As is the case with many services, Twitter and Android go perfectly together. It feels as though Twitter is naturally a mobile platform. Sure, I still tweet from my desktop, but tweeting from my Nexus just feel like a more natural experience. This is not only because of Twitter itself, though, but also because of the excellent clients that are available for Android. In the past few months I’ve been through three of them, and each has its merits. Today we’ll take a look at TweetDeck, Seesmic, and the official Twitter client.
I realize everyone is going to have his or her own preference on this, but I do think that these three clients represent the best that Android has to offer. I did try a few others, just to test my hypothesis. When I first got my Nexus I used TwitDroid, but found that I didn’t much enjoy it. Plus, I suspect that it greatly aided the battery drain that hampered my device in the early goings. Since then I spent plenty of time with the official app, but I’ve since ditched that. TweetDeck remains my preference, but I’ve used Seesmic enough to see the benefits. In any case, here’s the skinny.
TweetDeck
This is the one I use most frequently. TweetDeck is a hugely popular desktop client, and it now has an Android app. It was met with much fanfare at first, though the initial beta didn’t exactly impress. But it has been much improved in subsequent releases, and now that it’s in official production it is, if not the absolute best client, then one of the top two or three.
What I like about TweetDeck is how seamlessly it imitates the desktop client. You have three columns by default — home, replies, direct messages — and can add more. These can come from a Twitter search, or, better yet, from a second account. The ability to check two accounts without signing out and then signing back in is an integral feature for anyone who uses Twitter for both business and pleasure, and I suspect that it will be standard on all clients in due time. Having my personal timeline, replies, and direct messages, plus the @replies for my business account, make this a must-have.
One feature I don’t think I could live without, now that I’ve had it, is the ability to create different notifications for different columns. For instance, I have no notifications for my main timeline, a status bar and blinking light for @ replies, and a sound playing for my DMs. I also have that sound play when I get an @ reply on my business account. The ability to separate all of these is a big reason why TwetDeck is my fave.
The look of the app is familiar, with the gray background and white text. The text is also a bit larger than other Twitter clients, but you can adjust it as you see fit. The biggest size, though, seems perfect. Some want smaller text so that more tweets fit on one screen, but I enjoy having an easily readable tweet right in front of me.
It’s not all positive, of course. I really dislike the amount of time it takes for TweetDeck to reach the top of the column. While I do enjoy tweeting from it and do so frequently, there are times when I’m in front of my computer for long stretches and don’t check my phone. Getting to the top of my timeline can take quite a while, as TweetDeck scrolls through everything. I don’t know why it can’t just jump straight to the top.
Still, I find myself using TweetDeck more than the other two, even though I still have all three installed on my device.
Seesmic
When I first professed my admiration for TweetDeck, I had a few Android users tell me that Seesmic was their preferred choice. While I don’t see the need for two Twitter clients on the same handset, I was intrigued by the veracity of their compliments. A few of them, in fact, said they had switched from TweetDeck to Seesmic. I blamed that mostly on the underwhelming initial release of TweetDeck, but figured I should give Seesmic a try anyway.
The first thing I thought about Seesmic was that it reminded me, in some ways, of the old official Twitter app. It has the same top bar, which consists of re-load, new tweet, and search. There is the beneficial added function of the main bar bringing you to the top of the screen. It scrolls upwards far faster than TweetDeck, which is a nice little feature.
As with TweetDeck, the text size is changeable, so if you don’t like the smaller default view you can pump up the size. I also like that it’s black text on a white background. I’ve grown so used to this that I get a bit disoriented when reading anything else. The top navigation bar is easy enough to navigate, since it contains the basic provisions (timeline, replies, messages, profile). It’s not quite as powerful as TweetDeck, but it gets the job done.
That’s really Seesmic in a nutshell. It’s not some super advanced Twitter app — though I’m not sure what a super-advanced Twitter app would look like in the first place, beyond TweetDeck. It does its job and it does it smoothly. That’s all you can ask for in a basic Twitter app. If it weren’t for TweetDeck I’d be in on this one.
Official Twitter
After deciding that TwitDroid was not for me, I went and downloaded the official Twitter app for Android. For a few months it did what I needed. The main interface was a bit of a pain, in that I had to go to my timeline, replies, messages, and other such things from a main screen, meaning I’d have to navigate back there each time. It was a bit of a UI issue, but I thought they’d change it with updates. The updates did come, but it still has that main screen.
I suppose the main screen does have its purposes. You can navigate basically anywhere from there, including timeline, lists, replies, retweets, messages, profile, search, and trends. You can also press the new tweet button right there. I just don’t like having to navigate back to one point in order to access my other timelines. At the same time, I do like being able to see which of my tweets have been retweeted. But I don’t think that takes precedence over the UI.
The screens themselves are fine, and are as basic as they come. It’s along the same lines of Seesmic, only it’s blue rather than red. Once you click into an individual tweet you can reply, retweet, favorite, or share (even share to Twitter, which is just weird), but there are limitations there, too. I also don’t like the quote-style retweet, which is the only option other than the native Twitter retweet. It looks kinda dumb, to be honest. A simple RT @username works just fine, and it uses just one extra character.
My biggest complaint about the official Twitter, though, has to do with reloading. Gone is the reload button in the newest release. When you’re in any of your timelines, you just have to scroll further up in order to reload. That’s all fine and good, and I actually like that style. The problem comes when you’re listening to music. Whether you’re streaming or you’re listening to an MP3 on your SD card, the song hiccups twice. The first comes when you hit reload, and then the second comes when the new tweets appear on your timeline. This is what forced me off the official Twitter. Now that I’ve tried both TweetDeck and Seesmic, I’m never going back.
Surely there are other quality Twitter clients. Which ones do you prefer?
