I find the new version of this App worse than the last and it doesn’t do some of the things (e.g., automatically download) that it is supposed to - or at least the automatic download is not evident in the settings menu). The new version is a pain to use - I used to be able to read the newspaper and simply swipe left to advance. No more! Now I have to shrink the page fully, to reveal the next button on the bottom right and touch that - this is cumbersome. The new App has also had trouble downloading and frozen once, requiring me to delete and reinstall- this never happens with the old app. Navigation between sections is slightly easier now though, but certainly not worth all the other irritating drawbacks. Too bad…..I route for the Globe!
“Words can't describe just how bad this app is. Downloads get hung up so that one can be waiting days for issues that never show up. The Globe should be embarrassed that it's name is associated with this piece of junk. Don't buy it.” I wrote the above review several years ago and have been assured by the Globe that the app will be improved. Now, two years later, nothing has changed, and it’s still a pig. More often than not, the paper’s already slow down-load never finishes, and I say the hell with it, and never get to read the paper. How the Globe allows this to happen is incomprehensible. Ok, it’s September, 2018, two years after I wrote the above reviews. The new app is out, and I find it much improved. In fact, I’m now reading the Globe again. The only downside is a somewhat inconsistent page turning when I swipe left, but that may be my technique. It took a while but the Globe May have mended its ways.
Design decisions make this app lag behind other papers
I get that some people like this faux paper layout of this app but really it is cumbersome for most users and lags in comparison to the NYT, WSJ and the WashPo. Having to decide whether to download an edition or not as the first pop up when coming to the app is annoying and wastes time. Clicking into a story causes it to go in a non mobile friendly layout where the pictures do not flow well with the story. It is also difficult to scroll from story to story, rather one has to flip through each page of the paper like it is a physical paper. I am going to go out on a limb and guess that most mobile readers do not need to replicate the flow of a physical paper in order to appreciate the stories. I am going to unsubscribe to the Globe because I primarily read my news on mobile and the experience is just disappointing and frustrating. Please modernize this app and ditch the physical paper replication.
It is nice to be able to browse a full replica edition as a digital subscriber. The app is allowing that, but continues to be buggy. On the iPad Pro, it will not show the images of current and older issues, only blanks. After opening, it will frequently show a previous issue as current, requiring a pull-down refresh. In article view, the order of articles isn’t obvious so you have to constantly move back and forth between page view and article view to find what you’re looking for. In the comics, the image quality is frequently really bad so that enlarging the page only leads to a pixelated view that’s not helpful to my decreasing eyesight. Page navigation is difficult as you have to first have to reduce page size to a minimum before you can swipe to the next page. Alternatively, tap on a blank spot to bring up the navigation menu, and move to the next page from there. If you accidentally tap in the wrong space, you’ll end up in article view instead. And to add insult to injury, when you send a help request via the built in support email function, it is undeliverable. Some TLC for this app would be welcome
The positive is that the format of the Globe’s e-paper remains. It’s the one reason we subscribe. And it took a few years for the Globe to provide a stable, easy to use and read digital version on an iPad. And they RUIN it with the latest update that adds ANNOYING pop up bars that you need to tap somewhere on your tablet to remove EXCEPT that tapping on an iPad brings up any article that you’re not remotely interested in…so you tap on the expanded article to get rid of that which brings back the stupid bars! ALL I WISH TO DO IS READ THE NEWSPAPER…I assume this update is a less expensive digital product for the Globe…well, if they lose customers because of it, may be better if they just bring back the former digital product.
I used to enjoy reading the Globe epaper because it was formatted just like its regular newspaper, Not like its regular website version. This “new” version of the epaper is impossible to read. It is formatted in such a way that no matter which way I attempt to read it on my IPad, vertical or horizontal, the print is soooo SMALL that you would need a magnifying glass to do so. Also, I have noticed that in scrolling from one page to the next, one page may be connected half of another, so you are looking at 1 1/2 pages at once. Also, there didn’t seem to be any way to enlarge the print manually. Redo this app for the epaper ! It should be formatted to present the paper as a regular newspaper- showing one page at a time, and with the print large enough to read it. Disgusting! I’m going to delete this app.
The app continues to break down in new ways and when notified, the developer doesn’t even acknowledge it, let alone fix it. The most recent breakdowns are the the previews of the newspaper which normally appear on the home screen no longer appear and issues arrive with pages from 3 years ago. The navigation has always been horrible - I have to click in just the right place at the top of the screen to go back to the home page and if I click in the wrong place, I go back to Page 1 with no other option than to page through the entire paper to get back to where I was. This despite the very high subscription price. I am trying to be environmentally conscious and avoid getting and having to dispose of the paper version.
The Globe had finally gotten things right with their previous iteration of the app but the latest release is another step back. On the positive side, it has been available on time and I have had no problems downloading. But I have to close the app and reopen for the new issue to appear. Worst thing is the navigation. I get one chance to jump to a section using the bottom scroll bar - if I try and jump again, the app crashes. Even worse, when I restart the app I am in the same place as when it crashed, and I still can’t jump to another section without crashing, so I have to swipe through page-by-page. Please get this fixed!
The look of the new version is improved but is still painful, although improved, to navigate. I do the crossword puzzle and this has gotten worse from the previous version, which was still crude. I now have to screenshot, crop, then go to photos. The previous version would sometimes let you save the puzzle to photos directly (but not always) but that doesn’t work at all now. Just opens a blank screen now and returns you to page one of the paper when you try to go back. Very frustrating. The Globe web based crossword app is awful. Wall Street Journal has a very good puzzle interface built in - if you are looking for a model.
The Boston Globe needs to get a new web development team. The new app is worse than the previous one; it’s more awkward to use and it crashes repeatedly. It does not download automatically, and then once it downloads it has to do "load" before you can actually read it. And then you have to get rid of all the page previews at the bottom, which, if you click on them, sometimes load that page and sometimes make the entire app crash. Fail.
Update: New app is vastly improved. Thanks for listening, Mr. Henry. How do you delete previously read old editions? Btw - Alex Cora is a nice upgrade, too! Up at five no e-paper yet again. Writing this at 6:15 still no e-paper. Did the usual delete and reinstall of app - still no luck. Yesterday app crashed froze my iPad and caused me to do yet another delete and re-install to get paper. Oh, if only I could get the hours of my life back that I've spent messing with the worst app I have ever used. Please Mr. Henry, think about your customers and their experience!
The new app that appeared in mid-August 2018 is hugely improved. It's now the best newspaper app that I'm aware of. In the past the Globe had two big advantages: it looked on the screen the way it does on paper, and the whole edition downloaded once, so that it could be read offline. But navigating the pages was often a chore, especially on my slower 3rd generation iPad. Somehow all those problems have been fixed. Now it's a breeze, easier than paper.
I thought the previous e paper addition was bad but I think August 2018 new improved so called e edition is totally horrible. Everything about it is bad especially for people like me who are visually challenged. Before at least one could read paper in large type. Now all you have really bad zoom capacity which is not only in adequate but with the slightest touch crashes. It is in grey type, the menu is unreadable in very smallwith no capacity to increase it. Is The Globelll trying to get rid of subscribers?I have subscribed to The Globe for 30 years and I'm now considering having to cancel my subscription which I have admired and values. Please fix this mess!
Not a new issue but has always been a problem. I’ve had a subscription on and off for years. When I touch an article to open it up the problem begins. As I scroll/swipe through the article it suddenly jumps back to the top of the page, over and over. I’ve asked others if they have this problem and no one has said yes. I read on my iPhone and iPad and this happens on both devices. If there is a solution for this I would like to know. Thanks.
The recent update of the online version of the Globe is pathetic. It had made the downloading and reading the paper more complicated and time consuming than it was before. For the most expensive paper around they should have done a much better job than what they did. I downloaded the San Jose Mercury News in about 4 minutes this morning and the Globe took a couple of hours on the same internet. And even when it has been downloaded you still have to redownload each page to read it. I would and should have given a Zero or a negative rating it is so ridiculous.
Gone is the easy menu in the upper right hand corner, which has been replaced by an overly complicated bottom of the page menu bar that is really buggy. You can no longer easily navigate around the paper, you have to bring up the menu bar and select the section or article BUT if you leave the paper format and then try navigating back to the front page the app closes. The upper right menu was simple and effective this overly complicated lower menu tosses you out of the app. It was simple now it is annoying.
There’s all that room across the top, yet the icons are grouped together, making it far too easy to hit the wrong icon. Do that and this will be a real improvement over the last version. Though I will never understand why you don’t let readers jump from the front page to the inside page to follow a story. Instead who have to go to that one page UI. Following links seems a natural online viewing mode that you could mimic in this app.
Latest update has made it much more cumbersome to turn pages. The arrows that used to be on the left and right margins have been eliminated, so if the swipe-left action doesn’t work, which happens frequently, it usually takes multiple tries to flip to the next page. I’m not the only one to have this problem. Please correct this bug and issue an update.
The app is basically fine so far but the article view is hard to read on bigger screens. Can you add some margins or, even better, allow to customize text width? It would also be nice if the font size would be remembered so I don’t have to adjust it for every article. Perhaps both of those could be customizable in persistent settings?
Even after the many versions, the implementation is still a mess. Links that are supposed to give you a “pageview” so you can read the whole article instead of having to navigate the page jump frequently don’t work in a particular issue. And, all too frequently, the issue will simply not load and you have to keep trying hour after hour of the day to even get your newspaper.
The new epaper app is a fail. It hangs up when loading and is difficult to navigate. I really prefer the epaper format as I can browse the articles as opposed to the typical electronic paper where you have to look for things. I have been waiting for two days to get a workable paper as the app crashes as soon as it opens. None of the controls or settings operate and the paper never arrives.
Great to read paper page by page, but when you open an article the window is completely unstable. Even touching the article can clear it. You can’t switch to another app and come back to read the rest. Why can’t the Globe find a developer who can make this concept work?
Funny how the Boston Globe never publishes a news piece about its own problems—namely how poor its latest Epaper App works or actually doesn’t work. Crashes all the time and terrible UI for navigating. I will not go back to paper so I may just cancel my subscription if this App is allowed to exist in its current form for much longer. How little testing was conducted before it was released? It is shameful to expect readers to be the guinea pigs to field test poorly written and untested software.
I have used and enjoyed the app for many years. When it started to have issues, I downloaded the latest version. It didn't work for a week or so and I tried the other e-version. Not acceptable. Today, I deleted the old app and re-installed the new app. BANG! Right back to the great version I have used for many years on 3 iPads!! Please don’t ever drop this app! It gives you the experience of reading the paper without all junk in the margins. AND - is much easier to download editions for off-line use. Whew!!
Font sizes are stuck in largest font size and won’t “save” for all articles in just released 6.1.2. Before I could set the font size that applied for all articles and all epapers. Now we need to set the font for every article. iPad Air 3rd generation on iOS 17.4.1
One would think that after the many, many poor customer reviews and the many, many negative feedback directed to the Globe by email and phone calls, that the powers that be would have taken the lead in making improvements to this app. Not having done so after all this time is proof they do not care what their customers have to say. Subscriptions to other newspapers offer their readers the ease one would expect. The Boston Globe simply doesn’t care.
From a long time reader (moved to Boston in the 80's) - took a little while, but the latest app update addressed all the issues that I'd had complaints about - I'm back to enjoying the experience of "curling up with the paper" - thank you very much!
Personally, I like that it looks like the old paper version. It was glitchy at first, but either I’ve learned how it works or they fixed it. I like that I can see previous editions and I can download editions as I want to.
I travel a lot and the STUPID App will not let me read an already downloaded e-paper unless I have an internet connection. This is the only e-paper or e-magazine app that has this totally STUPID “feature”. The developers need to wake up and understand that many who travel and subscribe will want to read the paper offline when flying. Totally unacceptable. If you have this problem complain to customer support.
The new update was harder to use until, a couple of days later, it stopped working at all. It would not load and the screen froze. A note to tech support resulted in a request to “be patient” as they knew about the issue and were “working on it.” With newspapers in such peril it’s a shame they keep shooting themselves in the foot. I agree. What was wrong with the previous version? At least I could read the paper!
The new “improved “ Globe app is cumbersome to navigate. Now need to swipe down to find sections, then when you pick a section, sometimes responds , sometimes doesn’t. Then, try to get rid of the bottom section graphics so you can get a full screen - it’s not easy. Original version ( prior to April 2022) had a simple small me nu selector (several small bars) on upper right. It was easy tofind and use, but stayed out of the way. New version menu is way too graphics intensive. The app wasn’t broken,so big mistake with this “update” Also, new app buggy - crashes multiple times for no reason. Makes me want to go back to a paper newspaper. If you agree with me, let the Boston Globe know!
Glitchy app for sure, but it’s great for my daily commute on the T - every morning, my phone has spotty internet access for about 15 minutes underground. This app enables me to download today’s paper ahead of time so I can read the Globe regardless of having an internet connection.
We travel and so, the digital version has been great for keeping us connected. Until now. The new app won’t load at all today and it would crash out randomly so it seems like very unstable beta version and is unreliable. Not what we want from our digital newspaper subscription. Further, the new navigation is terrible - much preferred the upper right hand navigation to sections.
The electronic version of the Boston Globe is worse than nonexistent. It seldom allows a download for the day in question, and frequently not for the last day or two as well. If one enjoys watching the little spinning wheel while it’s supposedly (but never actually does) downloading, it’s great. But if one actually wishes to read that day’s news, it’s a bust! As a previous reviewer said, it’s an embarrassment for a major mewspaper to be this bad!
After downloading an edition I’d like to be able to take my iPad elsewhere to read it off line. Before allowing me to read the paper The app insists on refreshing the already downloaded edition which it cannot do when off line. In this context What is the point of downloading? Why must it refresh a static edition?
Blocks paid users with paywall making the app unusable
This is a poor app that keeps getting worse with each update. I’m a paid subscriber (but not for much longer at this rate) and yet the app bombards me with non-dismissible ads saying “You’ve been selected for a special introductory new subscriber rate” with no way out except to click on Sign Up. If you try to log in it doesn’t recognize you as a subscriber.
I am a huge fan of the Globe but this new app is significantly worse than the last version. I am a digital subscriber who loves to turn the pages, even when it’s only virtual. This app does not work well and I feel I’m wasting my money on my digital subscription when I can’t load the paper reliably each day or turn the pages without resizing each time. So sad.
For literally every single app that has articles, including the normal Globe app, when you turn off your phone while reading an article, and then you go back to the article it saves your spot in the article so you don’t have to start over. While this may not seem like a big deal, it makes this app close to unusable and shouldn’t take too much effort to fix.
Please reinstall the vocal reader ability that previously was available on earlier versions of the app. Usually when apps evolve they tend to add to and improve and in this case I feel this was misstep leaving out a very useful function. In this day of multitasking and a faster paced society I found the function invaluable to be able to listen to articles as I was able to get other things accomplished.
It took years to get a stable app. Now they do an upgrade and it’s a piece of crap again. I’ve written to the editor asking him to send me the hardcopy paper at their expense until they can get their app straightened out. Don’t they realize it so much easier to start getting other sources of news rather than have to fight with them all the time.
Lifetime Globe reader and user of the app for many years. It’s unbelievable how it continues to be such a piece of crap! I’ve also used The NY Times, WSJ, WAPO and other newspaper apps….. the globe is by far the worst. I find it stunning that they do nothing to improve it. Yes i question why I continue to deal with it. All others are superior!! Please Globe spend some money to make basic improvements!
Considering how expensive the digital subscription is, this app is very poor: navigation is not intuitive, and often doesn’t work as designed. Downloading the paper NEVER works: what value is this feature if it fails to work when in airplane mode?! Very disappointing. Oh, and when I’ve contacted support to ask for help: zero reply. Sad.
With no announcement my Globe app was replaced with an app that just doesn’t work. Doesn’t download the paper. Doesn’t allow viewing past issues. Why is this an improvement? I pay a lot to support the Globe. I want to be able to read it!
Every time I touch the screeen the thing goes back to the original view,so moving around a page or enlarging text becomes impossible. A fairly small investment could improve this ap dramatically.
This app is an embarrassment. When you click on an article frequently the IMAGES DON’T COME WITH THE ARTICLE! References to interesting articles within the edition that are highlighted on the first page are “dead”, i.e. when you click on them, it doesn’t take you to the article! This can’t be that complicated or expensive in today’s high tech world.
Bad enough we are not receiving our paper edition and are forced to read on iPad. New update is tedious. We simply want to read the paper in the same form it should be delivered. At least give us the option. Who knew it would be so cumbersome to start the morning with all this unnecessary set up.
This new version of the app is terrible. The app does not refresh to deliver today’s Globe! The previous version worked fine. It’s a waste of time trying to figure this out so as a reader of the Globe for over 50 years, do I need to go back to paper? Or cancel my subscription?
The latest update has made it unreadable on the iPad
The latest update has made the print too small for the ipad and the paper doesn’t paginate correctly making the print too small to read. The previous version was much better. Please revert to the old version for the iPad.
A complete redesign and now the thing doesn’t work at all. Says I’m in “offline mode”, even though all other apps can see the internet, then eventually gives up and suggests a restart. Which yields the same results. Jeeze. A couple of high school kids with a half-case of Jolt could probably rewrite this disaster overnight, but in the meantime I’m stuck.
Very disappointed in the new version of the Boston Globe App. I was completely satisfied with how the previous version presented the newspaper to me. I was able to more easily download articles and puzzles. How can I revert back to the old version of the app? I don’t need to to see 2 pages at a time. Frank
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