With Google expanding the Play Store, it is only a matter of time before every form of media that Google can get their hands on will be digitized and added to their library. While Amazon and Barnes and Nobles have been taking advantage of this for some time with their newer line of E-book readers, Google recently entered the game when they released their newest version of Android along with the upgraded Play Store. With the low price point and media-oriented design of the new Nexus 7, Google stepped up their game by adding a few new forms of media for users to choose from including Play Magazines and TV Shows. While these are not new to the digital world, they are new to Google and we’re here to tell you if they’re worth it.
The Good Things
While owning magazines appeals to some more than others, usually I’m not a fan, I decided to give it a go and take a look at what Google had to offer. Play Magazines does its best to provide you the feel of actually having a magazine subscription to the point of even making you feel frustrated flipping through pages of ads to find a usually well written article. The magazines are delivered to the user via a PDF-like format with a quick access table of contents and a slider of all the pages at the bottom. This design keeps reading simple while still allowing the user to choose which articles they would like to skip or read with the touch of a button.
Alternatively, the application also provides a text-only mode mostly designed for smaller phones or tablets which simply do not have the real estate for a full sized magazine page. If you’ve tested out Google’s redesign of the Google Currents application then you’ve used the text-only mode in Play Magazines. The borrowed design is a wonderful one which keeps articles divided like chapters in a book and allows for the text to be rendered to take full advantage of any sized screen.
If you were worried about your digital Magazines being lost, fret not, as Magazines that you are done with you simply long-press and click archive. Archiving the magazines tucks them away on the cloud and removes them from your internal storage to save space, while allowing you to re-download them at any time.
Some things that need work
While I mostly enjoy the Magazine reading experience on Android, there are a few things that definitely could use some work. The Google books application has had some time to mature, providing many features that I would love to see in the magazines app: most importantly is syncing position. Having to manually find your position every time you open a Magazine is a huge inconvenience when you frequently switch between tablet and phone. The settings menu in the application could also use a few more tweaks along the UI route, including a Dark theme for reading at night.
They app overall is generally nice with quick loading and download times for the magazines. Many of the magazines cost $1-2 per issue, which keeps them pretty cheap and can be canceled at any time. Play Magazines is not yet available in many countries at the moment, but it would appear that Google is attempting to fix the issue. If it’s available in your country and you would like to give it a shot, most subscriptions have a 15-30 day period where you can try the issue for that month out without having to pay. Check out the links below to grab the application off of the Google Play Store for free. You can also check out the gallery below for some more screenshots comparing the Tablet UI and the Phone UI.
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