Foursquare Sees UI Makeover on Android, Looks All Sorts of iOS

Foursquare, one of the long-standing kings of social check-ins, pushed out a major UI update to its Android app this afternoon. We are still awaiting an official changelog, but the changes are pretty obvious at first launch. Actually, before you launch the app, you will probably notice the brand new iOS inspired, cartoonishly flattened icon. From there, it only gets more iOS-like even with an Android hamburger slideout navigation. 

The top app bar is now a bright light blue to match that of the iOS version. You will still see the hamburger 3-bar icon, but it’s next to the flattened new Foursquare icon and other simplified navigation icons for Search, Notifications and action overflow. Speaking of the slideout navigation menu, an big profile picture now accompanies your name, along with the home, friends, to-do list, and add friends options. The big check-in button is also bigger, and flattened. Check-in pages seem to be much lighter and brighter, plus the leaderboard seems to have returned. Profile pages are all sorts of bright now as well. I could probably go on and on, but you get the point.

In terms of functionality, there are some changes here and there. The main page of the app used to show a mini-map of your current area, along with promoted items and the list of your friends and their activity. In the new app, all you see is a list of your friends plus that previously mentioned mega-check-in button. If you want to limit or expand your list of friends from local to worldwide, the option is a checkbox in the action overflow menu.

If you are a big Foursquare user, I don’t think you’ll have any trouble using the app. Everything still mostly acts the same, it just looks like you have an iPhone in hand.

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