Trigger is a news aggregator, but unlike other news aggregators it aims to bring it to you in a more sociable way. It wants you to share the things you find interesting and it wants to help you be in the know before anyone else. If you like being ahead of the game with trending news and other topics online Trigger not only feeds you what’s already trending but attempts to feed you curated content that’s on track to be trending so you have the heads up before things go viral.
Before you can get started with discovering trending news you’ll need the app installed, so you’ll want to head to the Play Store and search for Trigger News and the app pops up right up. From here, simply download Trigger and you’re ready to go.
Trigger is an easy app to get used to especially if you’re familiar with material design style apps. Trigger has implemented material design pretty well here and you simply swipe through the screens to move from topic to topic.
In each topic category you’ll have a collection of different trending news stories, images, GIF’s, videos, etc. which you can scroll through from top to bottom.
Trigger also has a day and night mode with different topic groups in each, so you can filter the types of news and other trends you might be interested in at the time. Day mode has a grouping of more serious news stories while night mode tends to be a little more lighthearted. Like any other true day and night mode it also changes handily back and forth between a light and dark colored theme as well which is fairly pleasing.
Day mode has about 12 different trending topics to choose from including Top news, world, national, entertainment, etc. while Night mode has trending topic categories for men and women, a “hot” category, buzz/gossip, funny and more. There’s even a NSFW category if it suits you.
Once tapping on any news story or trending content, you can share things easily with the FAB share button located at the bottom of the screen, and there’s a little “web” button towards the top which lets you view the content in your web browser of choice if you prefer.
The slide out hamburger menu provides you with two choices: newsstand and settings, which as it sounds flips you back and forth between seeing the content and the settings page, albeit settings has one single option which is what country to gather trending topics from. My only two choices were the U.S. and Taiwan.
If you’re looking for trending news, then Trigger could be a great app for you. There’s quite a bit of content to sift through in each topic category which is nice as it means you shouldn’t run out of stuff too quickly. The entire app UI is also very eye pleasing, which is a characteristic that is sure to grab the attention of many users. For all its good features though and a great UI, Trigger doesn’t seem to be without a couple of faults. My entire experience wasn’t without the occasional bug where it had problems loading content which in turn would keep me from swiping to other topic categories. The app also seems to be missing a few features which appear in the images of the app on the Play Store, like upvotes and downvotes, the ability to comment on content in the app, and seemingly the “overlooked” feature which Trigger talks about in the description is nowhere to be found. There’s also no way to add your own content in any way as everything is pulled for you from various sources around the web. Needless to say these were all things which sound like great contributions to the experience but without them Trigger didn’t feel as robust as it could be. Despite this though, the app was quite enjoyable to use and it has loads and loads of potential, and I have no doubt it will only continue to get better.
Ratings
- Speed (4/5) – Once the app gets going it was fairly smooth to move through content.
- Features (3.5/5) – There’s some great stuff here that users will love, in particular the Day and Night modes were a nice touch.
- Theme (5/5) – No doubt about it, the theme of the app is fantastic. It’s a great looking UI with material design inspired flair
- Overall (4/5) – Overall Trigger is a great news aggregator app, especially if you like keeping up on trending topics, some of which you stumble upon before they’re trending.
Pros
- Great theme and UI should grab the attention of plenty of users.
- Tons of trending topic categories
- Day and Night mode to help filter between more serious and more easy going topics
- share button and option for viewing content on the web
Cons
- Glitched out now and again where content wouldn’t load and I couldn’t switch between topics
- lacking some features which seem to be advertised in images and description
Trigger is a must have app if you enjoy trending news and content. For those who want the ability to control what news and sources get fed into your aggregator of choice, this might not be the option for you as content is curated. The app has plenty going for it though and lots of potential to only get even better than it already is. It looks great too, which is always a good thing.