Twitterrific for iOS v5.2 Adds Push Notifications

Today, the Iconfactory has released the latest version of its Twitter client for iOS. The great “new” feature is the addition of push notifications.

But, you might say, other clients have had push notifications for years. True, they did.

It took Iconfactory years to finally build Push into its bestseller app. But, I might add, it is much akin to Apple’s lauded Copy & Paste feature that was introduced with great fanfare literally two years after iOS’s grand debut. Apple’s Copy & Paste has since been the benchmark to the industry’s support of the feature.

I expect Twitterrific’s Push feature to quickly become the industry’s benchmark. I’ve been lucky enough to secure a spot into the program’s limited beta test, so I can report my findings here.

First, it’s fast. Like lightning fast. But we’ve grown accustomed to services having fast push notifications when they debut, and see their speed slowly decrease as the service gains traction. In fact, we can see it nowadays with Mailbox: when only a few thousand people had access to the app, the notifications were near-instant, generally popping at the same time that those of Gmail.com. Nowadays, when the app has one million users… err, not so quick anymore. But time will tell, and I trust Gedeon and his team when it comes to making great experiences.

Second, it’s almost whimsical: you’ve got to chose what types of notifications to receive, from a list. Direct messages, replies, mentions, favorites, retweets and follows. All of these options have nice, tiny icons that represent their functions (e.g. the star for the Favorites, the green-square-with-cycling-arrows for the Retweets). When the user receives a notification, the popup shows the corresponding icon instead of the app icon. The sound played with the notification is very distinct from all the ringtones and Push sounds were are used to. It’ll be very easy to know why my phone has rung in my pocket, and so it’ll be easy to not pay it as much attention as a phone call but yet still know that something’s pending on Twitter.

Overall, a welcome addition to an already great little app. And one feature that has clearly been shown great love by the Iconfactory.