iCab for iOS Updated with a Today Widget

iCab continues to be the best web browser on iOS. It’s not as fast as Safari for some tasks but the features are really impressive. Now it adds a clever feature to use a webpage as a Today widget.

The implementation has high and low points. The clever part is that the page is a local cache in iCab so it doesn’t need to immediately load the page and it remains useful when there’s no reception. In my brief testing, there was no lag with the widget.

The major issue I have with the widget is the lack of scrolling. The Today widget uses bookmarks to display a single frame of the page as an image. That frame does not change and does not have active links or buttons. If I want to see an entire page, for example a long commuter train schedule, I must scroll the page and create multiple Today bookmarks. Tapping the Today widget opens the page in iCab.

In some ways, this is better. The iCab widget allows for navigation between bookmarks and even provides a method for deleting the bookmark without leaving the Today screen.

If you ask me, there are many more reasons to love iCab than this widget. These setting screens lay out just a few.

That “Always allow zooming” setting is great. Even pages that force some sort of mobile layout, respond to pinch and zoom in iCab. The filters are also a huge bonus with a mobile device. They block a variety of common punch-to-the-face ad banners. Page load time (and I suspect bandwidth too) are cut way down with iCab. There’s a lot to like about this browser. The Today widget is a minor improvement on top of a huge list.

iCab | Universal | $2