Squarespace has been one of those companies that has intrigued me from day one. In fact I have a Squarespace site for hosting my Photography portfolio — I chose Squarespace because I wanted something cheap, easy and reliable. That is exactly what the service has been since I have been using it and I rather like it. Not in the way that I want to move everything I have to Squarespace, but in the sense that I have nothing bad to say about it and until recently, nothing great to say about it.
Then they had to go and release an iPad blogging app that is bar none the best iPad blogging app out there.
Damn. Now I kinda love Squarespace.
The App
I want to make two things clear: this is not a ‘formal’ review and this app is not just good because it is better than the meager offerings currently available on the iPad.
There are still some very real glitches in the app — glitches that I would have hoped never made it through the beta period, but they did. Switching between comments and posts sometimes makes the UI cut off the top of a post in the preview. Scrolling is a little janky at times — which is very odd when you are used to the smoothness of iOS. The rest are minor UI problems that seem to stick when they shouldn’t.
What makes the Squarespace iPad app so good is that it is leaps and bounds better than the web interface Squarespace gives you. It is infinitely less confusing to use.
Using Squarespace in your web browser makes you feel like you are building single web pages — not like you are using a sophisticated CMS. Using the iPad app makes you feel like your Squarespace account is an actual blogging account — that is no small feat.
Everything that can be done in the app is done beautifully — the entire app reminds me of Reeder. The stylings are very similar. There really isn’t much else to say since the app is free I encourage you to give it a try for yourself.