Facebook's Instant Article, which brings news stories straight to your News Feed, if finally rolling out to mobile today, starting with its iOS app.
So while you'll finally be able to catch all the latest news right within the Facebook app on your iPhone and iPad, you might have already seen the feature before as Instant Article had actually launched earlier this year on desktop.
Instant Articles for Android has also launched in public beta today, with a full roll out scheduled for later this year.
Facebook also announced that the Instant Articles feature has new news partners as well, including the New York Times, NBC News, The Atlantic, MTV, Slate, Cosmopolitan, The Huffington Post and the Washington Post.
They will be joining previously announced partners BBC, Guardian, Buzzfeed and National Geographic.
The social media giant says it will also be adding a lot more partners as well in the coming weeks, including Billboard, CBS News, Cracked, E! News, Fox Sports, Harper's Bazaar, Mashable, NBA, The Onion, Pop Sugar, Rolling Stone, Time, Variety and The Weather Channel. You can see the full list on Facebook's announcement.
News app competition
With Instant Articles coming to the iPhone and iPad this week, we imagine Apple's new News app will end up facing some competition from Facebook users, considering it'd be easier to get your news reading done while you're on your News Feed checking out what your friends and family are up to rather than opening up a whole different app.
Facebook also has the added benefit of showing you articles from publishers you already follow, or those that are shared by your friends, while Apple needs to seek permission to gather info about the kinds of articles you might be interested.
For users on Facebook, Instant Articles will be shown on your News Feed with a lightning bolt next to them and when you tap a story, the social media giant says article will load 10 times faster than a standard mobile web browser, making for a faster and "richer reading experience."
So while it thankfully cuts out the ads you might see on a typical article on your phone, Instant Articles still retains images, the ability to comment, videos and even interactive maps, and you can view all the features of an article by either scrolling, swiping or even tilting your phone in some instances.
