August 7, 2017: The Financial Times is now available in the iOS App Store for existing subscribers. The hybrid app uses the FT’s award-winning (HTML5) Web App inside a native shell, which allows improved video streaming and more options for content sharing.

The FT’s return to the App Store after six years dovetails with a strong business-wide focus on reader engagement, and responds to increasing reader demand for some of the functionality offered by iOS such as rich notifications and automatic reinstalls with new devices. It allows the FT to maintain a direct relationship with the customer within its existing business model.

The rollout in the UK and US in August follows successful trials in Singapore, Canada, Switzerland, Australia and Hong Kong, which indicate a positive effect of the app on reader engagement, whereby subscribers visit the app more often and read more journalism during each visit.

The FT’s combined print and digital circulation is 870,000 with digital subscribers at 670,000, a 13% increase year-on-year. Mobile accounts for almost 60% of total traffic. On Android, the FT completed a similar shift from web to native in December 2011.

The FT also has a number of specialised native iOS apps, including How To Spend It and Investors Chronicle. The latest launch follows the successful rollout of the new FT.com in 2016, which has won multiple awards including website of the year at the British Press Awards.