One of the first reviews I did for this site after relaunch earlier this year was a rundown of a few RSS reader Apps for the iPhone, by lucky happenstance I found one that suited every one of my needs. For a while. Then, I got an iPad and reading RSS reeds on my tiny iPhone display seemed archaic and I was on the hunt once again for a bigger, better Reader App.

All of a sudden there was a flurry of news about Pulse, the RSS reader that Steve Jobs had used during his iPad demo, and the NY Times fallout therein. Pulse was brought to my attention and I was more than intrigued, “I must try this” I said to myself. And then then said it in email form to the good folks at Alphonzo Labs and they graced me with a promo code.

Unfortunately I couldn’t just dive-in, as Pulse was still very much a work in progress, and did not yet have two of the most important features I need in an RSS App – Google Reader support and offline caching. The second was particularly important to me on the iPad as I have a wifi only version. So i waited patiently for the next update, which promised these features.

In the meantime I was simply itching to try the iPad version of the iPhone App that won the original search into the ideal RSS reader for me – Mobile RSS, who launched their own iPad App, a bigger ‘HD’ version even. However getting in touch with the developers turned into a harrowing experience eventually i did get in touch with them and they were gracious enough to also provide me with a promo copy.

Pulse was updated, boasting of my long awaited favorite features, and the showdown could begin.

(How’s THAT for a preamble to an App Review!)

For the record I did try a couple other Reader Apps, but none came close to being a good as these two, for me. So while you might love Feedler, or NetnewsWire or what have you, I simply didn’t. These are my two top picks, and I’ll tell you why:

Reading

The most important feature of any RSS Reader is the ease and comfort of actually reading your articles. Pulse wins at this. It was specifically designed by people who obviously know how people use the iPad, and how important layout and comfort work together to make a great reading experience. While MobileRSS is just fine I prefer the One-Stop-Shopping as it were of Pulse, having all of my feeds on the left and my current article on the right. With that said – MobileRSS has the built-in ability to flick-scroll between articles from within the article, and I really love that too – so it makes it a much better reading experience in Portrait, while in Pulse you need to bring up your current feed menu to choose the next article.

Winner: Pulse (Landscape), MobileRSS (Portrait).

Subscribing to Feeds

I suppose I’ve always taken for granted that I use Google Reader. I just assume everybody does. However if you don’t then, clearly, Pulse is better for you. While, yes, Pulse did recently add the ability to import your Google Reader Feeds (individually mind you), it’s by and large for users who subscribe to independent feeds – and it makes searching for, finding, and subscribing to feeds super easy with built-in Search. It’s a fantastic stand-alone reader/subscriber. You simply do not have the option to add new feeds from within MobileRSS.

Winner: Pulse.

Google Reader Integration

MobileRSS is, by definition, a Google Reader App, and it’s great at that. Not only does it import and sync all your feeds, it also keeps them categorized by your folders, Giving you the ablity to read an entire folder, or just one feed. It also imports your “Who you’re Following” Folder so you can read your friend’s shared feed items on the go. Pulse only adds your feeds individually and the Google integration ends there.

Winner: MobileRSS

Sharing

Half the fun of reading is sharing, I think everyone can agree. While lots of Apps add Social Media Integration for the sake of Social Media Integration I think that it’s always going to be a necessary component of RSS readers because if the nature of the content itself. It’s simply Sharable.

When it comes to articles Pulse lets you Post to Twitter, Facebook, Email or Instapaper. But that’s not exactly where it’s sharing features end.. if you have Bump you can share your RSS feeds with another iPhone/iPad user via Bump and vise versa.

MobileRSS has a lot more built-in sharing options for your articles, including all of the ones Pulse has, I’ll let you see from the screenshot below, but it’s very unlikely that you’ll be without the ability to post to whatever Social Media site you prefer. In addition, you can always add anything to your Google Reader Shared Feed, which, again is another huge draw for Google Reader users.

Winner: MobileRSS

Now comes the deal-breaker feature for me. While it was important on the iPhone, it’s simply imperative on my wifi only iPad (and I think lots of you who are in the same boat as me will agree);

Offline Reading/Caching

For those of us with wifi only iPads, saving my feeds to read on my daily commute to work is simply mandatory. The reason I’m writing this article now, and not two weeks ago when I first downloaded Pulse, is because I was waiting for its most recent update that claimed to include better offline caching of articles.

While, yes, yes it does cache the articles it does not do one thing, one very important thing (especially for my webcomic feeds). Cache Pictures. This is the exact same issue I came across when trying to find the perfect iPhone RSS reader and I couldn’t be more heartbroken by this. Sure, Pulse may not have the same sharablity factor that Mobile RSS does, but the layout/design and easy of readability was so impressive that I was really hoping to use this as my everyday RSS Reader. Sadly, Mobile RSS Has it beat.

MobileRSS loads and caches all unread articles, including pictures within the article.

Winner: MobileRSS

Cost
At $3.99 or $4.99 there really isn’t much of a difference here. While Pulse seems more like a polished product, and probably worth much more than $3.99, MobileRSS has won the Battle, so it’s really up to you at this point. No Winner.

Judgement

So, in the end, Pulse beautiful, wonderful and definitely one of the best RSS Readers on the market. If you have a 3G iPad and don’t need offline viewing – I highly recommend it. Especially if you subscribe to feeds directly, and want to be able to find & subscribe to feeds from within the App. Visit Alphonzo Labs website to see even more info (the company story is a fun one).

MobileRSS HD is The App for Google Reader users, and wifi only folks like myself. Not as elegant, but very useful, and full of sharing and social features. For now, it will remain my default RSS reader, but will keep you updated if that changes. Here is the link to the Nibiru Tech site.

I’m obviously emotionally invested in this App Category now. Let me know if you’ve tried out either of these, or if you have another option you think I should consider. Comment or Tweet me!