Localscope brings together local search with google, bing, foursquare, twitter & wikimapia. Anyone should be able to jump straight in and immediately figure out how to use the app be it for finding a local bank, people who are tweeting around you or places on foursquare. This is thanks to a beautiful interface that clearly has had a lot of thought put into and it shows.
The purpose of the app according to developers cynapse is “Always know where you are and what’s around you with Localscope!” and they achieve it perfectly. Out of the box the distance to places is shown in kilometres, for brits this can be changed in the settings to show yards and miles instead.
To test the app out I did a search for Gyms initially using google and quite a few were listed my local gym wasn’t on the list probably due to the fact it opened within the last couple of months. I switched to the bing search which had a more complete list of gyms but again my gym didn’t show but moving over to foursquare and I could see people had checked into the gym I use. And this is where Localscope shines, as the data it relies on is from external sources by integrating 5 search and social services you can pretty much guarantee to find what you’re looking for.
The default view for searches is a simple grid, this can be changed to a map view with pins or an augmented reality view. Tapping on a search result provides a myriad of options and results, offering a web address, options to add as a contact, text to someone else, email, facebook or tweet.
The social integration is also very interesting as you can discover local places that are popular on foursquare and the places people around you are tweeting about which makes discovering what’s popular extremely easy.
My only criticism is there is an option to send anonymous usage statistics back to the developers in other words the app phones home. While I personally don’t have a problem with this option being included and at least they include an option to opt out I think many would prefer to opt in rather that having it automatically enabled.
Conclusion:
Just when you thought all social and search apps have been done Localscope comes a long and redefines the genre. Even if only used to occasionally find the nearest Cash Point Localscope is worth it, but to those who like to discover new places or travel a lot will find it invaluable. 5/5
Get this App for $1.99
