[App Review] Trade Me for Android

It's finally here, for better or worse.

After a lengthy period as an iOS exclusive, New Zealand’s popular auction site has finally seen fit to push a dedicated application to the Android Market. In a sense, this marks the coming of age of Android as a viable second platform in this country – Trade Me is the second most visited page in NZ, only losing top spot to Google itself. Yet it has only now released its own app for Froyo and above, despite the Android platform meriting a dedicated application quite some time ago (I would argue around the end of 2010, when local carriers finally began making an advertising push for Android devices). Many major NZ services such as banks have offered Android support for months if not over a year, notably including the news site Stuff.co.nz, which is owned by Fairfax media who also own Trade Me .

What’s to blame, here? Fragmentation? Real usage stats by useragent showing a lack of Android uptake? Lack of development support, or revenue for the project? Or was the mobile version of Trade Me’s website simply deemed ‘good enough’? While I don’t have the answers to the above, there is one pertinent question I intend to explore: Having waited so long, is the app worthwhile?

Download the app here, and read on for the full review.

A cute, bright blue kiwi icon heralds the official Trade Me app’s arrival, and it’s followed up by a UI that pleases me greatly. Although fellow editor lokhor felt the auction house would have done better to adhere to Google’s Ice Cream Sandwich app development guidelines, I’m quite content with the look and feel. The app is both intuitive to use and inoffensive to the eye with its muted colour palette, and – platform wars aside - it’s certainly easier on the eye than the iOS application. My favourite touch is the set of icons that pop up at the bottom when viewing search results or browsing a category - The regional search modifier is marked by a silhouette of New Zealand, and the filter feature for item condition and payment options is a whimsical little funnel.

I couldn't justify it, myself.

Trade Me sum up the features of the application as follows: 

“Trade Me for Android lets you:

• search and browse

• bid and buy

• view your Watchlist

• see items you've won and lost

• view fixed price offers”

The landing screen following an account login displays a search box, a link to browse categories, and a list of the auctions one is currently interacting with – Watchlist, Won, Lost, and fixed-price Offers. A contact icon in the top right will take you to a very brief account overview, showing off your username, feedback rating, and account balance, but doesn’t let you click on anything to expand. Here, and when viewing other Trade Me members’ profiles in the same format, a menu press will let you view the terms & conditions, privacy policy, and code of conduct, should you feel you need a reminder on the go. In all other areas, a menu press will only allow a refresh of the currently-viewed page – a ‘home’ option would have been helpful, as it’s easy to get deep into a search, and hammering on the back button to return to the landing screen is a little annoying.

Shop for your next gadget.

As mentioned above, the search feature is well implemented, with a nice set of options to narrow down that one auction you want. The app allows you to ask questions while on the go, add auctions to your watchlist, share auctions through the standard OS-wide sharing menu, and view galleries of your next prize. Crucially lacking, however, is the ability to zoom in on photos, which particularly frustrates me as the official Twitter app has the same problem. No on-screen buttons, no multi-touch, this omission sours the otherwise-pleasant browsing experience. Perhaps an even more obviously-absent element is, well, anything seller-centric. Yes, this app is purely for buyers at present, clearly designed to aid in bidding on the fly and locating new items, there’s no ability to place feedback, manage your own listings, upload photos, or any other bits ‘n’ bobs. I’m sure all this and more will come with time, and aside from the aforementioned zoom issue, I can’t blame Trade Me for launching with a simple suite of Search and Buy functionality – what it does do, it does well. Performance is great on my admittedly dual-core device, images are quick to load, scrolling is smooth, and there are minimal loading delays.

Blast from the...present?

Trade Me previously relied entirely on the simple mobile version of its site to service platforms outside of the iDevice range. The mobile site is rather unfortunately reminiscent of the featurephone days of the mobile web that are (thankfully) almost entirely behind us – basic Android handsets running Gingerbread can be had for under $150NZD contract-free – so there are few excuses not to optimise mobile sites for touch experiences. TradeMe’s mobile information page promises a touch-optimised version of the site will launch in the near future, so stay tuned (As an aside, I find it a little bizarre that they use a Galaxy S to show off the ‘Touch’ version and an IDEOS X5 for the dedicated Android application). Although this app is a welcome leap forward, the bare-bones list of features means many a Trade Me member will need to continue to use the full site.

The alternative was presumably to wait and add more features before launch. I hope this app was pushed out early in 2012 to spearhead a mobile strategy overhaul, as that mobile site isn’t cutting it, and this app is pretty nice, even if rather basic. Perhaps it may have been a better move to wait until features were at least on par with the iOS app, as the market reception is decidedly cool at present -  The app has a 3.1/5 rating, even lower than the similarly-panned third party application TradeDroid, and the comments do echo my sentiments on iOS feature parity.

Guess what my other hobby is.

Why is Froyo a top search request?

So, although pretty and functional within its own limitations (Perhaps I am channelling Windows Phone 7, here?), the Trade Me app may well be too little, too late. My habits, at least, remain indifferent to the application’s existence – and I am a regular user of the site and its services. I rely upon Trade Me proper’s saved search emails to alert me to new and interesting items, and upon the watchlist notifications to direct me to that crucial closing auction. Ideally, I would see an app like this take real advantage of the platform, and provide inbuilt notifications to replace both of these email systems - At the very least, the next revision had best include the aforementioned basic options for sellers, and a zoom function for photos. 

Trade Me reassures us that new features are coming soon, including selling features and some variety of push notifications. For now, I still instinctively turn to the desktop site rather than the application, and at this point – beyond a nice layout – I see little reason to do otherwise.