MacRumors iPhone and iPad Blog: Apps, News, and Rumors

The iPhone and iPad versions of Rovio’s Bad Piggies of the game can be downloaded for free. The Bad Piggies are after the eggs again -- but as usual, nothing is going according to plan! Can you create the ultimate flying machine and steer them safely to their destination? Those tricky pigs have a few objects they can use, but they need your help to turn these into the perfect transportation!...

The follow-up to the popular stargazing app The Night Sky has launched today, introducing a number of new features. As with the original app, Night Sky 2 allows users to view the sky above them on an iPad or an iPhone to identify nearby celestial bodies. The revamped app offers a redesigned sky view that includes both higher quality imagery and original artwork constellations, along with a...

Last month, Firaxis and 2K Games released XCOM: Enemy Unknown for iPhone and iPad, an extremely popular and well-regarded title on both consoles and the PC.XCOM is known as an 'AAA title' in the industry; a major game with significant investments in both marketing and development. The company set the price of XCOM's iOS version at $20, well above the price for most games on the platform -- but...

Quip, a mobile word processor designed by ex-Google Maps and Facebook executive Bret Taylor, launched today on iOS. The app includes features such as a mobile-friendly interface and integrated to-do lists for tasks, as well as collaborative features that enable multiple users to edit and work on documents in real time.Quip is a modern word processor that enables you to create beautiful documents...

As highlighted by Android Police and Engadget, Google is ending support for Google Catalogs, its product browsing app for iOS and Android, on August 15. The app originally launched first on the iPad in 2011 and collaborated with various apparel merchants in an attempt to bring users rich, interactive content. The news comes just days after Google removed the Google+ Local App from the App...

Isis, the mobile wallet venture that has been backed by AT&T, T-Mobile, and Verizon Wireless, has announced that it will initiate a national rollout of service this year and will include support for Apple’s iPhone, as reported by Bloomberg. “What you’ll see coming from us is a vastly improved product, a variety of new places to use it, a vastly improved user experience,” Ryan Hughes, ...

Amazon has updated its Kindle app for iOS to version 3.9, adding a feature that allows users to search for book samples using the app's existing Library Search tool. Rather than simply searching through a user's library, the app now searches through Amazon's entire catalog of books and brings up samples that can be downloaded directly within the app. Though users can download in-app book...

Showtime has updated its Showtime Anytime app to include live streaming of the main Showtime channels -- both the East Coast and West Coast versions. Previously, the app allowed on-demand streaming of most of Showtime's TV series', movies, and 'after hours' programming.With the change, iPhone and iPad users will be able to watch live broadcasts of movies that aren't eligible for streaming,...

As Apple continues to bring its Developer Center back online after a week-long outage, the company is sending out emails to developers noting a potential delay for app reviews. ReadWrite has posted one of the letters being received by developers:"We are currently reviewing an app that you submitted for inclusion on the App Store, and want to let you know that the review process will require...

Sprint revealed today in its Q2 2013 results that it had sold 1.4 million iPhones last quarter, with 41% of those iPhones being sold to new customers. The company announced an 8% overall year-over-year growth, posting a record high revenue of $8 billion. This holds steady when compared to the 1.4 million iPhones it sold in the year-ago quarter. Sprint also announced LTE networks in 41 new...

The United States Patent and Trademark Office (USPTO) has rejected claims by Apple that Samsung Electronics infringed on its "pinch-to-zoom" patent – one of the decisive claims in the ongoing litigations between the two tech giants. The patent, No. 7,844,915, was first filed back in November 2010 and described, "an environment with user interface software interacting with a software application". ...

After integrating Google+ Local features into its Google Maps application, Google is planning to retire the Google+ Local app for iOS on August 7 and has already removed it from the App Store. The company sent out an email yesterday announcing the news:Hello, We're emailing to announce that the Google+ Local app for iOS will be retired on August 7th, 2013. The good news is that all...

Marketing Land has assembled this comparison chart showing what subscription and rental services can be used with the new Google Chromecast, the Apple TV, and the Roku streaming boxes. The new Chromecast, which costs just $35, plugs into an HDMI port on a television, and needs to be charged via a USB connection. The Roku box is perhaps the most direct competitor for the Apple TV, with the...

During an internal town hall event earlier this week, Microsoft CEO Steve Ballmer and COO Kevin Turner spoke to employees about the recent $900 million writedown the company took for the Surface RT, reports The Verge. "We built a few more devices than we could sell," said Ballmer, in reference to slow Surface RT sales. Ballmer also went on to say that the company isn’t happy with its Windows ...

The next-generation iPhone will launch on September 6th, according to German Apple website iFun [Google Translate]. The site does not have a significant track record with this sort of prediction, however. Earlier this week, KGI Securities analyst Ming-Chi Kuo said the low-cost iPhone and the iPad 5 would ship in early September with the iPhone 5S coming later because of production...

T-Mobile, the fourth-most popular carrier in the United States in terms of subscriber numbers, announced today that it is launching a new promotion whereby any new, eligible customers will not have pay a single cent in downpayment for a new phone when signing up to a T-Mobile USA plan. Customers can now receive new devices for free and spread the cost over the terms of their contract, which in...

The Los Angeles Unified School District is planning to give all of its students free iPads by the end of 2014 as a part of a program launched by the district, reports CITEWorld. The program, which will see a total of 640,000 iPads handed out, is part of an initiative to improve education for students and to ready them for the workforce by enhancing their technological skills and comprehension. ...

According to electronics buyback site Gazelle.com, while Google's newly introduced Nexus 7 has proven to be a popular upgrade choice for users who already own the current version of the tablet, it isn't attracting iPad owners. The site told TechCrunch that after the new Nexus 7 was unveiled, there was a 333 percent increase in the number of Nexus 7 trade-ins compared to the same day last week, ...