Leave a Review The Wall Street Journal.
Version 14.0: A Step Backwards
The most recent update, v. 14, removed the convenience of being able to simply swipe to the next article. Now after reading an article you have to go back to the contents page and figure out where you left off. May sound like a petty complaint but it adds an inconvenient extra step compared to the prior version. I wish there was a way to revert to the old version of this app. UPDATE: I have woken up every morning and frantically, with fingers crossed, check for an update for this buggy, crappy app. Nothing. The app is still terrible, terrible, terrible. Another app update, still a failure. The app is buggy, slow and cumbersome to navigate. And I even have to laugh at this: the most recent update says it makes the print edition available for offline viewing. WRONG! Still no offline viewing. Terrible!
UPDATE NOVEMBER 16, 2023
Getting better, but still 1 star. When you open the app and go to Print Edition, you see…. yesterday’s paper! You have to exit the app, wait a bit, and restart. Also, articles are inconsistently formatted. Some you can change text size, some you can’t. And when you change text size on one article, your preference doesn’t stick with other articles like the prior app version. Oh, and when you watch a video and swipe to the next article, the video, including ads, keep playing! You have to exit the app restart to make the video stop.Show lessJ A B
Would rate zero if allowed
Update: recents changes help to address the worst of it, but still fall far short of the previous version of the app. It’s hard to imagine what the user experience strategy is, as the actually user experience is a road of long road of disappointment and frustration. Just one question for WSJ: what was your strategy with version 14?
I stopped using this app in September 2023 when WSJ rolled out version 14. As other reviewers have almost unanimously expressed, the new user experience was a gigantic step backwards. It has effectively “bricked” the iPad app, rendering it unusable. As a result, I downscaled my digital subscription to the bare minimum. I rarely use the WSJ app now, except occasionally to see if they have posted any meaningful changes to restore the experience. They have not. Fortunately, I’m able to access WSJ content via other news apps, including Apple’s own. Even still, my ability to read the WSJ is a far, far cry from what had been for years the worlds best IPad news reading app experience. Such a shame, and all for nothing but angry customers. On a bright note for me, I have used this time to discover new sources of news for business and markets. That has turned up some surprising results with truly outstanding journalism. So I suppose the bright side of losing WSJ app has been to broaden my horizon.Show lessInnovationStudio
Awful UI update - AWFUL. See - The Scream
Update, WSJ is making progress on returning (re-adding) functionality to the iPad app. Why did they think it was a good idea to dumb down the app? It appears they were attempting to direct what people read vs letting people select what they read.
Update, Cust Support provided a general “We’re working to improve” which is great, but the star stays at 1 until the app is usefull (again). To the Cust Support - Thanks for listening to your readers and trying to go back to a more iPad-user-friendly version of the WSJ.. Could you re-introduce the date of the paper? A previous version allowed the reader to read the most current news or the paper that was printed that day. Update, I wrote to Cust Support about the current WSJ iPad app. Navigation requires more clicks, I don't know which day’s paper I'm reading, and I find that “Apple News” provides a more pleasing experience. Come on WSJ, listen up. At a minimum let your reader have an option to pick the Ui they want. I feel like the man in “The Scream,” Edvard Munch. Who would think that changing the user interface could decrease the usability of an app so drastically, so quickly, and so terribly? I could go on and on about how much I dislike the new WSJ app. It is challenging to navigate and quickly see articles I want to read. If it doesn’t change back or to something better, I’ll need to think about canceling the subscription to my favorite paper. Please go back to the -1 gen app.Show lessRmgeorge