Review: PortfolioRT

Developed by: Michael Litman Experience
Version Reviewed: 1.0
Price: $8.99 (introductory pricing)
App Store Rating: 3 1/2 stars
Hijinks Inc. Rating: 2 stars
Pros: Does what it’s supposed to, easy to use UI.
Cons: Crashes regularly, Yahoo-esque fonts detract from overly flow of the application, doesn’t offer charts.

Aside from the poor choice in fonts, my first impression of PortfolioRT was a positive one, it delivers exactly what its name implies, real time stock quote. And seeing as my broker wants to charge me $25+ a month for real time stock quotes, the $8.99 price tag seemed like a steal.

Adding stocks is as easy as 1-2-3, tap Edit from the home screen, type in the stock symbol, hit search, hit add. And there you have it. Now you’re free to watching your retirement account plummet further into oblivion as the market fails, all in real time! Oh, and you can also change the order the stocks appear in on the home screen.

Performance over WiFi is fantastic, however refresh speeds over EDGE can be painstakingly slow at times. As for 3G, I can’t vouch for it, but I think one can safely assume it works just fine.

The biggest downside (and it’s a pretty big one) to this application is the fact that it is entirely unreliable, it crashes constantly. Doesn’t matter if you’re just letting the app sit there and stream quotes or if you’re trying to add new stock tickers, it crashes every 5 to 7 minutes without fail.

Assuming they can iron that somewhat major bug out, I see a lot of potential for this application. And in emailing back and forth with the developer I learned that version 2.0 of this software is in fact on its way, which supposedly fixes the frequent crashes and adds more features.

Bottom line, it’s currently your only choice right now for real time stock quotes on the iPhone, and if that’s your thing, it delivers. All in bite size and easy to manage 5-7 minute chunks. My advice though, if you don’t absolutely need it, hold out for version 2.0 before purchasing.