Twitterrific 5 was slated for release at midnight, but the app is already available in the New Zealand iTunes Store. We’re not going to pretend to understand how ‘time zones’ work, instead we’re just going to comment on what’s changed in Twitterrific 5.

Twitterrific 5 iOS

We felt that the old version of Twitterrific could have used an overhaul.

The first thing we’ve noticed, right off the cricket bat, is that Twitterrific 5 seems to be its own app and not an update. Twitterific 5 is no longer free–instead it’s selling at a special 50% off launch price of $4.19 (New Zealand Dollars, ~$3.50 in American currency). That puts the regular price around $7 American–by comparison, Tweetbot sells for $2.99 while Twitter’s official app is free.

So what’s changed in Twitterrific 5? The interface of Twitterrific 5 looks to be highly customizable. Users can switch between light and dark themes, font sizes, line spacing, and the size of profile pictures. Retweets, replies and mentions still seem to be colored, though its the font that’s colored now instead of the background tiles. The screenshots look like something out of Windows 8 Metro interface.

Twitterrific 5 For Twitter iOS

Twitterrific 5, as revealed on New Zealand’s iTunes page.

There’s support for VoiceOver, switching between accounts, “pull to refresh”, gestures, direct support for Twitter’s picture service, tweet locations, retweet with comment (which you can add to the default Twitter app with this tweak), automatic switch to the dark theme at night, a built-in translator, and “read it later” support for Instapaper and Pocket. Twitterrific 5 is absolutely feature-packed compared to its predecessors. The question is, can a new premium Twitter client compete with giants like Tweetbot, and free clients like Tweetdeck–or even the official Twitter client?

Twitterrific 5

Twitteriffic 5′s iPad app includes an optional pin-able sidebar.

Download Twitterrific 5 for Twitter universal app – $4.19 (NZD) [New Zealand iTunes Store Link]

Download Twitterrific 5 for Twitter universal app [USA iTunes Store Link]

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