Financial Times: Business News Reviews

by Ggeopol

FinancialTimes and the FT site doesn’t allow paid subscribers who need to use these articles as sources for academic or scholarly research to save full text articles to organizers like Pocket or Evernote. As such the FT subscription is worthless. Other major news publications allow subscribers to save full text articles for future reference and use as source materials. A serious scholar or researcher needs to be able to keep full text articles from various publications on specialized topics in one folder or location. The way things ate at present, a subscriber has to log on to the FT app or website, then go to a different site, location or folder to compare or supplement the information in the FT article with that of articles from other publications like The Economist or Bloomberg. This is a huge nuisance indeed. New regulations are needed to stop FT from engaging in this monopolistic practice.

by Grigory Temchenko

FinancialTimes has been degrading over the last months to the point when it’s easier to use the website. First, whenever I open it it always loading something for a few seconds and then says it can’t load. Then I tap try again and it loads it momentarily. Why can’t it show me the feed from last update? Why does it always have to wait? Then it asks me if I want to add topics. I already have topics, I use them, I know about them, stop bugging me with this feature. It’s so annoying that it’s easier to use the website.

by I Wanted To Buy, Really

Every time I open FinancialTimes in the morning, I have to log in again. FWIW I log in using Google. Often in the afternoon or evening, I have to log in /again/. While FinancialTimes is aggressive about pulling stories down for an offline edition (a genuine utility for my subway commute), this means I absolutely need to be connected to data the first time I open FinancialTimes . At this point, that’s resulted in my having a little chore every morning off logging in as I walk to the subway.

Otherwise. FT’s coverage is what it is, and FinancialTimes design is fine — nothing revolutionary, but it works.

by T.J.E.

I am a big fan of FT and still read their web based articles on my desktop, but since this mobile update the interface is all scrolling like a Social Media feed and proves to be useless for me. I liked the last version where you can choose your topic, find a list of subtopics and and choose from a list of articles. I don’t care to scroll through articles to find one that seems interesting. This isn’t Social Media get back to the news.

by Pattydidwell

FinancialTimes ’s interface is great for things you only do once — add topics to track, share links, save articles.
However it’s much more difficult to scroll through a list of headlines, read one, and then jump back to the same place in that list. Instead, it sends you back to the top/beginning and you have to find your way back.
My own “myFT” profile has a quite long chronological list of articles. When I open an article published 4 days ago, I hate being forced to scroll down past >70 headlines to find the ones published 5 days ago. I should be able to jump back to the same place in that list.
Same recommendation applies for Search results (would also like to see filters there) however I understand such a feature would be harder to develop.

by Card Player77

I am a huge fan of FT. Read them while and college and was happy to finally have the time and money to read it again.
I went for the $99/year subscription. None of the articles that are suggested for me or interest me are part of that subscription. This plan is used a bait to get you to move up to the more expensive plan to actually read any worthwhile articles.

by Mila Pep

I am a long term subscriber and avid reader of the FT. But I have to say that it used to be better. News articles are sitting there for a long time and I miss the insights of people like John Autherr and so many that are gone. It seems like you are not able to retain top talent. And that is bad... no news like we used to have

by TheHamadaEquation

Wonderful app with up to date FT articles. I find no delay between the FT app and the FT website itself and using FinancialTimes makes reading FT articles on my phone so much easier. My only complaint is that some links (like comment links) will try to take you to the FT website instead of just taking you to the article on FinancialTimes itself. That is a minor concern and it is otherwise a great app.

by Capn Ch

The lack of integration of the e-paper and instead having to use a separate, kludgy bookmark, is odd.

The scrolling style of news reading is better suited to quickly updating oneself on the headlines or for open ended reading, but there is still a time and place to sit down and consume the entire paper, especially the wonderful FT Weekend.

by Kfughreiuhwerigh

Been a long time subscriber and love the newspaper. I usually read on the website on desktop or phone, after trying FinancialTimes I decided to stay with the website.
FinancialTimes basically delivers the website version in compact, however it feels inflexible. I wish I can change the sequence of sections by my preference. Also the interface lacks natural effect, which feels a bit inconvenient for the thumbs.

by Artykul8

Widget font is tiny and completely ignores system font size settings. Makes it absolutely impossible to read the news there. Can you please fix your widget and incorporate accessibility system settings to reflect user's size display preferences?

by Chapchip

I do NOT like the new layout. I have been patient and given it time, which has helped, but it is still not optimal. Having said that the FT app is the best app in terms of quality news. I also read the WSJ daily and that app is a complete disappointment in comparison.

by Ctbeiser

Content is great. But though FinancialTimes supports a fairly decent Dark Mode, it doesn't support turning it on and off automatically according to the device setting. This is frustrating, to say the least.

by Luving The Book

FT covers US political and economic news in an obviously partisan way, letting it’s staff’s opinions distort supposedly hard news coverage. This clear bias undercuts the FT’s credibility generally. However, features on books and other softer topics continue to be excellent and the FT provides important European coverage for US readers.

by Smith And Doughnuts

While I’ve only used a few other newspaper apps, FT is my favorite. The signature color of the background makes reading the news easy on the eyes. I also greatly appreciate the limited number of alerts FinancialTimes produces by default.

by Qmark2

I read a lot of news, and have done so for decades. The one source I look forward to, invariably, is the Financial Times. I don’t always agree with their Opinion pieces, but they are well thought through. I also view their info as top notch.

by SkillingInJail

FinancialTimes recently disabled sharing of articles on FinancialTimes ; I now have a small number of ‘share credits’ I can use or buy more at cost.

This prevents me from tweeting content to others. I don’t see the sense in that, and FT didn’t inform me in advance. I will reconsider my FT subscription when up for renewal because of it.

But otherwise FinancialTimes is good.

by Muscman

Unfortunately you discontinued the distribution of the FT In Florida
Since then I barely read the Paper. Articles are too long to be in the screen on an iPhone for a long time

by Bikfic

Solid and reliable! Distinguishes between news and opinion! Strategic and economic analysis sound and well researched. I'd like to especially commend Valerie Hopkins in Central Europe. Have been a reader for the last 40 years!

by Friendly Alert

The FT doesn’t attempt to cover as much as, say, the NY Times. It’s specialised and selective, but it’s not narrow. It offers reporting or core issues in the politics and economy of UK and US, to a lesser extent the individual countries of Europe and the world. It also addresses the EU as such and the state of global affairs.

So it’s good for an analytic take of politics and more depth on markets. But the best is its several terrific columnists.

by Nb1958&&

One saltar might be high - One of my frustrations with FinancialTimes was always that it was never possible to get access to all the articles you would find in the FT website (or, at least it was not clear how). I never had a problem with this second-rate app until some weeks ago when it never updates. I don’t even now why they keep it operational

by Former Grantland Listener

Worked well for a couple months.

Has been stuck on the same set of articles for the last two weeks. Every day I open it, see the same article about Switzerland, try for a minute to make it update to today’s paper, get frustrated, and leave.

Why can’t I get today’s paper all of a sudden?

by Batohi

The menu on the left (that appears by tapping on the the three lines at the bottom left corner) does not do anything when something is selected. This often happens once I have used FinancialTimes for sometime. Closing (killing) FinancialTimes and reopening it is the only way it works again.

by Ames Brown (NYC)

Can you please add 3D Touch to the iOS app with the option to refresh the FT content (i.e. download the paper) from the home screen. Useful if going offline, etc into the metro/subway/tube

by D.F. Barnacle

What’s up with these pop-up adds? I’m a subscriber!

Update: developer informs me this is fixed. Would be 5 stars, but per other reviewers, it still feels like a port, compared to more obviously native apps like NYT. Ease-of-use suffers as a result.

by Shcg85

Could you please add the feature of saving an article to safari reading list; without having to even open the article. (Similar to Bloomberg app)

by The Voice Of Joyce

I enjoy your balanced coverage of World affairs and the business and financial markets.

Your book reviews are impressive and worth following and reading.

As a seeker of fact, I respect and cite FT’s articles in my Posts.

by Joel Winkelman

It costs more than American papers, but the coverage is more interesting.