Android Facebook app: Shake up your friends

By Kent German on 09 September 2009, 1:11pm

While smug iPhone owners have long had a powerful Facebook app with a wide range of features, Android users have had to make do with the mobile version of the social networking site, Facebook Lite. Not only does it offer limited features, but it's also clunky and difficult to navigate.

But that changed on Tuesday when a new and long-awaited Facebook app hit the Android Market. The free app offers many of the features you've come to expect on the iPhone app and the full version of the site.

You can scan your news feed, view your friends' walls and user info, comment on status updates and hit the 'like' button, take and upload photos, add new friends and post status updates of your own. What's more, you can add a notification widget to your home screen and you even can shake your phone to refresh your news feed.

Though we welcome the extra features, the interface and navigation appear rather convoluted. For example, it takes several clicks to navigate to a friend's profile and list of friends. Also, there's no Facebook chat or access to messaging -- for now. We assume those features will be added soon.

It's worth noting that while Facebook is listed as the developer in the Android Market, Facebook's official Web page for the app says that it was not developed by the company. From what we hear, Google developed the app with Facebook's help.