obscure iOS game. Lol. Additional con: the most recent update removed the ability to share articles as regular links to the original site it was posted on. IN ADDITION, you can no longer “open in browser”. It just points back to the app again… I understand trying to retain traffic to the application, so you get more ad views, and thus revenue… but we cannot isolate the app like this. It ruins a wonderful utility it had prior to this most recent update. Please fix:(

Useful within Limits. I live in a small town in Washington state. I use news aggregation apps to increase my access to local stories. Like many other competing apps, this one regularly confuses articles about “Washington” (the state) with ones about “Washington DC” (the nation’s capital). I have to sort through the relevant vs irrelevant items. This may be a limit common to current search engine algorithms, an inability to refine results within the same keyword. Aside from that problem, I like the way this app is able to be configured to favor a wide range of specific topics as you refine your interests. The tab arrangement facilitates rapid navigation. The ads are able to be scrolled past easily. They don’t obscure content on the home page, which is a plus. I do not like the ambiguous “pitch” notification used under the “profile” button to try to get your email, which suggests signing in will make the app work significantly better or faster. I tried it side-by-side several times with other friends who signed in while I didn’t. We got identical results with the same topics selected, whether signed in or not. That alone cost the app a “star”.

Ads above ethics. I acknowledge that private publishers have a right to publish content from all perspectives. However, the SmartNews algorithm allows for some really despicable takes on current events to have a greater megaphone. Pieces written from the perspective of white nationalists have repeatedly made their way into my feed. News outlets engaged in vaccine misinformation continued to get fed into my newsfeed. News outlets that denied the facts of the January 6th Insurrection continued to be published. In a correspondence with their team, a staffer wrote to me that “ there’s no personal bias going into the channels that you see every day, nor do we favor any specific publisher over another. What you see is what people are talking about online at that moment, and this changes on a regular basis.” This is a problematic perspective aimed to absolve SmartNews of their social responsibility not to cause harm by amplifying problematic content that can harm others. Instead, they continue to publish this content to gain ad revenue. I am deleting SmartNews in favor of Newsfeed apps that give customers control to not see content that is hateful or harmful, or newsfeeds that self monitor for the same results.

Ads have killed this app.. I have no problem accepting ads as part of the deal for this free app. I have been a Smart News user for years. I did not mind the apps in the news streams. I felt the pop ads that take over the screen a bit annoying. The Taboola ads were just about where I drew the line. But recently the app has become unusable. A new type of ad that pulls the screen black and starts a video ad in the middle of reading an article. Ok annoying. Hit the close button and it comes back or appears in another 10 seconds. Or worse I have to close the app down. At this point I feel it has made the app too much of nuisance to use. Maybe they will change this ad type but for now I guess I am back to Google News. UPDATE: This is better now the Taboola pop ups are lees frequent. But the pop ads still are annoying. New issue for me at least is the amount of battery energy being used in a short session. In 10 minutes my battery will drop 5% it’s like a gas guzzler. Are ther magical settings to help with this? I have location services off and background app refresh off still destiny’s my battery. I save using the app to late at night. If the app uses energy for ads I would be down for an ad free version.

Not a bad app but!!!. I read a lot of the reviews on here and every one is I thought you said this app is “balanced” news. But everybody is complaining it’s not balanced because all there looking for is one side of the story. There either for Trump or against him. They don’t want to hear the other side. To Trump supporters of its not Fox News it’s Fake news. So why are you looking to find “balanced” news when you really don’t want to hear it??? The same goes the other way. The second thing. The reason I gave this app a low score is because I understand you have a free app and you need revenue but the pop up adds and all the advertising is absolutely ridiculous. There are news sources that don’t even let you see the news because there advertising for you to buy something from them. CNN has at least 4-5 pop ups in the first 10-15 seconds. I couldn’t even go into a comments section because it just kept popping up to the same exact spot even if I tried to scroll up or down. It is ridiculous. I think I’ve had enough of this app. I’ll find my news (on both sides) somewhere else.

Commercials.. I have been (inundated)as of late, been looking for another platform to get my daily news needs met as I am informe and very interested in social issues in my neighborhood and my country on a daily basis,until recently, “I noticed that as I was reading or might I say(trying )to read a (interesting (ed op)I was repeatedly interrupted by the annoying commercials that you have allowed companies to interject into your forum,as I have to lost track an at times interest in what I have an interest in reading,then I must stop and look for that very small (x) and then try and tap on it with my large thumbs,because I don’t always carry a (stylus all times, well that being said I began looking for an alternative for(you)I’m not interested in commercials while I am reading,it is bad enough when I watch television,I understand you have a need to pay bills but it help if we were at least given an option to look and or listen as opposed to feeling like a (captive in your program,I do like your format as I can go to top and pick and change topics at will, but the commercials just pop up so fast that I get (frustrated,and start looking for another venue..Thank you James in (Sacramento.

App Continuously Freezing up. When I first started using the app, the fact that it equally showed all sides of the equation. Left-right-Qs-nut cases etcetera. However, lately the app has started to freeze up after a few minutes of use. Sometimes it will unfreeze, but mostly it stays frozen until the app closes itself or in frustration I say screw this and and close the app myself. The same has happened to my girlfriend who introduced me to the app, so I know it’s not my phone which is btw a brand new. Both she and I have removed the app multiple time and re-installed it to the same results. Don’t get me wrong the info on the app is very informative and sometimes hilarious when the app is working. But it’s freezing up more than it works. Especially when you get to the middle that one really interesting article and boom frozen. The article might be there when it comes on but mostly it’s not. Just wanted you to know. A faithful but frustrated fan

Helps me stay in formed. Love smart news and have recommended it to many of my friends. I would like to see a few very minor changes though. 1. Something to show “not interested” in a certain article/topic. For instance, I may read two articles on the same topic, be done with it, and then the app assumes anything related to that person or topic I want to know about and I relentlessly get articles about that (ex. Aaron Carter’s passing - I now get every article written about the tragic event, “his managers last text with him”, “his fiancé spotted at…”, “what happens to Aaron’s fortune now?” etc - all of which I, respectfully, don’t want to receive anymore or read about just because I read the article about his passing. 2. Because the algorithm does push so much that it thinks I will like, I tend to miss actual breaking news stories. Would be cool to differentiate breaking news notifications even more, maybe with a different color logo or something (not sound). All in all, I love this app and have used it for years. It has so many great features like the smart view and features that have evolved like being able to see the articles you were notified about all in one place. It’s very helpful for staying aware of things in a timely manner.

Becoming more social and celebrity news source. When I first saw the app - was pleasantly surprised on the scope of of the feeds - seemed to collect from all sources. Now it seem too many - perhaps based on trends of what people are clicking on the most from each of the “news sources”. My observation : Looking at the “Top” stories tab it appears to me 50% of the stories are not what I consider news but how some socialite lost their spouse, who is sleeping with who, how a Instagram star was refused service because they were being obnoxious... I generally do not see the value of the stories on that section which is disappointing. To me those types of stories are interesting but it is not news. I know they are eye catching but feels more like buying a family size bag of tortilla chips only finding it 1/4 full of chips and 3/4 air because the product is sold by weight and not volume... I did not want the air - I wanted to chips... HOWEVER the app does most other do not - pull from sources you don’t see on others like Google News, Apple News...etc. I like SmartNews and will continue to use it as my top news aggregator but will generally avoid Top tab.

Wow. Downloaded because I like these types of apps to read all the news soon as I opened it I could clearly see whoever does this has a hand in the liberal agenda to destroy America it’s way obvious then I read one of their cringe worthy articles and realize they really are scared most the new generation along with older hipsters and all the career students that racked up debt on pointless wemon study degrees etc. are so afraid they’re everyone else will pay for my bills and generally lazy lifestyle don’t fear trump doesn’t even need to campaign watch and see the deplorable will show up faster than you liberals can create voters bus them in from Mexico Canada it’s not even a possible outcome to loose I been over this whole country the last year just count bumper stickers from even the last election most elections even the winners voters take them off but they’re all still on even the Hillary jail ones and I’m pretty sure she has died already or went back to her hole she came from

It’s Too Much Now. I have loved Smart News for years. They have been my primary source of news on my phone. But two issues have unfortunately caused me to uninstall the app. The first (and more minor) issue is the lack of control over my feed. Months ago I asked the app to show me fewer stories from one source. You don’t have the ability to straight up ban a content provider. Or if there is a way, I haven’t been able to find it. When I contacted support, they said to use the “show less content from this provider” setting. After changing the setting I continue to see what looks like the same amount of content in my feed from the source. So, one star gone. The second issue (and more major for me) is the incredible battery drain I experience while using the app. I can read Apple News for an hour and see about 1% battery loss. But using SN for just 15 minutes causes my phone to heat up to the point of discomfort while holding it, and eats 3-5% of my battery. This is just astonishing to me, and it seems to be getting worse. I lost 7% of my battery yesterday morning while using the app for 18 minutes. So, second star gone. I really like Smart News, and I am genuinely sad to say goodbye to this wonderful aggregator. But I just feel like it’s no longer worth it considering how much better it consumes. I’ll give it a year and check back in to see if things have improved. But I don’t have much hope. This issues has persisted since I started using the app years ago.

Honest question about advertisements.. Could we please be allowed an option for a one-time fee for an advertisement removal, like some other apps offer? I have used this app in-great length for a few years now. I’ve noticed one of the ad’s changed. Instead of clicking the little ‘x’ once - you click it twice, and it changes locations. Touch sensitivity increased, as well, and Safari kept opening. I began to force close the app. I’m tired of sifting through insufferable advertisements - I would rather pay for a permanent removal to further enjoy the app because, at this moment, I’m unable to do so. Please keep it in consideration. My rating would be five stars if it weren’t for the insufferable advertisements, and I cannot remove them permanently. Great app overall. My personalized digest is terrific! Update: These advertisements have gotten out of hand. Sometimes I have to force quit the app. Also, now I can’t share links without them having the app… a FREE app? You simply compile them all in one location, why do you think you have the right to make people download the app to read articles that you didn’t even produce? Doesn’t make sense in the slightest. I share my news all the time, and now I have to go through extra steps.

Smart News is really smart. I was apparently one of the first regular user of the app and shared articles on Twitter constantly. 3 or 4 of the developers asked me for an interview via Skype and what Interested ME, was that they were all very young and what interested THEM was WHY I was so interested in the news. An earlier reviewer cited being fed too much liberal news and she should be happy with the addition of NEWSMAX which is definitely right leaning. Early on the developers said the algorithms choose the articles in your feed by the articles you actually read and your interest profile is just algorithms doing what they do but you have the option to choose a tab and read any article from any of the magazine you have added. I asked them to please keep it that was and not to start choosing ( as Facebook does ) articles to put forth an agenda, especially not a political agenda. So far I don’t see it happening. I have pretty eclectic interests and really enjoy the variety I have to choose from. This app also gives you the ability to swipe over to Reader View and read the articles without the annoying advertisements. All in all I hardly use any of my other news apps. I am afraid to count how many tabs I have on my home page! Love it!!

Gobbles battery fast. I really like this app except for web view. When it launches whatever browser view it devours battery at like 5-10% a minute!!! I see no way to select the browser it uses. Of course smart view doesn’t eat power like that, but sometimes you want the web view. So that’s why only 2 stars. 10% a minute? And iPhone gets hot! Like the selection of stories but sometimes it just duplicates the same story. So, meh. Adding to review. Now it causes my (new) iPhone 12 mini to overheat! Yep. I have an app that reads the battery temperature and it goes from nominal to serious in a few minutes (once critical) of use. And of course the device is physically hot. Only this app. So something in it is making heavy use of the cpu? I cannot really use SmartNews and I like it, but it is overheating my phone. ADDING: the rapid drain is much reduced BUT now the battery overheats and scrolling causes screen flickering so I can hardly read the stories. Please fix as I’m going to have to find a substitute app for my news fix. Becoming unusable from the flickering.

Useful, but compromised. How does this app make money? A major source of revenue for the developers is presumably the sale of your news-browsing behavior to third parties. Probably many or most people don’t care about that. You should. If you have Privacy Pro or similar app, check out all the outgoing connections which happen when you click on a smartnews link. Update - Spring 2023: The Top tab still contains too much spam and clickbait. There is now an option to “receive less news” from a given source, but still no way to turn it off completely or to filter the specific sources you may wish to see. It is extremely irritating that this app suppresses the date when displaying news articles. Why do this? The app now provides the age of the story in hours or days, which is better than before but still no excuse not to include the date of the story as obtained from the original, if it contained the date.

Too many annoying pop-up ads. I like this app to get news across many different sources. It is good except for one glaring annoyance, the pop-up ads that make you sit there and wait for an x to appear. I have been using this app for years and have watched it get more and more annoying with the pop-up ads. The latest is where it brings up the ad and makes you wait until the x slowly fades in to close it. Even worse, if you click on the x before it fully fades in, it takes you to the link in the ad that you are trying to close. This is so annoying that I refuse to be part of it. When that type of pop-up ad appears, I close the app, and get my news from other sources. Not one time has that type of ad worked with me. Waiting for an ad, that I can read in one second or less, to fade in the x so I can close it has not resulted in me wanting the app or service advertised. I have never, on purpose, clicked on the link. What it has accomplished is me closing the app. I support having ads on this free app. In order for this app to remain free, there needs to be revenue creation. This particular ad style is not the way. It does not, at least for me, help achieve the revenue goals that are desired.

Biased POC. SmartNews is another very biased supermarket tabloid. 50% of what they publish is pretty meaningless and irrelevant. Of the remaining 50%, 75% to 80% is pro lib dems. They republish mostly articles that are negative against Conservative Republicans. Booo Hisss After following the instructions I received from the Apple Store, I added the more conservative sources that I believe are far more accurate and trustworthy than all the other Fake News sources. I recommend you put instructions when one first downloads your App so you know how to set it up. I gave you 3 stars until I can evaluate the articles that you select from these other sources. I am returning to my original ONE STAR rating and am deleting the app from all of my devices. Just like the rest of the msm, you are biased. You reprint 80% Lib stuff, 10% other meaningless celebrity crap, and, although I added all of the more accurate, reasonable, truthful conservative news channels, as you suggested, the last 10% is filled with the most negative articles you can find in the “conservative” channels. You are just full of crap and I am advising all of my family, friends, and social media followers to delete the app also. Good bye.

Solid, simple and customizable. I really like the simplicity of this app, especially the smart view of articles that strips away all the ads and such (though it does take images with it sometimes, it’s tricky). I also like that I can set a location and get local stuff mixed in. I would love a history feature where I can see a list of articles I’ve viewed, even the last like 25 would do. I often will want to share good stuff with someone when the topic comes up later in the day or I’ve even locked my phone halfway through an article, then get a notification for another interesting story and click it, only to remember I still had that other article finish which is now gone. Just a suggestion. Overall, really dig the app. Update: starting to see what others are saying about the spam-y articles seemingly being added to the “top” feed. I’ve unsubscribed to all the general channels and only follow publications now, but my top feed still has CNN and Buzzfeed mixed in. I assumed top feed was the aggregate of what I follow and nothing else. Would much prefer that.

Big Time Liberal News Aggregator. Look here, it’s not smart news when I have to physically add stories and sources. If you had good AI, you would know what I read and don’t read, which would give you a sense of what I am interested in, instead of spamming me with all kinds of liberal political news. And here’s the kicker, you defend your system, vice taking my recommendations to make your system better. The fact you refuse to make changes tells me that 1) the system is doing what you want, or 2) you lack the maturity and business sense to operate the business you are selling. UPDATE: Now why don’t you tell the truth? Almost all the stories are big-time left wing stories. Every once in a while you you toss in a conservative website origin story, and you call that balanced. Sometimes I would search for a conservative story and have to dig pages into searches. How about news that is not political, period? Or like I have seen quite a few liberals who think that media such as MSNBC and Huffington Post is centrists...maybe you actually believe that. Anyways, as long as you keep this business model, you will keep me away. Tried a long time but almost all the news is extreme liberal news. There is no balance...and it certainly could not figure out I want real news, not politics.

Thank you!. I thank you for existing and I really like the format. I find it easy to use and reasonably spaced well so my eyes aren't overwhelmed I find interesting that people are noticing a liberal bias as well, but I blame the media for that, not the developer. I'm not affiliated so I was looking for something that offers multiple perspectives and topics. I'm impressed with the selection so far. Reason magazine in particular. I like that you can customize your own choices for more control and better balance. At any rate , i got this app to leave my comfort zone on occasion. It has been enlightening and sometimes frightening. But I'm tired of being in an echo chamber. Break away from divisive forces and understand each other better. This app makes me feel like I'm doing that in a small way. Thanks to the developers for the service and I hope they welcome some smaller, indie news sites in the future

Ad popping. This app is now randomly throwing up full screen ads with hidden dismiss buttons. It’s amazing how something can go from good to junk apps with one greed based change. Ditching it, you should too. However, this review won’t make it anywhere near the top of reviews for obvious reasons. I’ve found great replacement that doesn’t force feed ads and in comparison to this app, they get me the news I want to read, while still allowing me to find what I want that’s outside my immediate interest. Importantly, without then flooding me with garbage because I read one article. You can say what you don’t like, and that stuff isn’t forced down your throat either. It’s not hard to find something much better, you should look. The developer is asking for suggestions. The suggestion is do not pop up full screen ads that are difficult to close and require user input, or worse killing the app. Simple. The inline ads were (are) plentiful without this. The fact that people don’t click them except accidentally is not a cue to make them full screen and hard to close. That motivation is about $ and advertisers, which has nothing to do with delivering the news. Not the product spots masquerading as articles, the actual news. Either you are a news app or an advertising outlet. Smart news seems to have made that choice. That’s why I, and many others are abandoning the app. It’s not a hard calculus.

NOW DELETED but WAS Best News Aggregator BY FAR. Below is my former 5 Star Review and I am now rating this ZERO Stars and this has nothing to to with politics as some have commented In the past, you could go to the Discover Tab and add Tabs from the various content providers (AP, CNN, Fox) Inexplicably that ability has been removed for the Follow Tab, which requires 4 more clicks to read the same content You folks literally took the best laid out app I have ever seen (News or otherwise) and created an app that I had to delete Whoever came up with the idea to eliminate the ability to add Tabs for the “Following” Tab should be fired in one of the most egregious screw ups in iOS history ————————- I have tried numerous News Apps and have left each one as they were not exactly what I was looking for From Design to Content, this is exactly how I would have built it myself. I do NOT understand the reviews which state that it leans one side of the aisle or the other...just don’t pick that particular channel if you feel that way My only criticism (and it is no biggie) is on the Top Stories tab, I could do without the “For You” section. I rarely find those stories interesting and would just prefer additional “Top Stories” to continue on scrolling down that page That aside this is the perfect News App

Enjoyable so far!. I’ve had this app for a handful of days and I enjoy it quite a bit. I can see myself using it regularly - not a download and forget type app. The automatic local news and the “smart view” is a great touch! I used Apple News about a year ago but deleted it because everything felt “curated” to what they think I need to hear vs what I actually want to read. One addition that I would like that this app does NOT have - Screenshotting/exporting entire articles. I love to save news clippings here and there and this app (nor any other I’ve come across?) has that feature. Updated after a few months (changed from 5 stars to 2): I ended up deleting. The sports news is of no interest to me and there no way to turn this off. The app is just a nuisance at this point. I also noticed most news is swayed away from the conservative side (maybe there’s just more left leaning news out there). But the app wasn’t picking what I actually READ as an interest vs. articles I clicked on and had no interest in reading. The app has great potential it just wasn’t suiting my needs.

JOKE OF A SITE. Biased left wing rag! Couldn’t even get past one topic that gave the story from the middle. UPDATE: your response to my review leaves me with a chuckle. The point of your site is to provide unbiased reporting to the people that have chosen to download this app...UNBIASED! Get it? To have me add or update Fox News et all is ludicrous... 1. I could download their apps. 2. You assume those are conservative sites. 3. You assume I’m looking for a ‘ slant’ to my news. All of which are wrong and ignorant. I’m looking for the news! Plain and simple. YOUR SITE FAILS WHAT YOU ACTUALLY ADVERTISE. I don’t care what your opinion or the opinion of who you paste and copy from is. I want the news straight and to the point. EXAMPLE? Sure... your NFL coverage of the kneeling during the anthem. 100% in line with liberal ideology. You’re nothing more than a cut and paste app. Much like the Patch sites. This is a loser of an app! A fraud! A lie! I’ll gladly let everyone I know not to waste the 10 seconds it takes to download your plagiarized cut and paste crap. Not worth the time or effort. Reviewing you however was more than worth it. You’ve been called out for the charlatan that you are. You can’t even get a simple business model right.

News from all sides. This is my morning ritual. After waking up and tending to the needs of myself and my animals, I sit down with a cup of hot cocoa and read this app’s articles. This app features the best articles from all side, democrats, republicans and independents. I get both sides of an issue. I feel very informed and the best thing is I don’t have to see pictures of all the worst things like the tv news shows. I don’t need those images in my head. I can imagine, but it’s not the same as seeing it. Each article has a link to the original post if needed. But I get to choose if I want to go looking for pictures. Plus, I get fun stories and posts from Reddit, Bored Panda and BuzzFeed for lighthearted reading. Critical to my mental health in these troubling times. I highly recommend this app to everyone. ps…..to the execs at this app, I like the previous format of the top stores better. IMHO. Update…. Thank you for putting the top stories back to the old format. Much easier to stay informed.

Used to be a five star. I’ve checked out many news packages but always preferred this one. Relevant news, good layout, easy to personalize, MODERATE ADVERTISING. There in lies our problem. More and more advertising. Now I understand why they need advertisers, everyone deserves a payday for their work. But while other apps are definitely worse, (every other story is an advertisement), plus they want to make you pay and subscribe to every news outlet, magazine or newspaper, et cetera. Now SmartNews is still better, but they keep coming up with sneaky ways to try and push you into clicking on their advertisers. What really annoys me is when you click out of a story back to the headlines….but it doesn’t take you there. An ad pops up and your forced to respond…. after several seconds so they can force feed you part of the ad, then you have to click a close button, or an X, or something else (“So you don’t want to save $$$?”), always different and in different places on the page so you are forced to read some of it because if you click the wrong spot it throws you out of everything to start over. And it’s becoming more frequent. The almighty dollar chase has ruined more than a few good companies.

Outstanding App. Here's the scoop. I've been using it for a few days and I've really enjoyed it. The way it is layered out (not a typo) means that I am likely to read some stories that I would never see otherwise. I like how it swipes from page to page. And, in web view if you normally comment on articles the comments are there. But what I really like is the choice between "Web" and "Smart" views. In smart view it looks more like a magazine article and all those "12 reasons why her abs are fake" or "This one wierd trick proves that insurance is a scam" click bait ads are NOT. EVEN. THERE. It would get a 5th Star if Smart View was able to be the default view. And, you can add your own news feeds as well. But, I would not recommend turning it into "All Sports" or "All Lifestyle". You need some balance. So, make sure you keep the real news. Because you really needed to know that POTUS had a sore throat. Updated to drop from four to two stars. When you share a news item it takes the person to a “get the app” page. So, attaching to social media means anyone looking has to have the app. The work around was to open in Safari Reader and copy the URL. Now, those don’t work. Might as well start looking for a new aggregator.

Fox News/The Washington Examiner?. I enjoy the app but I wish there weren’t horribly biased “news” services mixed in with reputable ones. Some “news” outlets are gossipy, completely without merit, or are laughable propaganda. I can’t control the contributors on “Top” news for instance. “TheBlaze, Popsugar, Footwear News, US! Weekly, or People” are not offering headlines that are worthy of my time, in fact, someone perusing the top headlines should rightly conclude that Meagan McCain is the most important person in the world, Brian Kilmeade is second, and Kirstie Alley is tied for third with some random “Real Housewife of Where Ever.” This makes the world look nightmarish. It’s wearing me out sifting through the garbage. I have never clicked on Fox, TheBlaze, PopSugar, Footwear News, TMZ, Vogue, Mediate, The Pluralist, or Entertainment Tonight, yet I am not seeing any diminishment in their prominent representation in the top stories of the day, in fact, I’m finding that the more you don’t click on a news source, because you find it disgusting, the more you see it. Maybe the algorithm is broken. How can I successfully navigate through the day without seeing the”Top” news stories concerning the Kardashians, Tomi Lahren, or the Bachelorette? The advice I’m getting so far is not getting the Jessica Simpson out of my “Top News.” Sad.

Love!!!. I love reading the news - but I hate news with an agenda. Before SmartNews, I had my local Fox News app, which is about as non-bipartisan as you can get. The reason I love SmartNews is because it gives me ALL the news...all sides, from literally all media outlets. I can go to the local tab (includes everything from the local Fox plus much more) or see what’s happening in our government, or the world, or to look at funny memes and animal pic compilations. I love how it’s not all doom-and-gloom news, they include the feel-good news, too! It’s amazing!!! I would highly recommend this app to anyone, 10-stars, big thumbs up 👍👍👍👍👍👍 P.S. I LOVE the recently read feature!!! 👏👏👏 Edit: I looked over some other reviewers and I’m completely floored that people would say this app has an agenda!! Every article is from its original source, so it’s clear where the article came from. If you get triggered by one side or the other, then go into your settings and adjust the scale so that you get what you want 🙂👍

Pros and cons. I really enjoy reading different viewpoints to make my own decisions and opinions. That is why I originally subscribed. Unfortunately so many articles have an interesting headline but when you click on it you cannot read more without paying to subscribe or the page blacks out after reading a few sentences. Sometimes the entire SmartNews site shuts down when I click on an article and closes out on my iPad. I have to reboot everything. It can be very frustrating to locate information and learn more about an article. Sometimes it seems as though many of the articles are only there for you to click on so that you can be bombarded with ads to sell something (almost all are things I have no use or desire to have and some have been borderline pornography!). If I need something I go looking for it on the web. I understand the need for having advertisements to cover the cost of the site and can deal with straightforward ads, but stealth/misleading clickbait articles brings down my enjoyment of your site and pushes me to go elsewhere.

Ultra bias in favor of liberal agenda. This app is clearly clearly clearly clearly guilty of pushing a liberal agenda. Pathetic. You are guilty of helping divide the country. Law abiding conservatives are being labeled as racist bigoted people every single day. So false! Disturbing and wrong when you scroll through the top stories, it is so obvious that this app is purposely pushing a liberal agenda. The hypocrisy level is off the charts where left leaning news outlets are writing headlines and articles themselves that are misleading and biased. Putting everyone and everything in buckets based on race or sexual orientation. It’s almost as if the Democrats have nothing left to offer other than being ‘nice and kind’ which is far from what I see with my own eyes on a daily basis. Lies with an agenda. Y’all are not news agencies. Simply put y’all work for the Democrat party. Your developer response is not helpful. It’s auto generated and actually admits that you feel news should be based on your preference. News is news regardless of what you want to hear. It should be factual. Period. Leave the opinions to the readers, not the writers and then and only then will you have smart news!

Biden bashing. Im increasingly alarmed by this app and its obvious anti Biden rhetoric, So many stories are bashing Biden claiming he’s getting senile and calling for his removal I thought this publication was fair and balanced but it’s becoming obvious that the editors have a definite hatred of our president by the way they publish one story after another about Biden’s failing memory and slurred words and on an on, I’m personally sick of it and can’t understand why they never mention the good things hes done for the country instead of constantly bashing him personally, Biden has had to deal with a country and government left in shambles by trump and his complete lack of understanding of government and his only concern was enriching himself and his family from his position in office, Listen to speech president Biden gave in ukraine and Poland and then tell me about how his mind is not up to the job, he gave two of the best speeches given by any president in history after hours of traveling and meetings with world leaders and never lost his train of thought or slurred a single word, If you’re going to be fair and balanced try listening to a few trump insane rambling speechs where he talks endlessly and seldom makes any sense has a 5 th grade vocabulary and constantly destroys the word he’s trying to say, Im done with this app and its obvious prejudice and hate of our great president

Stop the Popups!. UPDATE: (I am late posting this, but) within hours of me writing about my issue with pop-ups, the developers actually responded, and within a day or two, the problem was 100% rectified! I love developers who actually take the time to read and respond to the concerns of their customers, so because of that, SmartNews will forever have a supporter in me! I have been using Smart news several times a day, every day for years now, and I have enjoyed it for the most-part. However, as of January 1, 2021, I am now being greeted by a pop-up urging me to enable location services, which I have no desire to do. It is understandable that the app would request permission for such a feature, but it is requesting permission after EVERY•SINGLE•STORY read! It is beyond annoying and feels like harassment! If this problem isn’t rectified within a week, I will be uninstalling this app. Your readers should be given a choice of which features to enable, and not be harassed when they don’t choose in accordance with YOUR preferences. Update: I am updating my review to reflect a 4-star rating, because I am no longer being bombarded with popups. For everyone who’s whining about the app being too “left-leaning”, perhaps you should search for a Breitbart app, or some other tabloidesque news affiliate...and this is coming from an Independent.

The left wing bias is unreal. 75% of the articles that show up in the feed are clickbait left wing headlines that are all clearly bias which can be said for most new sources with both parties to an extent but these are usually flat out false or purposely written out of context and you can’t even judge for yourself by reading the article because the random “news” sources posting those clickbait titles sometimes leave out the details that show for a fact that what they are saying is false and the story is literally purposely made to make anyone or any topic that isn’t left wing look bad and I’m saying that as someone that’s not a fan of either party. Plus you can’t even use the “see less of” “see more of” feature because when I see those clickbait false articles I click on them and verify they’re fake then I click “see less from ____ (“news” agency)” yet I still see just as much from all of them that I’ve done it to including when I click “see more from ____” or “follow ____ “ on the very rare news agencies that post mostly unbiased news articles and then I see the same amount from them as I did before

I never leave reviews. I really love this app. I read this news every day and sometimes several times a day. I supported that it had ads as that what it takes to fund an app that doesn’t require purchase. But the ads have gotten out of control. Back to back full page ad with Hidden delete buttons that it becomes so hard to touch that you open an ad just trying to close it. And the ads are so consistent and ridiculous that you almost memorize them and hate them every time you see them because you see it so much. They pop up in the middle of reading some thing I’m really interested in and then I end up clicking 10 times just to get back where I was to finish reading an article that’s available on so many other apps. I just loved it the way that this one was designed but now it’s become a bit too much. I try to ignore the refresh that loses my place when trying to get to another article but now reading the news on this app has become more work than it is pleasure. With that note I’m gonna have to say goodbye SmartNews. I wish you well in the future and I hope that you can conform a little more to the readers and keep their interest while funding the project.

Decent but sometimes confusing. I have used this app as my main news source for a couple of years now. A good variety of news sources and points of view. Perhaps a little too heavy on celeb and retro TV stories, Costco and fast food news, but that’s okay. It would really be helpful if the article listings indicated what country they are coming from. I open an article about new ATM withdrawal rules, and it pertains to India. I open an article about something new McDonalds is offering and it’s in the UK. Wendy’s is offering a strawberry Frosty, but in Canada. If my app is set for US, I don’t expect a headline to be about Australia. Or Argentina. It’s okay, but I don’t want to have to dig into an article to find out it isn’t relevant. Then the algorithm thinks I was interested and then it sends more irrelevant content. Listing the country source (even a flag or country abbreviation) would really be helpful and informative. (Can’t go by the name of the publication because you can’t always tell).

Fantastic Function and Fav App but iPhone Capacity Issues. I love the news I get; frequently from cities I didn’t even realize it was tracking for me! Far superior to anything else I’ve ever seen I might be getting addicted this; I spend more time than I think I ‘should’ reading really interesting stuff that’s relevant to me. It’s not a five because it seems to ‘consume’ my iPhone 7 (with max memory)! Here’s what I mean: 1) Frequent pauses/freezes that can last quite a while. Some correct themselves with time, others don’t seem to. 2) Frequently I can’t open iPhone Notes to store an article. It just freezes! This is almost to the point rarely try anymore. But my memory is so bad what’s the point of reading all of this if a can’t save a link to it for later? 3) I was informed by the iPhone that my battery is going bad. However, this App seems to consume tons of power. If I stop using it for a day my ‘power issues’ seem to disappear. If I need a newer/faster iPhone for this app just let me know. If that’s not the issue, any suggestions? Alex PS - I’d like to store direct links to some of the news - is there an easy way to do this? Another suggestion: when I’m done reading an article option to remove from list or retain for a while (I may wish to forward to a friend ...... when it’s daylight again - ha, perhaps I am addicted!

Should call it Kardashian news service. The main problem with SmartNews is the complete lack of customization or filtering of topics or sources. They also use a huge number of “repeater” sources that simply summarize an article from another site. They provide a button for “suggest less news like this” but it does absolutely nothing. They serve literally thousands of click-bait stories about the Kardashian clan, no matter how many hundred times one clicks the “less news like this” link. If world war 3 broke out, half the “top news” stories would still be about what kim kardashian had for lunch. Other big problem is the heavy reliance on non-US sources for their “USA Edition”… often using titled versions of British tabloids like “The US Sun” (for example). I guess they dont want to license content from legitimate US sources! Could be a decent aggregator if they would fix the customization problem and improve their source pool… and lose their obvious algorithmic obsession with the K-family. Their standard response is “we emphasize discovery over personalization” but think about that… what that really means is “we don’t care what content you do or don’t want… we prefer to keep ramming the content of OUR choice down your throat whether you like it or not. Here… have another 50 kardashian stories!” Is what you want more important than what customers want??

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Top quality news. Always the best articles are chosen for me, and breaking news always comes through quickly.

Now awful. Have been using the app and enjoying delivery of news items. With the latest update, it’s all changed and unusable. Advertising is heaped on the pages and it really is a very unpleasant experience now. Such a shame as it was very good. I’ve deleted it.

Made American now - useless. Used to be really good now forced with US rubbish. Deleting

Waste of time. So bad, don’t bother wasting time to download this. Will get rid of it straight after this

Suggestion to developers. 1. You should expose a suggestion link in app where users can log suggestions. 2. When app first starts up there’s a moment when I see a fantastic headline. I hadn’t read it before but then it’s blown away all of sudden as feeds refresh. There’s a couple of ways to handle this - perhaps simplest in ux is to show the blue drop down forcing user to press the button. There’s pros and cons. You could have a switch to enable auto refresh.... Or have a timer rotate ticking down saying auto refresh in 5-4-3-2-1 and have ability to cancel. Or show a link to older /cached previous news - (use metrics to track how many ppl click.) This is only applicable to when app first starts up. or more complicated way - introduce a way to time machine back in timeline / dates. This could be fun to explore. Eg. Like go to last weeks news.

Suddenly terrible.. Most recent update that merged international and us editions ruined the app. Less channels/topics, local does not work outside of US. Flooded with irrelevant U.S content. Wiped my set up. More intrusive advertising including videos that ignore auto play. Just deleted the app.

You just ruined one of the best news apps out there. Stopping the international edition was a huge mistake. I might have been able to deal with the introduction of ads (even paid to remove them), but not being able to select my own channels killed it for me. The old layout was 100% better than selecting news and then having to select news source. I can no longer just read the news feeds I like/trust, instead now have to sift through sources I don’t like and certainly don’t trust! Bring back the international version!!!

Used to be 5 stars. It feels that every time you get to enjoy something online, something changes to make the experience unpleasant. This is definitely the case with this program. They recently merged international with US news and have flooded the app with ads. I will stick with it for a few more weeks and if it doesn’t settle down will have to find some other source for my news.

My favorite news and entertainment site. It's easy to use, customizable to show the feeds I like, and localized to my location as I change countries. Love it.

Notneed to be able to refresh headlines all at once. The rest I ok.

Good but..... Would be great if you could park publications that you really think are either junk media or almost click bait

Limited flexibility.. The news is by default USA based. I would like to tailor the top news tab with various sources from around the world, and my own country. Adding the channels along the top is a good feature, but one more step in being able to filter the top news would be great. Also, only two Australian news channels were available. Would like more.

Top page. Too many adds

Excellent news flow!. Best of the best!

New merged usa version is unbearable with too many ads.. Please revert to the old version

Thankyou smartnews for being the authentic you. SmartNews you are an awesome news aggregator. You are my daily go to global news update fix . In addition to the news and events you also provide useful educational informative links which are great predicate of knowledge. and helps in Upscaling by learning and adopting growth mindset . You provide on point news source in every aspect . You are ginormous source of information in sports as I m sports tragic , I Love beauty fashion Entertainmrnt music health & wellness , humour and am passionate about the latest tech ! I m an avid fan have been since 2016 .ISmartNews you are my daily fix . Heartfelt thanks to you SmartNews for being diverse & inclusive in offering something for everyone . My biggest take away . I learn something new everyday to be the optimal version of my self because I have acquired some form of new knowledge. I share links and great informative tips apps which I discover on smartnews with my friends and fam on a daily basis to the point They all call me here comes ms Smartnews what has she got for us today it’s epic You totally rock smartnews . Keep growing keep being honest funny kind humble respectful source of news and information. You serve my friends fam and my purpose daily . I promote you daily as my choice of the source for knowledge and power. Thanks kindly .

Don’t waste your time here folks…It tells what news to read and you don’t have a choice of content. The app needs to have a end user selection so when the news refreshes it defaults to the users preferred tab, not the ‘Top News’ which is the editors pick and does not reflect everyone’s choices…it’s actually the leftist editors favourite news channels..so if you don’t want to follow The Guardian News, or CNNNNN and you don’t select it as a news channel, it doesn’t matter as its news stories will still be shown in the default tab when you open the app…seriously biased and flawed news app…don’t waste your time here folks …there is far better available in the App Store

Is this app free. I’m wondering if I have to pay for using this app as I’m sure I saw Apple ID paid when I pressed to ok the download Not sure I just would like to know thanks Otherwise I’m excited to read the stories you have posted I just joined now

一番好きなニュースアプリ. 色々試したけれど、真面目なニュースと気楽な読み物系ニュースがどちらも読めて一番好きなニュースアプリです。

Too many Australian news!. Why so many Australian news ?

Snowflake Ready. App is solely for snowflake as all news sources are so far left they travel in a circle. Biased, one eyed, Leftist news sources. It is not a news app but a propaganga tool. Whatever happened to news apps giving you both sides so we can make our own opinion. Should be removed.

Great app!. An excellent app that I use to check all me news. Very smooth and silky with nice animations. Looking forward to seeing what you guys do with 3D touch!

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Congratulations on making smart news virtually unusable. The new UI is a dog’s breakfast. Hard to look at, let alone devouring the content! Has some one decided that a gong show is what is needed in the news field now? Please get some professionals involved in a new design immediately.

New format is junk news. Used to be smart news, now junk and tabloid news full of advertisements! Time to look for another app to replace it.

What is happening to Smart News. This international edition was the best news app ever but now that Smart News is merging its international ed with the US one, I am bombarded by ads and no longer have my favourites mixed in with the generic tabs. Why did they choose to mess with perfection?

It’s gone downhill - all clickbait now. I used to really get good news out of this app. Something has changed though and now it is all tabloid clickbait garbage. Uninstalling

Too many right wing rags on here. While I appreciate different viewpoints I don’t appreciate viewpoints that rely on lies, misinformation, half truths or conscious omission of some facts to lend credence to their story. Rags like The Blaze, Epoch Times, The Washington Examiner and of course Faux (Fox) News are a few of the rags that the general public can do without. I guess that these BS “journalistic” sites/rags are able to rely upon the general stupidity of the average American. Not sure if obesity is the cause of Americans stupidity or if it is the Republibigots never ending war against good public schools and good curriculums. Suffice to say, it would be great if SmartNews had a rule that only stories that have been fact checked get promoted on their app. This would easily eliminate the aforementioned sites/rags from having their Fake News stories on this app. Wake up all u right wing morons. It’s time for you all to move to Texas. Then we will happily build a wall. Oh, don’t forget your MAGA hats u morons.

Very close to unsubscribing.. Since you changed to the US version things are worse than ever!! Fox News and NY post reign supreme plus Mirror online and Daily Mail garbage. As top news we now get countless articles on latest murders, assaults, and daily crime ‘news’ everywhere. Please reconsider….. Not what I signed up for.

Smart News New Us Edition. The new US edition so called “TOP” daily articles is now just full of endless tabloid type topics,often repetitive on the same page,and useless information with built in commercials.”TOP” should mean “Coles Notes” version of useful ,concise and relevant daily news .Shame on you for bastardizing your website.NOT SMART! I am looking into other websites to rely on .

Terrible changes. This used to be a good app. Now it’s basically an ad and false news app. Use Artifact instead.

Gone to Garbage. This App was a five star until you decided to switch to the “American” version. Gone are the easily navigated news sites, now replaced with a jumble of incomprehensible crap I didn’t decide to follow. Too many tabloid type stories litter the feeds, and to constantly scroll down a page until I find a news site I actually follow is tedious. Happily deleted this once great app from my home page.

Battery Murderer. This app makes my iPhone 14 Pro get so hot, it feels like it’s about to meltdown. Apps like this will destroy your battery. Downloader beware!

Downgrade. Huge downgrade from the International version to the local US version. As someone from Canada, the local US version is completely useless to me. The layout of the app is different and now I am constantly bombarded by stupid ads. Please go back to International!!

Used to be a great app. Now it’s just another ad clogged, trendy people magazine style “news” app. I deleted it today after it hung up on another ad. Was great, is junk!

Canadian Content. Because many Canadians follow this app it would be advisable to carry more Canadian content. In the Sports area it’s always about European news. How about covering NOrth American tennis golf hockey etc …

Drifting into the right wing orbit. I’ve been a fan for years, butI’m troubled by the increasing number of inflammatory and dubious articles from Fox News and the NYPost. Like HuffPost, they should be presented as separate channels so the these screeds aren’t visible to those of of us who despise these right-wing rags.

SHADY SOURCES. Too much clickbait and sources you can’t block. For example “inside the magic” is an irresponsible news site with sensationalist headlines - can’t block it. This used to be a great app but it’s just gotten progressively worse.

Stop Sending Me Celebrity Crap!!!. This could be a great news compiler. It used to be much better. Lately all I get is crap about celebrities that I loathe. I didn’t ask for celebrity crap! It looks like I’ll have to stop using it if this keeps up.

Ruined. They ruined a perfectly good app. The new format is filled with uninspired, uninteresting articles from news outlets that I’ve never heard of.

Poor upgrade.. Since the last update the adds are repetitive, too large and in your face and cause performance issues. Very poorly done. Please return to the last version.

Erratic. I don't like the new format...it seems to be all over the place! It's not as easy to find specific articles.

Too many trash stories. Real news please !. Enjoy the app but there are too many old, mostly undated items. I suggest either edit out the old stories or mandate a posting date.

Don’t like the changes. Since last update with major changes to the platform eliminating the non U.S. option, has become junk where feed and preferences can not be controlled

So close to being perfect. I have been using the news app and overall, I am quite pleased with its performance. One of the standout features of this app is its incredible speed and responsiveness. Whether I'm browsing through different news articles or refreshing my feed, the app never fails to deliver a smooth experience. I appreciate the developers' efforts in optimizing the app for quick loading times and seamless navigation. Another aspect that sets this app apart from others is its minimalistic approach to advertisements. Unlike many news apps that bombard users with ads, this app manages to strike a balance. I'm glad that the app doesn't overload me with ads left and right, allowing me to focus on the content without unnecessary distractions. However, I do have one minor gripe with the app, and that is the readability and cluttered design. When browsing through articles, the text appears somewhat cramped, making it slightly challenging to read comfortably. It would be great if the developers could address this issue by improving the spacing and font size, enhancing the overall readability. Additionally, the app's design feels a bit cluttered at times. The interface could benefit from a cleaner layout, making it easier to navigate and find specific news categories or articles. Simplifying the design while retaining the app's fast and responsive nature would greatly enhance the user experience. Despite these minor design concerns, the app remains my go-to source for news updates. The app's speed and lack of intrusive ads significantly contribute to my positive experience. If the developers can address the readability and cluttered design issues, this news app would undoubtedly be the best of its kind. In conclusion, I highly recommend this news app to anyone seeking quick news updates without the annoyance of excessive ads. With some minor improvements in the readability and design aspects, this app has the potential to be truly outstanding.

Smart news. Enjoy SMART NEWS as NEWS items are short and to the point….please keep presentations that way… It affords me the opportunity to catch up on the what is going on in our crazy WORLD….

Awful talking ads wake my husband at night.. My most used app going downhill. Intrusive flashing ads are thankfully gone, but LARGE ad fills half the screen, makes it difficult to avoid touching it accidentally.

Not recommended. A lot of absurd articles from right-wing propaganda sources started to arrive in the past six months, after using the app for a number of years. Despite providing feedback, the app’s mechanism is quite limited to minimize receiving such articles, and one cannot chose not to receive such topics or such sources.

Ad ridden trash. The new update is horrible. Ads everywhere; after every paragraph, in between articles, popup after a few readings. Awful all around

Bring back the International edition. I have tried your new merged edition any really prefer the International edition. I sincerely hope that you have plans to restore it…..

New Format. My wife and I have both come to the point of utter frustration with the amount of ads and pop-ups in your new format. Who in their right mind thinks that anyone actually stops to read an advertisement when you are in the middle or reading a news article of interest. Some of the ads actually take you right out of your app and you have to close your app before you can get back into the news story (but then you know that). Goodbye, delete-delete!

Updates News items too fast.. Not enough time to read items because it updates too fast. Should have a manual update so we could read more items.

Unbelievable. I like it more than others

Too Bad. Ruined the app by merging International with US. Now lost the appeal. Deleted!

Was a great app several years ago. This app has gone down the toilet. “Top news” is mostly pure disinformation or clickbait. Many formerly available channels are gone.

New update is no good. New update sucks, you can’t easily access the news agency’s that you trust.

Merging US and International versions … now local news tab doesn’t work. As a Canadian viewer the merging of International version with local version has made this app useless for me. It will no longer recognize my Canadian location… just gives an error message and says tryi again. Going to delete the app.

Nothing but radical left news sources. It also said sign in to access your profile and change settings, etc, I signed in and there’s still nothing under my profile . And no ability to change settings. Also, no way to sign out! Also every headline is radical leftwing.

News is not impartial but rather fed on “preference”. If I opened one a news about “aliens” then these are the only news I see. I would like to actually see the latest news!

In the beginning it was good now it just plan sucks!,,. When you guys first started it was good and could selected difference new and information sources that were not so damn stupid and mind numbing as they are now. Are there monkey scanning new sources. It really reflects how stupid people are in different places. Then you cut the international feeds to focus on the moron in the states You really need to see how the rest of the world sees you. It’s not very becoming

Meh. No news from Canada...what’s up with that?

New version is garbage. This latest version of smart news is stupid, will probably end up deleting it

Please return to the international version. I can’t tell you how much I’m disappointed with the Updated News app. I am writing to express my disappointment with the recent update to the news app. As a long-time user of the app, I have found it to be my go-to source for news. However, since the update, the US and Canada version has become disjointed and difficult to navigate. The user-friendliness of the app has decreased significantly. As someone who has been with the app since its beginning, I am disappointed that the changes have made it difficult for me to continue using it. I am now forced to look for another app that can provide me with the same level of service as the previous international version did. I hope that you will take my feedback into consideration and work towards improving the app's user experience.

Fox is not news. Fox News is propaganda and The Province is a trash tabloid that doesn’t report facts. This is NOT smart news.

Another Leftist Propaganda Site. Remember when HIIT alists took pride in presenting facts. ALL the fact so people could decide for themselves? You may be better than most of your garbage Left media but Left none the same

Destroyed the app. The recent massive ads have destroyed the entire experience and pleasure of this app and made it unbearable to use. Forced to delete it after this review

Gimmicky headlines. A serious news source would stop using those childish gimmicky headlines. Grow up.

Why so Anti Trump?. Bunch of left-wing garbage written by brain washed fascist diversity hires.

Not good. Bad compared to what it was with international education. Will delete it and continue to use other news apps

Not really news. PSmart news is much more about entertainment and wasting time there on finding any reliable sources of news. But I like it, in small doses. It really went downhill zero after the latest app update on or about November 18, 2023.

Another Fake News app. One sided typical fake news

Biased. I find their news extremely biased.

Not useful for Canada. The layout and feel of the app is great, but I’m not sure why it’s available on the Canadian App Store as it only support 1 news feed from an obscure publisher. Even searching for Canada in news bring up US publishers with the work Canada in their articles. Definitely not local news. Great app if you want news on the US and world news from a US point of view.

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Find out Truth…. Comparable with other news outlets in this current era of media coverage from around the globe….this is important because we need to know what is happening. We as a vast majority of people are trying to live our lives in the best possible ways and together we can make the world a safer place for everyone! I understand why morality matters. I understand why you would want to stand up for yourself and stand up for others when you’re just trying to enjoy the freedom of your happiness… We are tired of being manipulated by aggression! The aggressors of humanity for selfishness with their actions and abilities to impoverish others for power…well putting it mildly has become such wrong for us all to have to suffer and be treated like this! “That is why I enjoy “Smart News” as it is a multimedia platform for people”…

Performance Is Awful - Needs Ad Removal. I’ve used this app since I was a Sophomore in High School - I’m almost 23 now. For years this app ran beautifully well and any issues were extremely limited - aside from the biased liberal news that the US version totes. Recently, you’ve begun prioritizing video ads that infinitely loop and it slows my phone down tremendously (I had the battery replaced in October, so I’m at maximum performance). The app now makes my phone stutter, lag, and freeze. I don’t mind REGULAR ads that AREN’T looped video ads for a game that has 0 relevancy to me, but don’t make them every 3 or 4 articles down the list. Finally, I wish you’d revert the overall design to how it was before you guys made everything one long, linear list. Being able to see MULTIPLE articles at the same eye level is great. You miss a lot when all you’re doing is looking down a long list. I’d go 2.5 stars if I could, honestly. This used to be an app I would give 10 stars to if I could.

Endless loop. I absolutely hate the latest updates, so I’m downgrading from 5 Stars to 3 Stars. You used to be able to open articles in your web browser to gain the full experience of the article, i.e. missing photos, videos etc. or to be able to forward an article to someone who doesn’t have the SmartNews app. Now when you go to open an article in the browser, it opens a truncated version of the article and asks you to download the SmartNews app to read the article, even though you already have it downloaded. So you click through back to the original article and try to open the article in the browser, and again you’re confronted with the notice to download the app, and so on and so forth, endlessly. And then if you forward a news article directly from SmartNews to someone without the app, they’re unable to open it, so they just give up. Please SmartNews, remedy this situation.

TIMED ADS, STACKED ADS, and DISAPPEARING CLOSE BUTTONS. UPDATE 2: Over and over, this app’s creators attempt to alienate its users. Now, WITH AD AUTOPLAY SET TO “NEVER”, musical ads start playing regardless as soon as you open a page. WHAT IS WRONG WITH YOU, DEVELOPERS? DO YOU HAVE NOTHING TO DO BUT ANNOY USERS? So, once again, I’m deleting the app. UPDATE: Now TIMED ADS are STACKED with one following another. Also they’re p,aging the “HIDE THE X BUTTON HERE, THERE, NO, OVER THERE. I ASK AGAIN; DO YOU REALLY THINK PLAYING THESE GAMES WILL MAKE ME WANT TO BUY ANYTHING ADVERTISED? I’m done with this app. UPDATE: Timed ADS continue to push the MONEY-GRAB envelope. App is becoming worse and worse‼️ UPDATE: I used my right to quickly push through advertisements and SmartNews’ response: TIME-DELAYED ADVERTISEMENTS THIS APP IS MOVING FORWARD WITH THE MONEY GRAB. DO THEY REALLY THINK TIME-DELAYED ADVERTISEMENTS WILL INDUCE ME TO BUY FROM THESE ANNOYING COMPANIES? A B S O L U T E L Y N O T ‼️ EVAL: 1. ADs are starting to pop up. The usefulness of this app is nearing its end. When ADs disrupt - it’s over‼️ 2. STILL, AFTER YEARS ... STILL reloads the home page randomly and TOTALLY DISRUPTS MY LOCATION IN THE HOME NEWS CHAIN. WHY, AFTER YEARS, is this still an issue❓ How difficult is a simple MANUAL UPDATE BUTTON?

Useful, but compromised. How does this app make money? A major source of revenue for the developers is presumably the sale of your news-browsing behavior to third parties. Probably many or most people don’t care about that. You should. If you have Privacy Pro or similar app, check out all the outgoing connections which happen when you click on a smartnews link. Update - Spring 2023: The Top tab still contains too much spam and clickbait. There is now an option to “receive less news” from a given source, but still no way to turn it off completely or to filter the specific sources you may wish to see. It is extremely irritating that this app suppresses the date when displaying news articles. Why do this? The app now provides the age of the story in hours or days, which is better than before but still no excuse not to include the date of the story as obtained from the original, if it contained the date.

Ads are vicious horrible and take over your phone. Predatory ads. The ads techniques this app uses should be illegal. If you even so much as breathe on one it takes over you phone. I mean the smallest brush and it’s taking over your phone and you’re in for the ride. Sometimes I think the ads are opening without me touching them at all. Typically bringing you to the App Store right away. Sometimes going into horizontal mode and playing some annoying spiel. They almost always make it difficult and sometime impossible to close the app by subversive means such as hiding the x but sometimes there is no way to close them at all. I’ve had to restart my phone so many times due to this app . It’s really a shame because the way it provides news is good. I have a love hate relationship with it. I’ve deleted it so many times but come back. Then get aggravated and delete it. I’m always looking for an app I can trust. This app feels like it’s run by con artists due to the way they program ads. I can only hope they are getting rich and eventually choke on a steak.

Smart News is my primary news source. I use to use multiple Apps to check out both sides of the news, now I primarily use Smart News. I wish they would allow the user to request additional news stories from a single source after reading what is presented in Smart News limited number of stories from a single news source. I also wish they gave the user a chance to increase both the size of the font in the news story, but also bold text, and increased contrast of text. Of all the many news Apps I've used, and I've used quite a few, Smart News seems to be the best, as it provides a single App access to so many news sources. Keep up the good work!!! I spend hours a day using your app to educate myself. In my opinion this is a great App. I do have one request, and that is to add a search feature.

Notifications/bookmark. I like having notifications set so I can see the headline quickly & decide if I want to further read the story. Most of the notifications I get from SmartNews have multiple stories in the notification so when I click the link it takes me to the main SmartNews home page where all stories are listed rather than opening the link directly for the 1 story I wanted to read. If you wait several hours to click on the link instead of immediately when the notification comes through you’ll never find the story. If I have say 5 notifications from SmartNews & want to read 2 different ones, if you click on the first one then all the other SmartNews notifications disappears (IOS). It’s very aggravating & I’m just about to turn it off altogether. If I had time to read all the stories then I wouldn’t need the notification. Also, seems like having a save button or bookmark to read later would just be a given but no such luck with this app.

Great Sometimes, But the Bias is Evident. SmartNews advertises themselves as an unbiased, all-sides, free journalism kind of app, as opposed to other news apps, which give you a one-sided, biased view of the world. And they’re right, at least on a global and national scale. But the local articles that I use SmartNews for the most, because most other apps don’t even have local news options, are HEAVILY biased. Now I don’t know how their algorithm works, but if it’s a person curating the articles in each region, I can tell you whoever’s working the PNW is alt-right. They consistently put hardly disguised white nationalism into my notifications for local articles, and while the national news has been firmly centrist in opinion since the George Floyd protests have erupted, my local articles have been echoing the president in calling for a military coup against local governments. Honestly, I wouldn’t even be able to tell that this wasn’t the consensus opinion if not for my ability to google other local articles on the same topic. Tl:dr, the local articles are weirdly far right

Misleading and Frustrating. Notification about a specific story I’m interested in, I click, no story. No problem, maybe it’s old - I’ll search. But no obvious search field. And no obvious way out of news section to maybe a homepage. Even Settings doesn’t prove a search feature. Ahhhh! Forget it. I’ll Google it. Now, while these elements might exist, the app is certainly not intuitive. Frankly, I see nothing ‘smart’ about it. It feels like bait and switch applied to news. I do NOT recommend this frustrating app! Update: I finally found a support feature in Settings where I received an answer to my question: ‘search for story’ only to discover disappointedly that a search feature ‘is not offered at this time’. What the...? My reading calendar is crammed full. It often takes me some time to get to stories that interest me. This app is useless to me.

A breath of fresh air in a climate where corporate media is so biased. I’m incredibly grateful for finding this app. I get to read both sides and make my own judgment on a topic versus relying on corporate media to shove biased, agenda-driven news down my throat. One thing I’d like to see added to give it a full 5 stars: a save article or bookmark article function. Twitter and Reddit have this function that saves things in a personal “saved posts” or “saved tweets” section within the app so that you can find an article if you’d like to refer back to it or you’ve saved it for later viewing. The reason I find that such a big deal here is that the news articles on your personal feed are constantly changing and an article I might have seen in my feed but wanted to read later due to time constraints will no longer be there next time I open the app since the the feed has updated by then. I’ve lost many articles I’d have love to have read but didn’t remember the topic due to this and it’s pretty frustrating. Other than that, this app nailed it for people that are tired of feeling like they’re being spoon-fed garbage news from corporate media channels. Their jobs as corporate media companies is to force their hidden agendas on us viewers and not to give us news straight. A much needed app in this climate of so much misinformation.

Gossip App for Politics. Could someone please post real news worthy information regarding politics? I’m so sick of hearing about who in politics is suing who, people hating what Trump tweets, who is getting fired and so on. None of this informs the population on what is actually happening FOR our country. I could care less at this point about Russian collusion or Hilary and her being prosecuted. No matter whether you are Democrat or Republican -aren’t we sick of this. I thought this app would help educate the country on real issues and what the President and Congress are passing or discussing to deal with issues but it’s just another media gossip outlet for people to read more about how there are haters of Trump or Clintons. The site is very left and liberal not unbiased at all. When did news become so opinionated? Aren’t you all suppose to give the facts and let us make the decision on how we feel. The Media in general is such a disgrace. The sad issue is that the majority of people out there really don’t even know what’s going on in DC or the issues. They just read all the crap and gossip that the media has their opinion on.

Trojan Horse = Smart News=Disguised Bias. This app pretends to be diverse and inclusive of “...all points of view.” In reality it is HEAVILY biased towards left wing news sources, with only an occasional news story from either the center or middle of the road news sources. PROOF - I pointed out this problem on several occasions, and they said, Sorry, but our algorithm is programmed that way! As if they do not control the algorithm! The publishers of this App pay lip service to diversity of thought, but in reality, they promote only left-wing, biased news sources. MORE PROOF- the “Top News” tab opens automatically when you open the app; you cannot turn it off, but this “Top News” tab insidiously loads and displays ONLY left-wing, biased news sources. In other words, the app is designed to promote and force-feed you ONLY left wing biased news sources, you have to seek out other sources. Why not just use FLIP OR APPLE NEWS or my browser rather this app?! What’s the use!? If you’re seeking balance or diversity in your news sources, and independent or just differing points of view (like their misleading advertisements suggest) then users should look elsewhere.

Used to be the best, now becoming unusable. I’ve been a loyal user for years, and recommended this app to plenty of people. Now, it’s hardly functional, freezes constantly, and the ads have gone from full-screen pop-ups, to ads being wedged in between every 3rd headline. I understand the need for ad revenue, but charge me $5 up front, and clean up the ad garbage. When it works, it is an amazing news aggregator, and lets you parse a huge portion if the internet, quickly. Also, don’t buy into the reviews complaining about bias and bad reporting; this is a news aggregator, not a journalistic endeavor. It crawls the internet, automatically, and grabs content from random sites. Repeat, there are no reporters who work for Smart News. It is a robot piping in content from all over the internet, enabling the user to quickly scan content without visiting various sites. Fix the overheating and battery drain, scale back the ads, even if it costs users upfront, and allow specific topics/sites to be excluded by keyword, and this would be a 5 star app again.

Advertising everywhere!. If this app didn’t have ads literally everywhere, it would be a much better app. Scroll through news headlines? Watch out, advertisements will pop into your feed and will move the headlines. Read a news article or two? Watch out, advertisements might pop-up and block the entirety of your screen. Want to try reading a news article? Watch out, advertisements will force the article to be sixteen times longer because every other photo will be an advertisement. Oh, and one of the worst things about all the advertisements? They are often all the exact same ad, so you see it 500 times. It’s even more terrible when those ads are gross (pictures of infections or rotten teeth for example). while there’s a “report this ad” option, you have to do it for each instance of the ad (remember how I said you see the same thing 500 times??). So reporting the ad doesn’t help. I would be much more willing to use this app if I wasn’t subjected to an avalanche of advertisements Hey devs: Maybe consider “$5 no advertisements”?

Seems to be in Decline. I have used this app for years and recommended to others is a great source for a wide variety of information. Over the years, I found that the quality of the news sources has declined. Most recently, they did a revamp of the entire app, and several nice features have been eliminated. It used to be that you could see the headlines for 8 to 10 stories of a glance and pick the one you wanted. Now they have gone with large photos and you can only see a couple of stories at a time. You have to scroll through to find one as of interest to you. It does have a nice personalization feature where you can specify the topics that you are interested in, but you can’t organize them in the order that you want any longer. Also, you can no longer choose the sources that you are most interested in, and some of them that they do offer are clearly of lower quality and less reliable. Google News is probably a better choice at this point.

Coverage of Politics. You are without a doubt more biased and slanted than all of the mainstream media combined. I am a registered Democrat who votes independent if need be and even that does not make your biased and disgustingly leftist views acceptable. I have read and watched you distort everything from Koby zbryant’s death to BLM, to Charlottesville to basically scrape bottom on any, all, everything President Trump has tried to do. Your rag has spread rumor, gossip, and liras and downright malicious slander. I am done with you and I will post a negative comment every single day on your 🤮🙈biased site! I had hoped for real journalism!! I got rumor, gossip, innuendo and leftist propaganda. I detest your site!! I am a former reporter and journalist; the trash and lies and bias you put on line is appalling and disgusting! DONE with you!! I intend sending a copy of this review to all 1000 plus people on my list to warn them you are just another outlet pushing a hate all things Republican agenda. And I am not even a Republican. Your journalistic integrity is NONEXISTENT!! You should be required to register as a lobbyist for the left!!🙈🤬🤬🤬🤬🤨🤮

Obviously Progressive Leaning. It is obvious that this “news source” if it could actually be considered other than entertainment is progressive leaning. This site does not represent what the working men and women are looking for. We could care less what actors/actresses and sports figures think about our day to day lives. For the most part most of them have forgotten that “WE” technically pay their salaries. We can not speak out at work, they should not take the time that we pay for to do so. We use their work as distractions from our lives and day to day problems. For them to use that time for a personal forum for subjects we might rather to choose when we listen to them is disrespectful at the least. It does show us how spoiled and self centered they have become. Wealth from sports or acting does not equate to intelligence. If they want to promote a political or social agenda please do so when “WE THE PEOPLE” are not paying them! One thing for sure, many US citizens feel as I do, these people can take credit for most of us reading more and watching tv less!

Biased info. This is definitely fully Democrat biased information. I would like to see a little more balance instead of just as much Negative information you can possibly muster up toward the Republicans. I am in between and like to look at both sides of the story instead of all one way. Maybe Trump has made some bad choices, but so has The left with condoning all the riots that took place this last summer! That certainly wasn’t publicized and ridiculed like this situation with Trump is! There is a balance in there and I would like to see some of the Positive things Trump has done for this country talked about too instead of only negative! Your news right ups can’t even say one positive thing about our first lady who is elegant and beautiful with her word and morals. You only criticize her if she doesn’t smile perfectly every moment of every speech, only things Nancy Pelosi has to say get out there when it’s derogatory toward Republicans! There is good and bad to both sides and I would like to see a balance of reporting for both sides not just all negative toward the conservatives.

Seeking all of the news. I just read your article about the three-month-old who supposedly died of Covid. While this is a horrible thing to hear, I was really hoping that smart news would be an objective media outlet that reported everything, not just that the pushes a narrative. What about those epidemiologists who are brave enough to come out and give a differing view of medicine? What about the thousands and thousands of vaccine injured that we never hear anything about unless we go to some online conservative news site? Why not talk about how well Florida is doing with no lockdowns and no mask mandates?What about Sweden?If the media will choose a stance on one topic, I’m guessing that they will be biased on others. We all know that you can’t turn on the TV to any news channel without hearing stories completely aligned with liberals and far left socialist/communist mindsets. Please don’t become one of them.

Biased POC. SmartNews is another very biased supermarket tabloid. 50% of what they publish is pretty meaningless and irrelevant. Of the remaining 50%, 75% to 80% is pro lib dems. They republish mostly articles that are negative against Conservative Republicans. Booo Hisss After following the instructions I received from the Apple Store, I added the more conservative sources that I believe are far more accurate and trustworthy than all the other Fake News sources. I recommend you put instructions when one first downloads your App so you know how to set it up. I gave you 3 stars until I can evaluate the articles that you select from these other sources. I am returning to my original ONE STAR rating and am deleting the app from all of my devices. Just like the rest of the msm, you are biased. You reprint 80% Lib stuff, 10% other meaningless celebrity crap, and, although I added all of the more accurate, reasonable, truthful conservative news channels, as you suggested, the last 10% is filled with the most negative articles you can find in the “conservative” channels. You are just full of crap and I am advising all of my family, friends, and social media followers to delete the app also. Good bye.

Burns up my phone?. I enjoy much of what I see on SmartNews and love the opportunity to delete stories that I don’t care for. Also appreciate the local news tab (although sometimes I get news from other states with a city with the same name). BIGGEST PROBLEM: This is the only app that heats up my phone, and I mean HOT! Sometimes I can just shut the app, but sometimes I actually have to turn the phone off so it will cool down. This can’t be good for my phone, but I don’t want to lose this news, so I will delete and reinstall. Crossing my fingers! UPDATE: I did delete and reinstall, and the burn-up problem is gone. Thank goodness! I’m so glad I can still get all the news I want without melting my phone! One more star - the only thing keeping it from five stars is some of the trash stories (which I can delete) with extreme bias and vulgarity. Still, love the app.

Great app, until…. Was a great app at one point. Then they started injecting ads into your scrolling every 3 articles that draw as you scroll. I’m moving to Starting other less intrusive and better designed alternative apps such as Flipbook. Suggest you do the same as well until they chose a different means of delivering ads. Yes, the developers will respond that they’ll take this ‘to the product or ads teams’ but rest assured that this is just lip service. They’ve been saying this for months and the ad intrusion had only gotten significantly worse. Really disappointed, this used to be a great app. Would rate lower if possible. UPDATE: 3/2/2 Still getting excessive ads, obnoxious pop up’s, and ridiculous repetition of the same ads. Developer is all about lip service that they are addressing it, but it’s only got worse and worse over time. Strongly recommend that people look elsewhere for a news aggregator as it’s clear the developer isn’t doing anything to materially change it for the better.

Too soon to judge, but...... I’m giving 3 stars because I just downloaded and opened and have not yet explored enough to give it 1 or 5 but wanted to address a common thread in the reviews and review responses I saw before downloading: many users complaining of left-leaning bias and developers responding with a canned response stating the app is optimized for balanced news and to just go add FoxNews or NY Post or Blaze. That’s all fine and good, but it should be balanced from the start and then tweakable. The first thing I saw upon opening was a barrage of “top stories”, 90% of which from left sources. That is inherent bias from the start. The default state of the app should reflect its claim of balance. Basically, if you’re liberal, you’re already set up. If you’re conservative, you have to work at it. Now I will customize and see if it delivers and will update my review accordingly. My recommendation to developers would be to eliminate the bias from the start. In its default state it is a big turnoff to half of your potential users.

Bad idea Grouping multiple news items in single notification. I think Smartnews is a quality app overall in terms of getting all of your news sources in one place. But, whoever's bright idea it was to group news items into a single notification should be tarred and feathered. How do you expect a notification to take you directly to a news article that's bundled with another article? And don't say, "well it takes you to the main screen... just go find it" because most of the time it's not there... even when the notification just came in! This really makes the user experience of the app very bad. If it's a single item, most of the time that works but there have been times when even it doesn't. So, also, why not leave the notification active? Why delete it right after the user clicks on it? It’s frustrating when you get a notification and you *really* want to read that article and yet you never get to it.

Out of CONTROL Embedded X FORCED Popups!. I finally gave up on this app TODAY. It’s become X (Twitter)-embedded GARBAGE. The ads are bad enough, but you can no longer read the articles because you are literally forced off the sight, as your browser is forcibly opened to raise a Twitter-embedded file. You have to hit “back” 20 times just to get back to the app, only for the same thing to happen. It’s hopeless. The crazy thing is, this happens even if there is no Twitter reference in the article you’re trying to read! I’ll just stick with Apple News and HuffPo. Smart News isn’t so smart anymore with forced ads and all the greedy pop-ups. If them forcing ads on people is more important than their audience, then they can have it. It should not be that hard to simply read the news. Whomever reads this, please don’t waste your time downloading this app. You’ll get nothing but forced ads and them gaining access to track you for advertising purposes. Sad thing is, this USED to be the best news app I’d ever come across; but as always, greed takes over and the ads popping up made the app completely useless.

News feed is becoming more extreme right and now pop up’s. I just deleted the app as one of the things I liked about it was it stopped pop up’s. After one of the updates the app started popping up ads between articles. Now I’m getting video adds from the app. I love the tab organization but am not interested in stupid video adds for cartoon apps. Previous review: I enjoyed the app but I am finding that the app is picking more rightwing fake news than before. Fox is one of my tabs, I would check the headlines but rarely open as they seem more a propaganda site now. Fox dominates my political tab and election 2020. And now I’m getting ccn as a news source, Ccn not CNN. And it seems to be a briebart/ fox spinoff. CNN and msnbc are also tabs that I open more often but are usually the 4th article on the newsfeed with fox being the top couple. I find I have to be more vigilant when reading the news just so I don’t waste my time reading garbage like : Romney is now an agent for Soros and the dems!!! Starting to explore Flipboard but don’t like the pop ups 😢

Lots of news from multiple perspectives. I really like being able to customize my newsfeed to suit my reading habits without having to pay or subscribe to a particular news source. If I want to read more about a particular story there are links to other articles about the topic. There is lots of interesting information available from multiple perspectives in one place. Here is my personal pet peeve. While I can add or delete topics I cannot add or delete a particular source. I would like to be able to delete individual “news” sources, as I don’t consider some of them to be reputable and would prefer them not to clutter up my feed. I just do not want to know the latest malicious gossip about the royal family of England, and I have strong negative feelings about outlets that report that kind of dreck. Yes, you IBT!!!! There is a reason that I don’t have a gossip tab on my feed. Please allow me to make this go away!

Hands down best news APP, but they continually screw it up!!. So sad to watch a company screw up such a great platform but this company clearly has a self destructive streak. I truly do think they ever test out any of their new gimmicks to cram the ads down our throats. It’s a free app so we’re prepared to look at ads but these folks keep changing how invasive they are and in the process locking up their own app. Now when you open most articles they will continually reset whaTs on the viewing screen so it never stays still and you can’t read it as they figure out what ads to cr in the middle. Clearly they think the only way to make us look at ads is to make screw jump around so that when we’re trying to scroll 4-5 time a just to try and finish a single paragraph that keeps jumping. And to make it better screw up, after it jumping around about ten times the screen will just go black. Can’t navigate or back up. Have to exit. PLEASE. EVERYONE DUMP THIS APPP, TELL THEM WHY IN REEVIEWS U TIL THEY LEARN THEIR LESSON. WE’LL READ YOUR ADS BUT QUIT TRYING YO FAKE READERS IUT AND FOR GODS SAKE, TEST IUT SOME OF THESE STUPID ENHANCEMENTS BWFORW YOU LAUNCH THEM.

Top Tab Edit Function Required. I already received a response to my previous review and I am changing the rating to something more reasonable and refining my review as follows: Now, although I can have varying news sources across my tabs, and I do, I would greatly prefer to have a better ratio of right and left leaning publications on the Top tab. I am moderate, but there are still publications that are far too left, and far too right on the Top tab in my opinion, and I just want to see the ones that I enjoy instead of ones that infuriate me at a single glance. On top of that, there are publications that are simply not in line with my interests at all, but a great deal of stories from those entities are what seem to fill up my Top tab. An editing feature would make the Top tab significantly more useful, and would be greatly appreciated. I do like your app tremendously, and I simply want to see it be more flexible and customizable so we might perhaps get more people to consider it as their primary news aggregation app. Update: apparently if you mention politics at all in your review, they send you a canned response that tells you about conservative news outlets that are available on the app. I received the same practically identical response twice.

NOT BALANCED NEWS. The devs want you to think that their app is balanced and "optimized" to provide news from both sides. If you prefer more conservative news or even some kind of balance from 98% left leaning news, they recommend adding FOX News or Washington Examiner tabs. That's just TWO sites that they offer among hundreds of left leaning news sites. Doesn't seem so balanced to me. Today, Feb 27...Cohen is lying (some call it testifying) to Congress today. Trump is meeting Kim in Vietnam for possible peace talks. So far EVERY notification today was about lying Cohen. The HISTORIC meeting between the US President and the NK leader is the fourth story. This is day in and day out. Smart News does have a nice layout. But don't be fooled by the developers. They have NO intention on making this app balanced. If they did, they would allow you to remove the extreme news sources from BOTH sides, but you can't. I've been patient for months waiting for this so called "optimization" to occur (yes with the conservative news apps selected). But it doesn't happen because it's not in their algorithim to do so no matter what they spout.

Update makes app loading worse. Ok my phone is old (Iph 6s). So, I’ve caught up on the updates and now constant frustrations. The stories take forever to load, then some just churn and stop and start so much that I cannot read a line before it jumps and reloads and jumps again and reloads at another point in the story, then sometimes the text just goes black leaving only the top banner. It does this apparently to add more and more ads. It also does this across news sources, so it must be my phone and something to do with the iOS update, but because it happens to SmartNews exclusively, I dare say maybe it’s their update that’s messing up my morning read? Also, where have the dates gone? Providing the date an article is written is mandatory in journalism! How does the reader know that an article is current. Disinformation campaigns are known to dredge up old outrage-provoking stories as if current. Bring back this critical piece of data, please!

Was a STRONG 5 Stars but new updates = problems. Let’s start with the overall use of this app. I LOVE most aspects of it, and have been using it for years. I have gotten all my friends and family to install it and they have all become huge fans... until recently. The news on the app is still great, I feel so much more informed because of this app. I get every side of the news and can make my own decisions! I love it! Now to the bad... these recent updates took this from my lifeline app to one that is slowly working its way into my unused folder. I understand the need for ads, of course the developers need to make money somehow. My issue isn’t with the ads it’s with the app constantly freezing, refreshing in the middle of reading an article that then I can never find again and so on. Countless times a day now I’m forced to close the app and reopen it while in the middle of reading the news because the app just freezes and failed to respond. This is all fairly recent and I’m holding on hoping they fix this soon because this app really was amazing. I Would even be willing to pay for a paid version or even a subscription if they offered it but whatever they did when they rolled out video adds completely broke the app for me and everyone I had gotten to use this app. We all greatly miss it! Please please please fix this! Additional info for devs: I’m running an IPhone XS Max on iOS 14.4 I do run a VPN but I appear to have freezing issues even when my VPN is turned off

Corrupted by ads.. UPDATED: The company has responded to my review which remains below. In light of the 2020 election there needs to be a news outlet that puts honest reporting ahead of revenue driven content. I have been fortunate to be a reporter and have enough education to ask questions about what I read. News aggregator programs, like SMARTNews have even more responsibility since they have not supported the writing of the news. Americans believe in a free press and they believe in an ethical journalism industry. Tiny words and barely visible fonts and text boxes are not acceptable substitutes app for well written honesty. ~~~~~~~~~~ I have loved this app forthe last year or so. I was well aware some news that showed up on my feed was nothing more than sloppy marketing pretending to be news. The articles have become less objective and more fluff particularly over the last few weeks. Now I have ads popping up that take up large blocks of space. SMART news has become just like the rest - advertising first, information last,

Cluttered, dated UI and not so great sources. I gave SmartNews a shot after my favorite news app (Artifact) unexpectedly shuttered. In general, I find the look pretty cluttered, like a mobile app from 2010. The quality of the sources doesn’t appear to be as good as Artifact either, and I’d put them about on par with Flipboard. Annoyingly, since this app seems to be playing the silly “both sides” game, I keep getting articles in my feed from well-known propaganda sources, despite clicking “show less” (note there is no option to mute or hide a source completely that I’ve found). What I do like is that it appears to give me the best local news of any news app that I’ve tried, which is rare for someone that lives in a rural state. I don’t know if that’s enough for me to want to keep using this app, but I’m going to keep trying it for at least a couple of weeks. I’m writing this review now in case there are other Artifact refugees looking for a new app. If that’s you, I don’t think this is what you’re looking for.

Used to be great. This app has everything I’ve been looking for in a news app. It has dark mode, a reader view, many different categories, and a dedicated local news section. This has been my go to news app for the past year. However, about 3 weeks ago I started getting pop up ads after I finished reading an article. The ads completely takeover the screen and I have to close out the app and reopen it in order to get back to the articles. I understand ads are needed but these types of ads are intrusive and completely ruin the reading experience. The app already has ads mixed in with the articles and the ads look just like the articles, so they’re easy to click on. I’m ok with this because it doesn’t takeaway from the reading experience. This app is so good I’d be willing to pay for it to get rid of the ads. However, pop up ads are a dealbreaker. I really hope they get rid of the pop up ads because if they don’t I’ll have to find another news app. I’m giving this app 1 star but if they remove the pop up ads I’ll change it to 5 stars.

Fake News is Present on this App. I love the idea of this app and enjoy the interface. The developers did a nice job designing an app that people will enjoy using. Unfortunately, I started getting articles that were pure nonsense. These were tech and sports articles that were nothing more than angry journalists who were out to slander particular people with no basis for the “facts” they were claiming. I know that by “unbiased” the developers mean it is optimized to give the views of both political sides, which is fair I bet they did their best on that. However, this is not a political issue, as I customized the app to filter out all political topics, I mainly read sports and tech, which is straight forward. And still, somehow the TOP article on the tech page is from the New York Post and is completely absent of facts. This “journalist” (which btw, the article did not even state the authors name), was simply writing sensationalism with no in-depth analysis of facts. Very tabloid-like, and if this this the TOP article in the section about technology then there has to be a better news app out there.

The way the alerts work is extremely irritating. I love perusing the stories that are selected for me, but I find it extremely frustrating that when I click on one of the alerts, all the other alerts I’ve received then vanish, so I can’t click on those stories. Also, some time ago, some alerts started to be combined into three stories per alert, and when I click on that kind of alert, it doesn’t take me to any of those stories. If the Alerts persisted when I clicked on them, and if clicking on an one of those alerts that has three stories took me to a screen that showed me the three stories in the alert (without having to scroll through dozens of other stories, or more if I waited a while before clicking), then this would easily be a five star app. As it is, I keep thinking about deleting this app, just because dealing with the alerts is such a source of frustration, and there are other news apps there which might not be as well-curated, but which don’t have these kinds of problems with their alerts.

Smart, direct, honest. This is one of only 2 apps that I use for news. I prefer news that is just that: news. The feeds come from a variety of sources and one can choose what one reads. In our unhealthy news climate, there is a present danger of buckling to the insanity of fringe news from actual non-news sites that cater to a select type wishing to reinforce their agenda. This app keeps the news as it is and unfiltered. For those who only want to read their own talking points back and forth in a limited circle squeezing each other off, they can probably tweak their choices to arrive at that too, but how sad. The news is about fair coverage as it is given by long established and sincere journalists. I appreciate such a well written app and the plethora of offerings from news of all types. Please keep up the good work. Do not succumb to those tiny voices who wish to change the very definition of news.

Trial and Error led me here!. I downloaded every single news app I could find on the App Store to figure out which one I liked the most and this one was by FAR the best. It doesn’t have original news stories, it takes the news from every credible news source on the internet and compiles it into one amazing app. If I want to read an article written by CNN or FOX, it’s there, New York Times, ABC, even Buzzfeed (meh) is on this app. I love it because you can read stories from multiple sources and decide what you think about them on your own instead of reading one FOX article and just taking what it says as fact. You can compare different biased writers and pick the truth out of the story. It even has news categories for things like fitness, sports, technology, space, U.S news, Top news, international news, etc. This app has it ALL!

Very liberal bias reviews. This is the third time I have downloaded, look at the reporting, and deleted the app. For example with the McCabe reporting all that was reported was what McCabe said on 60 minutes even though he had previously stated that the whole investigation was based off of a report that was funded by the Democratic Party end it without that report they could’ve never investigated President Trump. The other thing they missed was that McCabe and Rosenstein tried to illegally remove Trump from office when he himself admitted that there was no evidence that Trump created any crime and that there was any reason other than their dislike that he should be removed from office. Even if you don’t agree with this view what I am stating is fact and you should at least report on it and then if you want to give an editorial as to why you disagree with it fine but ignoring it tells me you’re like every other news cast where you report what you want and not everything that needs to be said so one can make up their own mind by knowing all of the facts and not just the ones you want to share.

Like the content have App issues. I do like the content of this app. I have had to remove it from my phone several times because it makes my iPhone 7plus freeze and shut off. I had the same trouble with my iPhone SE. With both phones I have plenary of space and do not have a ton of apps on my phone or running in the background. I put it back on yesterday and the phone froze today. Disappointed because I like the content best of all the general news apps. I do not have this problem with freezing and shutting off when the app is not on my phone. It is 4 weeks later. I received feedback from Apple that sent the developers info regarding my phone. I just removed the app - again- because it causes my phone to close apps and functions randomly. I have over 50 g of available space and close apps when I am done with then. I am again disappointed I hoped the feedback from Apple would help but tonight Safari kept closing, smart news kept closing. I uninstalled it again. Phone is not auto closing now.

Not as advertised.. The TV commercial for the app sold it as being more unbiased than other news outlets. Not really true. The politics section just mirrors the left of center information sites. It’s not a down the middle approach. Half of the news articles for the political section are stories about the January 6th probe and offered no counter balance thoughts or discussion. I’m looking to hear both sides of an issue so I can decide what to think. Same issue happens with the articles about Covid. I only see articles from non-doctors and politicians giving an opinion and rarely find a doctor writing honestly about the issues and discussing why half the country is at odds with the other half about this virus. I just want to make up my own mind on this issue like I have made my own decisions about my health in the past. My body my choice. I will still look at this app and try to sift through it BUT the ads on TV are not true and really should be rewritten.

Unwelcome changes. This app has been my go to news app for several years now, but there have been some recent updates that have made me consider changing apps. For starters I used to be able to share articles with people who don’t have the app with the option to recommend the app. However, now those same people are forced to download the app in order to access the article that is being shared and there is no option for me to grab the source link to share. I’d be forced to search the web for the article which defeats the purpose of having a share feature. I understand the purpose from a business perspective but as a user it is extremely inconvenient. My only other gripe is the constant updating and showing new articles every time I open the app. There are times when there are several articles I may want to come back to later but don’t have the time to save them. I would expect to be able to access the same articles every time I open the app except after the times I’ve indicated that I want to receive updates, unless I manually request new articles to be loaded. I haven’t been able to find any way to change this setting. Other than the above, I love this app and would love to continue using it if the above are addressed.

Good news aggregator but many times you can’t see the images. This is a good news aggregator. And it allows you to see news from a variety of sources. However many times when you click on an article it will not show you the picture that was viewable in the list of articles. For example if in my list of news articles I see a an article that has Salma Hayek for example and then I click on it I may or may not be able to see that image of Salma Hayek. And sometimes there is the option at the top of the screen to click on what’s called smart and sometimes you can do that and you might or might not be able to see the image. But on many articles there is not the option to click smart it in other words you end up not being able to see the image that was in the list of your articles at all. If they would improve that this would be a five star app.

Biased and Extremely Depressing. I really had high hopes for this App because I thought it had a lot of stories about a wide variety of subjects. I couldn’t have been more wrong. I’m a pretty middle of the road kind of person, an independent voter who thinks the US is a pretty good country and I have traveled the world from Helsinki to Hong Kong. This site posts every negative story about America, COVID, the economy, (US and the world). Just gather every depressing, left wing biased news article from around the world and you here you go. It’s all here. I would love to see them post just ONE positive story. Just one. Look at their headlines and you’ll get the idea. COVID will never go away. The vaccines are worthless and dangerous. The new strains of COVID will kill you. Take any subject matter and post the most horrifying articles. That is where they excel. Don’t download this. You’ll need antidepressants.

To many ads. This news app is IMHO the best of a bunch that are mediocre. The most infuriating thing about the app is the number of ads inserted into every article you read. The app will insert the same ad over and over while you are scrolling down reading an article, this will cause you to lose your place at times requiring you to find where you were at. The same ad will also be inserted into all articles you read over and over and over. If I was interested in what they are advertising I would have clicked on it, I don’t need to be irritated by multiple ads of the same thing. The app also refreshes way to often resulting in missing an article you spot but hadn’t had to to read, then you have no way to search for the article. Developers I can refresh myself so stop the auto refresh. The app also slows down on my tablet and gets flaky with it flipping across tabs and articles at random.

Oh Please. So many comments from conservative folks about the “fairness” of the news on here. News is only supposed to be factual. It’s just supposed to be the reporting of events and what folks said. So when the news reports on that terrible thing Donald Trump said or did and you can’t believe that - even though there may be video right in front of you of DT doing or saying these things - maybe you need to get help to realize what is actual reality and what is Donald Trump’s reality. I’m in fact on the opposite end. Seeing “news” from Pluralist, FoxNews, TheBlaze when the reality of these outlets is outright lying and propaganda designed to only help Trump - it makes me want to delete SmartNews. That crap isn’t news. I wish the developers of this app well as they are in a tough position. Hopefully one day the Fairness Doctrine can be implemented again. Although I have a feeling conservatives would label the Doctrine some sort of liberal conspiracy. Or whatever crazy thing Trump drills in their heads.

News won’t load anymore. When I first downloaded this app it worked great! I was able to go to every source and topic tab. But several weeks back, after I had to do an iOS update, I started having real problems. I’ll go into the app and nothing will load in my feed. I’ve closed the app and restarted it and sometimes that will help but not always. I’ve rebooted my phone. I looked through the help faqs and it keeps saying that it’s my internet connection but my wifi is strong and I have no issues with anything else. I tried to contact support but I click to enter my info and no keyboard pops up so I can’t type anything. Please fix this so I can adjust my review. I also want to state that I get notifications but I will click to open and it usually can’t even open that but the few times it does, after closing that article, I’m back to a blank screen with only the title tabs no matter what I choose to change it to. It’s getting very frustrating!

Good gatherer. The app, for the most part is intuitive, and certainly has plenty of content however, the display of that content needs work. Most of the headlines are cut off, and some of the images aren’t really associated with the actual article. A good app developer realizes that some people use different size fonts. Instead of having the photos from the articles to the right of the headline in the feed, they should simply put the headline above the photo and have a longer scrollable feed with bigger, beautiful images, and a headline that is complete!!! I mean simple usability should’ve told them this!! it is baffling why they would format the text to a small little corner on the left of the image. Additionally, this is a heavily leaning left app! You won’t find Newsmax or some of the other major conservative Republican news publications. Although they market themselves as being able to get news from both sides, they strategically have left Newsmax out!! SHM.