The BBC is going live with its iOS news apps - according to the corporation they should be hitting the App Store today (23 July).

The BBC's man in charge of apps, David Madden, has stated in his blog:

"Our aim is to develop a set of core public service apps that bring some of the BBC's most popular, distinctive and original content to mobile in an easy to use and convenient way. The first of these apps is BBC News, and I'll be letting you know about the other BBC apps soon".

The video above shows off the iPad version, which looks darned good. Stories are presented in category carousels which you can swipe through with a reading pane on the right (when in landscape mode).

You can personalise the categories that are on show, and you can also increase the text size if you want to.

There's even a news ticker that runs along the top, and you can also choose to stream the BBC News channel as well.

The most pleasing aspect for iOS users, who have long been frustrated with not being able to play the BBC News website's video content, will be that any videos that are associated with the story can now be played.

Social network integration has also been included - you can email, tweet or send stories to your Facebook contacts inside the app.

The iPhone/iPod touch version is similar to the iPad's in portrait mode. Stories are presented in their carousels and when you click a story it is presented in full screen.

The BBC's director of future media and technology, David Huggers, has outlined the importance of mobile devices as news platforms and has also signalled the BBC's intent to bring the apps to other mobile platforms.

"We know that increasing numbers of you want to access BBC output on-the-go and the rapid growth of internet-connected mobiles and smartphones in the market means we can cost-effectively provide our content and services on these devices, and this is a really important way for us to deliver online services in the future", he said.

"Today we begin with our news App becoming available for the Apple iPhone, and soon it will come to Blackberry and Android phones in addition to other devices later in the year".

We'll keep checking the App Store throughout the day, and we'll let you know as soon as the BBC news apps arrive. In the meantime, check out our App of the Day inclusions to make sure that you're up to date with everything that's cool in the app world.

Update: They've arrived. Get over to the App Store now and fill your boots.

• See also - BBC News website gets a makeover

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