Channel and Article Design

Publications in Apple News are called Channels. They’re very customisable, and you’re able to make them accurately reflect the look and feel of your publication.

Unless you specify, the FlatPlan design team handle the customisation of your channel and its articles, working alongside your design team to ensure we capture the correct look and feel. Apple holds design in high regard, and we take design seriously.

FlatPlan article pages utilise the full functionality of Apple News Format. This means we’re able to feature responsive design and flexible layouts, and we’re able to produce every component Apple News Format supports, presenting content with legible typography, rich imagery and subtle animation.

There are a number of details we require:

1. Guidance on whether to follow your digital product or brand guidelines
2. Licensed fonts in TTF or OTF format
3. Brand guidelines (if available)

Our team will create designs and present them to your contact for design approval. Once your team have signed off on these we will build them into actual pages for final sign off before pushing your channel live.

Your contact for design approval should have access to Apple products for “live” testing – preferably an iPhone and iPad.

Apple’s UI

Below all articles is a 'recirculation' area. This is part of Apple’s UI, so the design of this cannot be tweaked.

Other considerations

There are other areas of Apple News a publication has control over.

The channel logo will, naturally, most likely be the logo of the corresponding publication. For maximum legibility on the platform, ensure your channel logo features horizontal text on one line, with a transparent background (not white) – no fill. Apple requests that your logo match the name of the publication. It must be a .png logo of 256 pixels in height with an aspect ratio of no more than ten to one. This is so it remains legible in article listings, where logos are often reduced to a very small size:

Channel logos are added in iCloud Settings for your channel, under Branding > Logo

Your channel will require an icon as well: a square representation of the channel logo which appears below the Channels & Topics list on all pages of the app:

Channel icons must be uploaded as a square .png or .jpeg and should be at least 120×120 pixels, though we’d recommend a width and height of at least 1000 pixels.

Channel icons are added in iCloud Settings for your channel, under Branding > Logo

Lastly, consider your channel tile. The channel tile is a combination of the logo and a cover image, and appears when a user clicks the Discover Channels & Topics button below Channels & Topics:

It’s important to ensure that your logo and cover image work well together, as the channel tile is the first impression a user gets of your publication. When they use the app for the first time and are invited to indicate their interests, publications are recommended to them using channel tiles. The channel tile will be your only representation to a user who knows nothing about your publication.

Apple requires your cover image to be a .png or .jpg of at least 600×600 pixels. There are two types of cover image:

• Static: a static cover image will remain the same in your channel tile. It’s a great choice for brands with an instantly identifiable logo mark
• Dynamic: a dynamic cover image pulls lead images from articles in your feed. This way, your channel tile will constantly correspond to the latest news your publication has covered

Channel tiles are added in iCloud Settings for your channel, under Branding > Cover Image