New Bing iPhone App Includes Bookmarks, Location Based Search, Parental Controls & More
Microsoft has released an updated version of their iPhone app that is now available for download from the App Store.
The new version of the app fixes a lot of stability and design issues besides introducing a few nifty features.
Here is a run-down of the major additions in the new version of Bing's iPhone app
Bookmarks: The Bing app now makes it easy for users to bookmark any page from the app including maps, business listings, search results, directions and weather reports. These bookmarks may be directly accessed from the Bing homepage.
Location Based Search: The new Bing app makes it extremely easy to search for results based on your current location. Users may also choose to search around specific locations using the location settings on the application.
Parental Control: The new Bing app introduces stricter parental controls by offering users to secure SafeSearch levels for their apps with passcodes to protect kids from unsafe results.
Besides these updates, there are also significant additions like:
- Easy link sharing
- Copy paste URLs
- Search from history
- Private search
- Integration of contacts in directions
Bing's new iPhone app has also added support to the first generation of iPod Touch. The application has been extremely popular on the App Store and has been downloaded over a million times in the three months since it was released.
Update:
For some strange reason, Microsoft seems to have removed its Bing iPhone app from all the International App Store. According to Neowin, Microsoft had this to say about the sudden disappearance of the Bing iPhone app from the App Stores:
"When we released the iPhone application we inadvertently made it available to all countries in which the Apple Marketplace has a presence. We noticed the error within 24 hours and took steps to remove availability for all countries except for the US."
Microsoft hopes to re-release their iPhone app on the International App Store sometime in the future but hasn't given any dates. Neowin points out:
"Microsoft originally released the Bing iPhone application in December 2009. It's not clear why it took three months to remove the availability for all countries except the U.S."
Interested readers in the US can check out Bing's iPhone app from the App Store by clicking here (iTunes link).
This brings me to the question that I wanted to ask you folks for quite sometime now. I personally prefer to search on the web using iPhone's Safari browser (Google as the default search engine) rather than use a native iPhone app. How about you? Do you use Google Mobile App or Bing app on your iPhone? Let us know in the comments.
