iOS 11 beta offers some new and exciting updates to Apple News Format. We have added the ability to link from one component to another within your articles with anchor links, and made placing content side-by-side easier than ever with the new Collection Display property. For more information on these features and how to begin experimenting with iOS 11 beta, check out the What’s New section of the Apple News Format Reference. You’ll need to install Xcode 9 beta 3 and News Preview 1.3.7 beta to get started.
Optimize Your Content for Siri Suggestions
Apple News Format gives publishers the ability to include promotional components that help readers discover apps, newsletters, marquee content, and more. However, the text that appears within promotional components is usually unrelated to the article the user tapped on. We want to ensure that News personalization ignores any text that is not essential to the story. This will help Siri make the most informed content recommendations to News users, increase content placement accuracy within For You and topic feeds, and help you find and develop the most engaged audiences for your articles.Please place any unrelated or promotional content within the new aside component. It looks just like a container component, but sends a signal to Siri that it’s safe to ignore the container’s text when making personalized recommendations in the future.
Example JSON:
{
"role": "aside",
"components": [
{
"role": "photo",
"URL": "bundle://interview.jpg"
},
{
"role": "heading",
"format": "html",
"text": "<?a? h?r?e?f?="h?t?t?p?s?://w?w?w?.?a?p?p?l?e?.?c?o?m?">Check out our (unrelated) interview with John Appleseed<?/a?>"
}
]
}
Tips and TricksMake Your Links Pay: Join the Affiliate Program
Are you linking to media content like music, books, apps, or podcasts from your articles? Our Affiliate Program provides a way for you to effectively link to millions of songs, albums, apps, books, movies, TV shows, and podcasts around the world while earning commissions on qualifying sales and receiving valuable campaign data. Apply now to join the program, gain insights on your commercial traffic, and earn commissions from your links.
More Beginner Support in Design Tutorials
The Apple News Format Design Tutorials now have more content than ever, including easier-to-use article templates and more information for designers who are new to JSON. New Further Exploration sections show you how to create your own designs by customizing the tutorial templates. To get started, see Apple News Format: Design Tutorial for the basics of components, layout, and style, or check out Apple News Format: Advanced Design Tutorial for more about containers, side-by-side layouts, animations, and other effects.
You can find all of our Apple News documentation, resources, and FAQs on the News Publisher Resources and Support site. If you have any questions, or would like assistance with your channel or articles, Contact Us.
Regards,
The Apple News Team
