Facebook updates its iPhone app too — and it’s wicked fast

Facebook slipped an update to its iPhone app under the door last night, just after releasing a completely rebuilt non-HTML5 Android version earlier today.

The big update? MOAR SPEED!

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Facebook’s app release notes say that the timeline is completely rebuilt, and that the new feed opens faster on your iPhone. I downloaded and tested the update, and while this app is theoretically an incremental improvement, not a completely redo like the Android release earlier, it is much, much faster.

Facebook’s slowness to load and refresh on iPhone has been my wife’s major complaint about the app. She almost exclusively interacts with Facebook on mobile.

But even on her iPhone 4S, the app loads, displays content, scrolls, and refreshes at least 25 percent quicker than previously. And on my iPhone 5,  the news feed positively flies, where before it always seemed to struggle to keep up with my scrolling.

One thing that’s clear after also playing with the new Android version that was just updated yesterday: Facebook has finally achieved feature and user experience parity on the iOS and Android. Both apps feel snappy and very, very responsive.

In addition, Facebook also added the ability to upload photos to a specific album to this updated version.