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Notice anything different? That’s right: your favorite destination for everything Android has been completely redesigned into a whole new beast of awesomebot. Here are 9 specific things we want you to know before diving in.
Android News without the “noise”
Phandroid is much more than a news feed, but we know our most loyal readers visit several times a day to discover the latest Android happenings. For this group – our most loyal followers – we’ve created a no BS page exclusively to showcase the latest Android News.
- Toggle between list view and mosaic view
- Filter by most recent, most popular, and most comments
- Adjust the timeframe
The best part? We’ve stripped out almost all of the ads on the news portal to make browsing the latest news more enjoyable than ever. We know that visiting the new Phandroid homepage will take some getting used to for many of you, but keep in mind that you can quickly jump directly to the news portal from any page by typing phandroid.com/news/ directly into your browser or clicking “News” in the top left navigation.
Click it and give it a try: Android News
Smarter Search
There is nothing more frustrating than knowing exactly what you’re looking for but still not being able to find it. That would happen quite often on the old Phandroid, causing people to retreat back to Google… no more! The new Phandroid has two major search improvements we’d like to share and there will be more to come in the future.
Auto-complete search will now give you suggested keywords when you’re typing in Phandroid’s search box. Clicking or tapping directly on one of these suggestions will bring you to a portal specifically for this topic. If you’d prefer to conduct a normal search, just press enter as you normally would.
Google now powers Phandroid search. Whereas previous iterations used built-in WordPress functionality to conduct searches, we’ve partnered with Google to bring you our search results as calculated by the world’s best.
These won’t be the last improvements in the search department, so stay tuned for more updates and keep your eyes peeled.
Android on Androids
Believe it or not, the majority of traffic to Phandroid.com is from mobile devices. Not surprisingly, most of them are Android devices. Although the old Phandroid was updated to incorporate responsive design, the mobile website just seemed like an overly dumbed down version of the desktop website. We wanted to give everyone the best experience possible – especially our Android users – so we completely reimagined the site, making the mobile experience a priority.
You’ll notice that the above search enhancements take place on every page whether you’re desktop or mobile. Making search a convenient task from mobile is something we focused on and we think you’ll love the experience, auto-complete and all. For those who want to browse, we’ve also made the navigation experience consistent, tucking the menu neatly away in the slide out left navigation.
From the big beautiful images and convenient navigation elements to consistent font styles and well organized layout, there is no better way to get Android information on an Android device than the new Phandroid. (Except for maybe our very own Phandroid Android App.)
We’d love to take complete credit for thinking up all these brilliant ideas ourselves, but let’s face it… we had some help.
Inspired by Material Design
As you browse throughout the site, we hope you’ll notice the attention to detail that we paid throughout the process. You’ll likely notice larger components like the similarity between our primary navigation and the one found on the Google Play Store. There are dozens of smaller ones we hope you’ll spot as well, such as our selection of icons, colors, and card layout/structure. From basic structure to finishing touches, we feel we’ve crafted the perfect balance.
The new Phandroid doesn’t follow Android’s Material Guidelines 100% in every single regard, but our departures were carefully calculated. Some of the smallest details – most of which you won’t notice or will overlook – involved hours of conversation before coming to a final decision.
What are your favorite Material Design inspired elements of the new theme?
Photogenic Facelift
The web has increasingly become a visual, experience-based medium with beautiful images at the forefront. In addition to redesigning Phandroid’s homepage to feature at least one focal point every day in the most visually enjoyable way possible, we’ve also given our articles and pages makeovers.
As you read Phandroid articles in the coming weeks, pay attention to the different layouts and templates you see. Right now we’ve got custom designed templates for featured articles, basic articles, thorough reviews, and many of the pages around the site. You’ll see more customized template types as time goes on.
Our main focus? Beautiful visuals that allow for an excellent user experience. If you have any visual ideas you’re itching to see explored on Phandroid, let us know in the comments!
Reviews worth Revisiting
What’s interesting today is often old news tomorrow, causing many Phandroid articles to have a short shelf life. However, we’ve also got a huge library of articles with golden content that stays valuable month after month after month. Often times we’ll update our most popular articles from months/years past to ensure they’re still accurate and relevant.
Reviews are always popular, so we’ve taking some of our popular reviews from recent months and updating them meet our new style. And upcoming reviews for the Motorola Moto G 2015, Samsung Galaxy Note 5, and Samsung Galaxy S6 Edge Plus? You can expect them to be shown in this stunning new format.
Stay tuned for these full reviews!
The Android Phone Guide
Our Android Phone Guide existed before most of these young buck Android blogs popped up on the planet. We’ve now given it a visual overhaul that you’re sure to love (and check out our redesigned spec pages, too)! Have a gander:
- Android Phone Guide
- Best Android Phones
- Available Android Phones
- Upcoming Android Phones
- Rumored Android Phones
- Retired Android Phones
Considering the sheer volume of Android phones It’s tough keeping all of this information accurate and up to date. If you see issues, please let us know by contacting us. Better yet, you could join our team as a contributor and help us keep this information up to date regularly!
Be sure to check out our Android Tablet Guide, too.
Meet the team
In years past, we haven’t put enough focus on the people who make Phandroid what it is. In many ways, that’s you- the community, readers, commentors, and sharers. But first and foremost, it’s the bloggers and developers who have helped build Phandroid from the ground up and continue grinding 24/7, 365 to make this place the best it can be.
We’ve updated our Meet The Team page and invite you to check it out.
Love, Hate, Advocate
We love feedback. Even when it comes in the form of harsh criticism where words aren’t minced. Drastic redesigns call for drastic feedback, so we want to know:
- What do you love?
- What do you hate?
- What bugs have you spotted?
- What do you wish we changed/updated that we didn’t?
- What would make Phandroid even better?
Thanks in advance for your kind words in the comments. And your not-so-kind words, too. Sometimes those are the most helpful!
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