Skip to main content

Flipboard’s redesign makes it easier to keep up with your favorite topics

Announcing the All-New Flipboard, the Place for All Your Passions
Flipboard is rolling out a major redesign today for version 4.0 of its popular news aggregation app, and at the center of it is a new feature that promises a more personalized, curated experience for its tens of millions of active users across iOS and Android.

It’s called “Smart Magazines,” and Flipboard is saying it fundamentally reorganizes and streamlines the experience so people can keep up with whatever it is they are passionate about more quickly. Think of Smart Magazines as collections of articles with unique layouts, tailored not just to your favorite categories, but to more specific tastes as well.

Flipboard always allowed users to choose topics and filter them out individually, but the default view was a mishmash of every category, and every user who tuned in to the same topics would receive the same content. Now, the app encourages readers to dig deeper after they’ve selected a basic area of interest.

For example, selecting the “Photography” topic brings up a list of selectable tags, like “Leica” and “Nature Photography,” that provide more granular control over the kind of photography content you’ll see.

As a result, each person’s Flipboard — even if they subscribe to the same general topics — is now guaranteed to be unique. And separating those topics out into individual magazines should make the daily swarm of content much less overwhelming to digest. By default, Flipboard’s home screen will house up to nine smart magazines, which can be navigated by swiping from left to right. More can be created, but they’re stored away in a menu.

For longtime users, the option still exists to subscribe to specific people, news sources, and hashtags, as well as magazines created by other users. Groups can even make their own custom magazines to share stories back and forth.

Rather than just listing new content in a chronologically flowing feed, Flipboard says stories that are liked, added, and shared have a greater chance of surfacing for other readers. What’s more, the app’s algorithms learn from use, and Flipboard reportedly gets better at predicting the content you want to see as you continue to use it.

Many news aggregation services, like Apple News, Google Play Newsstand, and Feedly, operate in a uniform fashion — a general feed of top stories, followed by the highlights of each category, and then an alternate view for topics and sources. Flipboard also features a top stories tab, but places content neatly filtered by topic immediately within reach, and aims to feed users more of what they like based on a deeper understanding of their passions.

In practice, the experience really does resemble that of a curated magazine, rather than a wire of information — that is, if a magazine could show video, and be instantly shared with your friends. The update releases today for iPhones and Android smartphones, with a tablet version to come at a later date.

Editors' Recommendations

Adam Ismail
Former Digital Trends Contributor
Adam’s obsession with tech began at a young age, with a Sega Dreamcast – and he’s been hooked ever since. Previously…
What is the Temu app? Here’s everything you need to know
Temu logo on an iPhone.

Following an increased marketing push starting in 2023, the Temu app has started to pick up some solid momentum that's driven many shoppers to want to check it out. As new marketplaces start to make their way into the mainstream, however, there's usually a healthy amount of skepticism toward them.

Although it's always a good impulse to be cautious about putting sensitive information into any app, here's everything you need to know about Temu — and if you truly need to be careful.
What is Temu?

Read more
Your Google One plan just got 2 big security updates to keep you safe online
Two Google Pixel 7 Pro smartphones.

Google just added some major new security features to keep its Google One subscribers safe while on the web. After all, the internet is where you spend a lot of your time, whether that's looking things up, paying bills, shopping, booking appointments, or sharing photos with family and friends. That’s a lot of information, and Google wants to keep subscribers safe from the darker side of the web.

Regardless of whether you use an iPhone or an Android smartphone, all Google One subscribers are getting the following two security features.
VPN by Google One for everyone

Read more
Our 5 favorite iPhone and Android apps by Black developers
An iPhone with apps from Black developers downloaded on it.

As we wrap up the celebration of 2023's Black History Month, it remains important to recognize and appreciate the contributions that Black people have made in various fields, including technology and the smartphone apps we use every day. From social media platforms to productivity tools, Black developers and other people of color have worked hard to create innovative, useful, and just plain fun apps.

Here, we're focusing on five helpful apps developed by Black people that you should check out. These iPhone and Android apps range from ones that help you discover and support Black-owned businesses to ones that provide legal assistance in case of an emergency to ones that curate and highlight sources of news and entertainment by Black creators.
We Read Too

Read more