This is my one remaining digital publication and I am looking to get more. Not only is the price great, but I don’t have to search for it and if I’m done, it isn’t necessary to recycle it. When I go to my summer house, it follows me! However, it has been succeedingly difficult to get my download. I get notes like wrong ID format , notifications of new providers, subscription expired. I’m paid up into 2020 through HEARST on line and about every other issue I have trouble opening the issue. Hearst confirms my script! I still don’t know who is the magazine source or where to turn for help. So I ‘m using this and MAZ and PM that should have been e magazines.
I’m glad Pop Mech has allowed for an all-digital subscription that’s actually better than what you can get in paper form. Many other publications force you to also subscribe to the paper version, which is superfluous with a digital copy. I like how I don’t have to download all the issues onto my device, since all of them are available in the cloud any time. I like being given a choice of how to access the content (as a sort of browser or as a more book-style PDF). This is digital content done right.
January 2020 issue never came to be downloaded in i pad and it is already feb 2020. DigitalmSubscription paid up to august 2020. I feel cheated and robbed. A refund would be ok.
Normally, I enjoy it right now I am not…… Look up my occasionally
Occasionally, I want to look up my account,,,, stopping me from doing that… why??…. and I allowed to know when my subscription started, when my subscription ended or is going to end… and several other legitimate questions…. why are you not allowing me access to my account?.. I want access. I’ve tried several things it just goes around and around this oughta be easy…. should have something in the upper right hand corner, little icon, my picture something hit that and everything pops out…. where is my easy access?…
I'm growing ever so tired of this app losing my subscription. For every new issue coming out, I have to "restore" my subscription info, which doesn't work all the time. The app will also not start up in offline mode. Just prior to writing this review, I boarded an airplane. My iPad was already in airplane mode. I go to open the app, and it gives me a blank screen with an airplane at the bottom, and an error saying it cannot make a connection. What good is downloading content for offline, if the app to read the content will not work offline!
I love the mag. However I live in a poor internet environment & I download issues for supposed offline reading, when I’m in the US. Unfortunately they are never available afterwards. Is it a VPN issue or what? It worked fine when it was an app available in the Apple App Store. Though now, I have a library full of mags that need to be downloaded. Throwing money away is always frustrating. You would think with a title like "Popular mechanics", they could fix the app.
I used to sneak away on my bike to the library to read these magazines at the Port Hueneme Library 🙏🏻✝️🙏🏻. Happy to revisit these magazines & all the epic information & engineering.
I give one star because advertising in this book are too many as pay monthly for education? We don't need ads every other pages per education as we either enjoyed or not enjoyed reading and learning. I would put fewer ads at the very back end of the page. I'm so sick of see ads every where......
The best of the best was the story of CC Meyers rebuilding the burned out blown up section of the I 580 in Oakland (the maze). Fantastic story about an amazing accomplishment by an amazing group of men
Bought subscription two months ago and still can’t login. Email customer service is useless. They just keep shuffling me around and I still can login to my account and access the digital magazines.
Can’t swipe from page to page, contents button exits magazine, and even when you do get to contents, the links don’t work. I literally cannot read the magazine anyway. Copy some other magazine that works please, like pops science. I hate having different interfaces on every dang magazine I read!
Just updated to most recent version of app and now it doesn't work
I've been reading popular mechanics on my iPad for years. I updated the app and now it locks up, then it won't open. Very frustrating. I have to delete the app and reinstall it when it gets stuck. Nothing else works.
Since Hearst saw fit to remove the “News” feature, I feel this is is generally worthless to have unless you subscribe to the digital version of the magazine. I get it. They want subscribers, not “freeloading “ readers. I’ll delete the app from my iPad and phone. I can get the mag on Zinio for the issues I want to read the mag.
I am 64 & I have read every issue since I was 10. You appealed to an ability others said I did not have. Today I run my own company and I still apply the message of using your head and your own hands to simplify a complex world. Steve Ricci
I have tried multiple time to log in via subscription, but it won’t let me. I want the app, and love popular mechanics, but i wish I could actually log in 🤷🏽♀️
I decided to get a yearly subscription online and from the very start it’s been a nightmare! From how you “activate” your subscription to getting multiple errors while trying to log in! Not worth the headache
App has always been poor. I’d prefer a pdf rather than the buggy mess that is this app. For the current issue, the app crashes continuously after about the fourth article.
I subscribed. It says I have a subscription and asks for my account and password- which of course it never let me set up a password- so I Can’t access anything. Popular mechanics support has NOT been helpful. All that money wasted.
I just subscribed and I go to read the digital magazine nut all the shows up on the screen is a white blank page or one that has an empty image place card thing in the upper corner.
First off, if you are trying to compare or talk about price regarding the paper format, don't bother. At two dollars a month or less, this magazine app is well worth your time and money on its own right. That alone garners a five star rating and me as a happy subscribed customer. The formatting is wonderful, you scroll and activate buttons for bulletins and movies just how you would hope. Moving through all the articles can be a bit weird with the drop down and timeline format on the bottom, but starts to work well enough with a little practice. Issue downloads are a little large but with a decent Internet connection you won't have to wait too long. Using an iPad 2 I have not had any issues with usability or slowness and can only see some improvements in terms of streamlining how you find and view articles that you particularly interested in - perhaps some kind of word cloud. I'm really pleased with the subscription rates and content I get and I think most people will be too.
Visiting on my Chromebook frequently but can never log in with the app, why is this so complicated? Email and zipcode should be easy you think, I guess not
I love to buy a copy of Popular Mechanics on my way thru an airport. It's a great magazine with a stellar history of technology journalism that I have enjoyed all my life. I don't remember how much I paid for the last paper issue I bought at the airport newsstand but it was probably five or ten bucks. For the cost of a few paper copies this subscription is worth every penny. It's got interactive media like I always thought electronic information should be presented. The interface is simple and intuitive and the content is first rate. I subscribed to another magazine app and all I got was a copy of each and every page with no extra content at all. Zero. This is how it should be done. If you already subscribe to the print rag then call them up ASAP and tell them to stop sending you dead trees in the mail and give them your money for this instead. Its the future of the magazine style media experience.
Layout is nice. I like how you don't have to scroll up & down, what you see on the screen is what is on that page besides some occasional horizontal sliders which work well. When you flip the page however it's like the page freezes for a second then turns, minor issue but kind of annoying. The app crashed on me 4 times (always while turning a page) and I'm not finished reading the entire mag yet. Font size is good, pics & video look great. I love the DIY sections where you can rotate the projects and see the individual pieces with some details on each piece, the horizontal slider that details the assembly without turning to the next page is great. Subscription is a must if you want me to buy more than a couple mags/year though. The bookmark feature is fine but maybe make it accessible from the library view and be able to enter a custom name. That way if I ever have 20 or so issues stored and I don't remember which mag had the DIY article I wanted to come back to, I just go to my bookmarks.
Finally a cheaper subscription option. A bit more expensive than the paper but I love the user experience, great interactive features something I'll never get from the paper version. Plus LESS ADS than the paper version which makes the $7 extra worth it. I suggest having a sample issue (10 or so pages that shows the different cool features of the magazine) and not just a thumbnail preview of the issues. But other than that, it's a great interactive magazine.
For Print Subscribers: Forget it - Still does not work !!!!
I have a print subscription to Popular Mechanics and was excited to learn that hopefully, hopefully, this new version would allow us print subscribers log on. This version does not even pretend to have allow access for paid subscribers. Instead, the only provision is to resubscribe through iTunes with another paid subscription. It will likely only be a matter of time before magazines such as this go bankrupt for not accommodating people that already have a subscription. Popular Mechanics should take the lead like Time and Newsweek, which have weekly new editions - both in print and with iPad formats. If a magazine publishes refuses to accommodate this rapidly changing market, they will not likely last much longer. With my subscription, I only subscribed with the thought that I would be able to utilize the iPad version. Unless the publisher changes thier habits, I will not be resubscribing.
I signed up for a subscription to the Popular Mechanics paper edition based on the mailer they sent that said, "Now you get the digital edition too!". The next sentence says, "Now you can read your POPULAR MECHANICS on your computer, ipad or any PDA, because - along with your glossy print issues - you get your exciting magazines digitally too!" It then goes on to say that you can turn pages with a click, bookmark your favorites, zoom in, share articles, and so forth. I bought a 2 year subscription and got an email saying that I now had access via my Hearst sign-in to all the digital media from all of their magazines. However... as others have noted, this app doesn't allow a sign-in - you must pay for each issue. Also, the link on the website for the digital edition takes me to a place where I can buy a digital subscription (and yes, I did sign in with my user and password first) but doesn't give me any option to view the digital version, and the iPad version link doesn't work at all. The app is exactly what it says above, but it isn't what they said in their advertisements and inducements to buy a subscription. Needless to say, I'm very disappointed. Hearst, fix this - if you are going to sell it, you MUST provide it.
Update following December 2011 version... Not getting any better. The mag showed blank pages when the thumbnail on the page viewer showed that there should have been content. The interactivity and multimedia integration is downright lacking. I personally dislike the user interface quite a bit. I subscribe to other digital magazines like Wired and really prefer their interface way more. I can't even pop mechs in landscape. Oct2011 I expect to buy the subscription to get the most of digital publications. I feel that 19/yr is a fair enough price. I enjoyed my last subscription of pop mechs in Zino so I gave this publication a chance. I've got to say, I'm extremely disappointed in the format and functionality of the read app. It's very lackluster and clunky... Which is a shame because i really enjoy the magazine. I wish I had just renewed the Zino subscription!
Whatever issues others are having with the current release I'm not seeing. No crashes, page turns are quick for an old iPad 3. I suggest they delete the app, do a hard reboot to clear out all caches, reinstall the app and try again. My only complaint that knocks the app down to 4 stars is the layout style they use on some pages require the reader to swipe a thin narrow bar, clearly labelled "Swipe here to change page". I urge them to rethink this page layout style vs user inconvenience of doing a normal page turn swipe multiple times unsuccessfully before noticing the yellow "swipe here" bar. As always I love the content.
This app is terribly unstable and slow. The biggest complaint and the reason for 2stars is due to the apparent auto archiving feature. This wouldn't be to big of a deal if the app would let me re-download my purchases but it does not. When I attempt to a message indicates that all will be well, however it is not. The little downloaded icon turns green for a moment then turns back to grey a moment later. Bottom line if you read your magazine once and do not retread then you will probably be happy. Furthermore the website for suppor will not allow feedback it states that the survey is closed. Maybe they are finished with this app? That wouldn't hurt my feelings at this point but how about a refund for the remaining 9 issues?
I love this magazine and this is a great app(sorta). A lot of people have complained about slow downloads. Ive never encountered this. It does crash occasionally. My main complaint, which is why I'm writing, is that in the full year I've been using this I haven't found a way to exit the issue I'm in so I can select a different issue. It always brings me back to the one I was reading. Seems like a simple button option at the top is all that's needed. This is very frustrating. I don't share the other opinions about cost. The electronic version has features that the paper version doesn't. Clearly a lot of effort and additional cost goes into this. I'll keep subscribing but please fix the bugs
Subscribed but app will not let me download new issue.
I downloaded this app and subscribed to the $1.99 per month plan last month. Was able to download the July issue just fine and loved the app. App gets an update and adds the new August issue but will not let me downloaded it even though I'm a subscriber. The app wants to charge me the cover price of 3.99 even though, again, I am a subscriber. I have 4 r magazine subscriptions on my iPad and none of them have this issue. This is the first one that tires to charge full cover price to a current subscriber. I've email Popular Mechanics app support team twice and they have yet to respond. Only choice left is to cancel my subscription and delete the app. Guess they really don't want month to month subscribers since they try and charge you full price for each issue anyway.
I'm not like most others and think that just because I have a paper subscription that I should get the digital subscription for free. The paper subscription covers the cost of the paper, the digital cost covers the price to digitize everything and make it specifically for the iPad. I enjoy the magazine on the iPad and read it every month. The one complaint that I have with the magazine would be that I would really love to have a Retina quality detail to the magazine and app itself. Now that I have the new iPad, reading the "low quality" magazine is annoying seeing that rest of my magazines are all Retina quality. You guys a big corporation, get it together!
Multiple times trying to restore purchased articles and, even emailed PM for my paid magazines. The reply I get try to restore again. I'm tired of this b.......t. I also found that their are a couple more that do the same ripping off subscriber's. I'm dropping mostly all of my renewals. No more headaches and, yes backup whatever is left of your magazines. Hopefully when they lose enough customers they'll do the right thing to the new and former subscribers .
I hate to write a review when I haven't even seen one of the magazines, but not only is PM expensive at $3.99 per issue (when compared to paper copy subscription rates), they also don't provide a sample copy to try it out. Organic Gardening and some others let you test the waters with one free issue, but this free download provides only the interface to let you buy and read issues. Digital versions differ from their paper counterparts in that once they are completed, additional copies cost next to nothing to distribute. Perhaps prices will come down once this upfront work is paid for, but for now I'll stick with paper...
Did you forget Landscape Support and More $, Really?
Can it be that you forgot or refuse to support landscape support? Pop Sci supports it, and Pop Mech doesn't? Also I subscribe to print versions of both, and want to read them on my iPad, I could even see paying a small, yes small fee not another whole subscription. Maybe like $5.99 or $3.99/year, we all know that you just want more money and will figure out any way to get it, but I have been a paper subscription member for 10+ years and it's a little frustrating that I have this great tech that you all talk about in your mags but I have to pay again for the "privilege" to read it digitally. Or how about a transfer to digital from paper? And let us keep out current subscription?
Due to not accommodating paid paper subscriptions and the long history of lack and poor customer service provided by Popular Mechanics I have decided to let my subscription run out and not renew it this time. I had a 5yr prepaid print subscription yet the Popular Mechanics wouldn't allow me to change my subscription from print to digital, allow me access to digital without paying for another subscription, or even allow me access to back issues. Almost every other digitally published magazine (now including Popular Science) allows print subscription access to digital.
Let print subscribers access at no cost! Applies to all magazine apps.
I'm getting pretty fed up between magazines expecting their print subscribers to pay again for app versions and also charging a good bit more again for the print and how every book through iBooks and the app store is always equal to or more than the print version. For books, I'm buying something that's delivered digitally. There's no way it should cost as much or more than a physical version. Same for the magazines but even worse. Magazines make money mostly from advertising. So that means I'm paying once for a print version that the magazine also makes money off of from advertising space they sell but I'm then again expected to pay another time and more money than my print version for the digital version thats again filled with ads. Seems pretty greedy to me and not in any way about what would keep your long time (decades!) subscribers happy and inclined to stick with the brand. Some have gotten it right. Wired, Fortune and Business Week are all great examples of how to do it correctly.
From practical advice on everything DIY to the latest technological advancements in every field, Popular Mechanics always delivers the news and know-how that interests you most. SUBSCRIBE NOW AND GET YOUR FIRST ISSUE FREE! Don't forget, you can also get free access to issues with a timed preview (on your iPhone, too!). Plus, share app content with your favorite social networks. Using a simple two-finger tap, actual images of the content itself are “clipped” and can be sent directly to Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr, or Pinterest, or via email or saved to your photo roll. Download our free app today! Select the issue you'd like to purchase, or sign up with a subscription and save! Please note that you must have iOS 10.0 or higher installed on your device to use this app. Popular Mechanics Magazine US Pricing: • Subscription 1 Month - USD 1.99* • Subscription 1 Year - USD 19.99* * For non-US app stores, the equivalent currency charges will apply. Please note: App subscriptions do not include access to subscription-only content on our website. Additional Subscription Information: • Payment will be charged to iTunes Account at confirmation of purchase. • Subscription automatically renews unless auto-renew is turned off at least 24-hours before the end of the current period. • Account will be charged for renewal within 24-hours prior to the end of the current period, and identify the cost of the renewal. • Subscriptions may be managed by the user and auto-renewal may be turned off by going to the user's Account Settings after purchase. • No cancellation of the current subscription is allowed during active subscription period. Privacy Policy - https://bit.ly/2J5Ujfh Terms of Use - https://bit.ly/2J1YZqL • Any unused portion of a free trial period, if offered, will be forfeited when the user purchases a subscription to that publication, where applicable.
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