News Digest is another strong Android app from Yahoo that has popped up in some of their other apps in particularly useful places. As the name suggests, News Digest hauls in the day's top stories from recognized sources and in major topic areas.
Every story pulls on multiple sources and provides embedded videos and relevant tweets. There are both tablet and smartphone-optimized apps that serves up the top eight stories in the morning and eight in the evening.
Topics span world, technology, science, sports, entertainment, odd news, business, and national. Write-ups from respected sources like Reuters, BBC, Associated Press and others are meshed elegantly with rich media like Google Maps, video streams, and relevant Wikipedia entries. Photos are displayed in a scrollable filmstrip, and shots can be expanded to full size, zoomed in on, and viewed with a caption. Additional sources either launch into relevant apps or go straight to the web browser.
Though Yahoo News Digest focuses on completeness, making sure you know how many of the stories you've read, when you're done, and when the next one is coming in, you can also dive back into the past week's archives if you missed anything. If you just can't get enough news, there's an Extra News section at the bottom, plus you can switch to international, UK, Canadian, or American digests that might have some different stories.
Once you're done reading, there's a share menu always available at the top that taps into the system-wide apps available, but News Digest still throws its rakish design angle on the pop up window. As is the case with just about every Yahoo app for Android, News Digest enjoys a high amount of visual polish. Story headline images duck away behind the page's text in a nice foreground effect, numbered circles for each story blip in as you ready, UI switches between light and dark themes depending on when the digest comes in, and swiping between stories provides a smooth, sharp transition.
A small home screen widget for News Digest is available which allows users to flip through the issues available and open them with a tap. Notifications can be enabled or disabled for when new ones come in. A few more widgets would be nice, for example one that would let you flip through the stories in the latest edition of the digest.
Good
- Sharp user interface
- High quality content
Bad
- Lack of customizability
Bottom Line
Yahoo News Digest unifies a lot of disparate information in a really beautiful way. It's a distinctly different experience than what you'd get from, say, Flipboard or a flag-out RSS reader, but it's also more rich than any dedicated single-publication app. News Digest is wise to the limited amount of time available to mobile users, and sets a relatively low, attainable bar to staying informed on a daily basis. Though it's easy to appreciate how well-curated the stories and sources are in News Digest, I certainly would have liked to have more science and technology stories surface to the top, and it would have been nice to enable at least a few more sources or topics that aren't available in my national digest by default.
Yahoo News Digest is an undeniably wonderful reading resource, especially considering it's free and there are zero ads. Pick this up if you want the daily news with minimal fuss.
Reader comments
Yahoo News Digest review
This and Feedly are the only news apps I have. I sorely want this app to be on WP as well, I feel it can be very well done in Metro style. Also what I have noticed, you can NOT save anything to Feedly, it will only save the description of Yahoo News Digest not the article itself.
Posted via Android Central App
I'm using a few of the Yahoo apps these days. Yahoo search, Yahoo weather, Yahoo news, Yahoo Digest and Yahoo cricket. Keep up the good work guys...
Posted via Android Central App
The widget is great, too. One of my most used apps.
Posted via Android Central App
Agree, the small, stacked widget looks nice.
Posted via AC App on HTC One
I feel it's important to point out that the share menu is horribly useless. It shares the headline and a link to the Play Store listing for the app. So, very frustrating to use. Even worse, no saving to Pocket or similar apps.
I use this app extensively! I love it!
Posted via Android Central App
I've been using this for months and while it gives every story a rather superficial treatment, that's all I ask of it. Twice a day I'm quickly spoonfed the top headlines and once in a while one will be something I'd not yet heard about.
The only gripe I have is that once you scroll a bit beyond the last story (as in the last two stories are still on your screen but the little summary showing how many of the stories you actually read just starts to become visible), if you take your thumb off of the screen, it jumps all the way to the bottom. I wind up having to scroll back up for the last story or two.
Maybe I should put this in the app review instead of in an AC comment thread...
I deleted it quickly. There's more happening in the world than 10 random news articles can cover. I prefer a app from a dedicated news outlet.
Posted via Android Central App
Why is it we are still having trouble getting apps that support tablets? Getting old
Posted via Android Central App
Not that the Yahoo apps are bad. I do like some of them but the amount of reviews of Yahoo Apps from AC recently makes it painfully they are getting paid to do so. Which I do not have an issue with but let us know it is a "sponsor"review.
No, or it could be the fact Yahoo has a nice suite of apps that deserved a formal review, I am just sayin', not everything has to have a hidden agenda.
You could be right but there are others that have a nice suite of apps and do not get reviewed or get reviews in such a short period of time. Not saying I am right but sometimes people do have a hidden agenda. Just saying.
App is clean, and to the point hot quick news. Same with weather app,it shows what you need,smoothly. What more can you ask of a free service.
Posted via Android Central App
I have been using this app for a while and like the quick news summary each morning and evening. I would love a Save to Pocket tie in so I could easily mark an article for a more in depth look later. Yes I could use something else, but I use Pocket!
Oops, I stand corrected, you can save the stories to Pocket. That's great for me.
A well written review, thanks!
posted from LG G2
On the settings menu, tap one of the dots of the logo and let the games begin.
I really love those app.
greatt to readd but no indian news