When comparing NewsBlur vs Flipboard, the Slant community recommends NewsBlur for most people. In the question“What are the best news readers?” NewsBlur is ranked 4th while Flipboard is ranked 8th. The most important reason people chose NewsBlur is:
NewsBlur has a discovery algorithm that users can "train" to show stories they are interested in and hide ones they don't care about.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Recommended articles that improves over time
NewsBlur has a discovery algorithm that users can "train" to show stories they are interested in and hide ones they don't care about.
Pro Keyboard shortcuts for fast navigation
By default arrow keys and spacebar are used to quickly navigate stories, but they can be rebound for premium accounts.
Pro Multiple layout & style options
NewsBlur allows users to customize the font size, line spacing, story layout, and type faces.
Pro Fast to use
Very fast to navigate around the UI and load articles.
Pro View content the way it is originally displayed
NewsBlur offers an option of reading articles just like they are displayed on the original site.
Pro Organize feeds into folders
Feeds can be grouped into folders for easier management and to allow users to separate feeds for work, comics, research, etc.
Pro Share stories with comments
Burblog is a simple, customizable website for sharing stories with comments that people can subscribe to.
Pro Aggregates email newsletters
You can forward email newsletters to a user-specific email address to have them aggregated in your feed reader along with your RSS content.
Pro Free / Libre software
NewsBlur is FOSS, so it can be freely modified & redistributed.
Pro Freemium service
Free version has a limit of 64 sites. Upgrading to unlimited sites costs $1/month.
Pro Very polished UI that is organized like a magazine
This app has a very polished, magazine-style layout, that is flipped through by swiping. Because of its layout, Flipboard is especially nice on tablets.
Pro Personalized magazines
Magazines is a features by Flipboard that can allow anyone to create their own personalized magazine by collecting the content from various websites and collate them into a magazine that can also be shared to other readers. Magazines can be set to either public or private access and anyone can follow the magazine.
Pro Free
Pro Cross-platform
Flipboard is available on Android, iOS, BlackBerry, Windows and web app.
Pro Google Reader import
There is also a simple import from Google Reader.
Pro Social network integration
Flipboard pulls information from Facebook, Twitter, Google+, LinkedIn, etc. Everything is aggregated in one app, which can then be flipped through and shared, either directly on Flipboard or on social networks.
Pro Easily discover stories based on topics
Flipboard has millions of Magazines that anyone can follow, covering various subjects. Some cover general topics like home decoration, while others are immensely specific: for example, there’s one just about technological advances that extend human lifespan. All users can create their own Magazines and share them publicly, with friends, or keep them for private use.
Cons
Con Freemium
This service is free, but can cost up to $24 per year for premium users.
Con Can't have unread items older than a 14 days/month
This is a premium feature.
Con Excessive ads with no way to remove them
Flipboard doesn’t offer subscription plans, having only the completely free full version. However, it does feature ads that appear between articles and there’s no way of removing this function.
Con Needs better organization of topics, mags, users followed
When you follow 3-5 magazines per topic (sometimes more) it would be nice to be able to group some of these together in a way that constricts the 'fire hose' of content.
Con Low quality news sources
The default content is from low quality sources such as Mashable.