# Fortean Times Magazine — user reviews

> 43 indexed App Store user reviews of Fortean Times Magazine by Metropolis International Group Ltd, rated 4.80/5 from 105 ratings.

- Source: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/fortean-times-magazine/id468664318/reviews
- App overview in markdown: https://appshunter.io/ios/app/fortean-times-magazine/id468664318.md
- Rating breakdown: 5★ 96 · 4★ 4 · 3★ 1 · 2★ 0 · 1★ 4

## Newest reviews (14 of 43)

### 2/5 — Needs work

*2022-07-20, version 4.2*

I can longer buy individual issues and latest issues that I purchased are no longer working 

This is coupled with the fact I have been trying to find my first two or three years of digital purchases  ever since the app was updated a few years ago

### 2/5 — Great Magazine - Terrible App

*2020-06-26, version 4.1*

Worked great for the first few days but now it’s stopped working and the makers keep sending me back to apple to fix the issues with the app itself.

### 1/5 — Older issues have vanished

*2018-10-07, version 4.0*

Only one of the digital magazines I bought is now available. Is this going to be fixed and the back catalog of issues added to this app?

### 1/5 — it used to be okay

*2018-10-02, version 4.0*

but after this last rework, it's forgotten or lost many of my magazines, and it doesn't include the special issues at all. 
Zinio is a much better alternative!

### 1/5 — F@@cking useless app

*2018-09-28, version 4.0*

I'm hate this new update to the app.  All my previous magazines have been deleted along with my special additions which I bought aside from my subscription. It tells me I need to input my subscriber number but as a digital subscriber I don't have one.  I'm am so angry with this developer because this is the only magazine that I have ever enjoyed.  Fix this bug because no one is happy.

### 1/5 — Deletes back issues without warning

*2018-09-24, version 4.0*

A week ago I updated my app and lost access to six years' worth of back issue purchases. Wrote to "customer service" and still have no response.

### 2/5 — Great magazine....new app is awful!

*2018-09-16, version 4.0*

Fortean Times is great...I haven't missed an issue in 25 years and it's one of my great pleasures in life curling up on the sofa with the latest issue. I migrated to the digital version a few years back as I'm trying to save space at home...BUT the new app is nowhere as intuitive or wieldy as the one it has replaced! I can no longer look at a 2 page spread and the page no longer automatically fits to screen size and makes you scroll. It's a backwards step for usability and compromises the overall design & layout of the actual magazine. Hoping a future update fixes these issues!

### 4/5 — Love the magazine, new app annoying

*2018-09-15, version 4.0*

The magazine itself is constantly brilliant. The updated app though annoyingly has a strange header ui that means the page scrolls vertically by a centimetre which is REALLY ANNOYING.

### 1/5 — Customer service is useless

*2018-07-30, version 3.6.1*

I have been a long time subscriber to the magazine and was advised that a digital copy would be free, customer services confirmed this but there is no way for me to access my subscription without additional cost and submitting help forms does nothing, no one ever gets back in touch!

### 1/5 — Don't bother

*2017-03-04, version 3.6.1*

Why is it that a magazine that's advertised for £2.99 suddenly jumps to £3.99 when you buy it?
Rubbish and a con if you ask me!

### 4/5 — Nice magazine, poor app

*2016-06-29, version 3.6.1*

I have enjoyed Fortean Times over the last decade or so and when it came out on my iPad I figured "great, no more spotty mail delivery". Unfortunately the app is less than ideal if you want to view your purchases in anything other than portrait view. I mean forget the unnecessary things like page flipping animation, in landscape view the spread is minimized to a corner and can only be enlarged to fit the screen if you manually stretch it with your fingers. Side note... that only works for the page you are on and you will have to do it for every consecutive page you turn to. I guess I can view it on portrait mode but the case I keep the iPad in makes this a clumsy venture.

### 1/5 — Please fix the app

*2016-04-28, version 3.6.1*

I have long supported and loved the Fortean Times but the app must be the flakiest app on itunes. And it gets worse with every update.  My subscription gets lost every month and it is a terrible reading app as well.

### 3/5 — Unique magazine

*2013-06-18, version 2.5.9*

I love the magazine, and the app is everything you could reasonably expect for a niche publication (ie basically a zoomable PDF with tappable hyperlinks)

What I don't like however is how the app relentlessly spams popup alerts for the distribution company's magazine subscription service which I am not interested in. I've had to turn off notifications for this app because it was getting alerts almost daily.

Somehow they got my itunes email address too so they're spamming that as well now.

### 4/5 — Exactly what it says on the tin!

*2013-02-16, version 2.5.9*

It states in the description that back issues and future issues are purchased through the app. That you can also subscribe to the newsstand/digital version of the magazine with the prices listed.

Those that have written bad reviews, inferring they have in some way been conned because the magazine isn't free, are incorrect. The description, if people bother to take the time to read it properly and not just d/l because the app says it's free, will realise quickly this app isn't misleading or dishonest in the slightest. The app is free, the magazine, like most other magazines, is not. As a subscriber to the physical magazine I would be disappointed if people got this app with the ability to read the magazine for free. 

Would like it if there was a way to input my subscription account details into the app instead of having to cancel my current subscription and re-subscribe here. I like getting the physical magazine and currently I can log online and read when away from home and have forgotten my magazine, so thought I could just input my details on the app. Unless I have missed something!

## Most critical reviews (10 lowest-rated)

### 1/5 — Unable to Access Subscription

*2025-08-20, version 5.0.2*

I’ve got a live subscription, cannot access it. App developers no help whatsoever as they reckon I ought to talk to Apple. I got the sub through Apple. Only suggestion from Diamond is to buy sub through them rather than Apple at twice the price. This is testing a long-standing reader’s patience to its limit.

### 1/5 — This app is awful

*2024-11-20*

I’ve been a subscriber to Fortean Times for over 20 years. I stopped ordering the paper editions because since Brexit, issues would go missing so I signed up for digital. The app randomly signs me out then locks me out. It’s annoying to not have access to things you’ve paid for and supposedly downloaded. The previous app worked much better.

### 1/5 — Needs a very expensive subscription

*2024-08-24, version 5.0.2*

I subscribed to the fortean times and my subscription ran out. I thought no problem I haven’t read the last issue I had downloaded I will read it then subscribe later. You CANNOT read previously purchased issues without a subscription. What an incredible ripoff.

### 1/5 — New app (Nov. 2023) is rubbish

*2023-09-30, version 5.0.0*

Low resolution photos and other images make the new app an unmitigated disaster that ruins an excellent magazine. A huge downgrade compared to the app it replaces. The developers should be ashamed of themselves for foisting this rubbish on the loyal subscribers.

### 1/5 — En FRANÇAIS…

*2022-11-09*

Bien regrettable qu’il n’existe pas une version intégrale en FRNÇAIS. Désagrément très courant dans les applis Anglo-Saxonnes 😓

### 1/5 — Poor customer service

*2021-05-18*

I bought the Fortean Times app for my iPhone a couple of years ago and want to read the magazine on my Mac, too. I contacted the publisher, Dennis, but they said it’s not their problem and to contact Apple. Thanks a bunch for the kind, helpful assistance, Dennis. Apple *were* helpful and said the problem lies with the developer/publisher side.

### 1/5 — No customer service

*2020-02-09*

Refused to address their robbing me of many paid for back issues.

### 1/5 — NEW APP ABSOLUTE RUBBISH

*2018-10-31, version 4.0*

The new app is RUBBISH! Can't view my old issues. Navigation is poor. Customer support is a joke. Apparently because I bought the the magazine using iTunes the magazines support team can't help. Feeling letdown and cheated. Considering returning to the paper version.

### 1/5 — Deleted past issues

*2018-10-30, version 4.0*

Love this magazine! I am not a fan of cluttering up my house with back issues of magazines, but love to look over them again and again. Imagine my surprise when they updated this app and most of my years of back issues had been deleted!!!!!!!!!!

Why do I even bother? Seriously mad here. It is if someone came I to my home and robbed my library. These were MY magazines. 

I am so angry. Long time reader, contemplating whether or not to continue subscribing. Be forewarned- you are purchasing a read, not a magazine. 
😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡😡

### 1/5 — The update has deleted my collection

*2018-10-15, version 4.0*

I tried to sort this with the publisher, but as I got the app through iTunes I don’t have a subscriber number so they cant escalate the issue. I have to take it up with iTunes apparently.

## Most praised reviews (10 highest-rated)

### 5/5 — Disappointing

*2019-01-26, version 4.0*

Love the mag but new app is rubbish.
I repeatedly get Unavailable right now; please check network and update your edition or try again later.
I have super internet connection but every issue there are pages missing.
Unless resolved I will cancel my subscription.

### 5/5 — Back issues missing

*2018-12-11, version 4.0*

Love the magazine...been reading for decades, first in print then digitally. But the latest version of the app is very disappointing. All but the most recent dozen of several years of purchased issues are missing. I paid for them...now they have been taken away.

### 5/5 — Great mag, great app

*2015-11-20, version 3.1.4*

FT is a quality magazine with excellent journalism and interesting features throughout which I have been reading since it broke through the distribution net in the UK - about 1990, I think. The app is neat, never crashes and shows off the magazine brilliantly. Ignore the earlier reviews as this is not the same app now. If you like unexplained and weird occurrences but want to make your own mind up this is your magazine.

### 5/5 — Love it

*2013-05-25, version 2.5.9*

Too hard to find without manually searching the App Store.

### 5/5 — Great app.

*2013-04-20, version 2.5.9*

Great app.

### 5/5 — An appalling update

*2012-10-03, version 2.5.4*

Crashes upon opening. Now I can't read ANY Fortean Times, including the one I still haven't finished.

What a genius marketing strategy. *deletes app and unsubscribes*

### 5/5 — the world of strange phenomena

*2012-02-10, version 2.2.6*

Fortean times is a magazine
of the strange and bizzare
it does not provide the answers
but shows things as they are
from abcs to ufos and everything in between
Fortean times is a magazine
designed to be lived and seen
stories of amazing variety
in every shape and form
shifting us beyond the boundary
of the convention and of the norm
strange days has tales of stranger ways
extra! extra! has news headlines in prominent displays
sidelines is interesting serve
of bungling, twisted, and weird ways of twisting the nerve
strange deaths is always an intersting toil
about the ways humans shuffle off the mortal coil
the reviews are welcomed and appreciated
for me each issue is eagerly anticipated
until my need for strangeness has been satiated.

### 5/5 — Charles would be amazed

*2011-11-16, version 2.2.3*

Long time reader and subscriber... Very happy to give up my American subscription (I'm not a fan of the US distributor) in favor of a Newsstand edition.

### 5/5 — How it should be done

*2011-10-31, version 2.2.3*

This is how it should be done: individual magazines are cheaper than print (okay by 26p) and the annual subscription is £10 cheaper.
Other than cost, I really love this mag and have been a subscriber for years. The only reason to stop subscribing to the print version is that I can now get the e-version.

### 4/5 — Great app

*2020-12-03, version 4.1*

Fantastic app,just checked if one existed on the off chance. Very reasonable price for each issue and good selection of back issues. My only complaint is when reading on an iPad I have to scroll up and down slightly to read the whole page. This is a little annoying and takes me out of the illusion of reading a magazine slightly. Would be nice if a fix was possible for this.

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*Data collected daily from the US App Store and indexed by [AppsHunter](https://appshunter.io/). User reviews are verbatim App Store reviews. Ratings, prices and chart positions refresh continuously; this snapshot is from 2026-09-12.*