Barnes & Noble launches iOS, Android Nook app in UK
Barnes & Noble has launched an app for the iOS and Android platforms that allows users to download digital version of books, magazines and newspapers directly from the Nook store.
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The move expands the reach of the book retailer's platform as it continues its expansion into the UK and pits it in direct competition with Amazon, which also has an e-reader business in the form of the Kindle and Kindle Fire.
"Combining a fully integrated shop with Nook's award-winning digital reading experience, customers can browse one of the world's largest digital bookstores featuring new releases, bestsellers, classics, and a large collection from independent publishers and self-publishing authors," the company said in a statement on Tuesday.
However, like Amazon's Kindle app, the Nook app integrates with devices allowing multi-platform synchronisation of features such as last page read, bookmarks, notes and highlights. The app also alternate display features like 'article view', which focuses only on text, and 'zoom view', which concentrates on certain panels within a comic.
Barnes & Noble said that its store contains over two and a half million items of digital content; more than twice that offered by Amazon's Kindle store.
The push to launch a UK app comes follows hot on the heels of the release of new Nook devices in the country. The Nook HD (£159) and Nook HD+ (£229) tablets arrived in the UK on 23 November, while the Nook Simple Touch (£79) and Nook Simple Touch GlowLight (£109) e-ink readers have been available since the end of October.