A modern computer user cannot imagine life without social networks. But smartphone owners are also trying to keep up. At the dawn of the Android OS, everything was very bad with social networking clients. But now the situation has changed. For example, the most popular social network on the Runet, VKontakte, has a huge number of clients. And only one of them is official. But he doesn't represent anything interesting. That's why everyone tries to use third-party products. The most popular of them is Kate Mobile. What kind of client is this and what is interesting about it? This is what we will try to figure out.
What it is?
As soon as the developers released the official application of the VKontakte social network, it became clear that this product was completely unviable. Then independent developers got down to business. And, as often happens in such cases, their product turned out much better. What this is connected with is unknown. Perhaps there are “crooked” programmers working on social networks? Be that as it may, the Kate Mobile application for Android was born. And it immediately broke all download records. The official work of VKontakte programmers remains somewhere on the outskirts of the Market.
It is worth noting that some developers have made attempts to outdo Kate, but no one has succeeded. The most famous third-party client at the moment continues to break download records. And it seems that no one can stop him. The Kate Mobile app somehow managed to win the love of millions of users of the VKontakte social network. What's so special about it? Let's try to figure it out.
Disadvantages of the client
Despite a bunch of additional features, Kate Mobile also has a number of disadvantages. For example, there is no way to edit your profile - so far they have only added the ability to change your avatar. So you will have to launch the browser/official application to make any changes.
Recently, the ability to cache music has been removed (tracks were saved to the smartphone’s memory, which made it possible to listen to songs while offline). At the moment, the developers of the social network have prohibited third-party applications from accessing audio recordings in this form.
Appearance and Design
Externally, this application is very different from the official one. And this is the first reason for its popularity. When the official client switched to a design strongly reminiscent of Facebook, millions of users switched to Kate, since only there the original appearance of VKontakte was preserved. Square photos, familiar news layout, no unnecessary recommendations. For many people this is all they need. This is the first feature of Kate Mobile. That this is very attractive for users who do not like global changes for the worse is understandable.
But that is not all. Unlike the official client, Kate can be customized to your taste. To do this, there are many themes that will help make “Contact” individual. In addition to the pre-installed themes, you can change the colors of the themes at your discretion. The design is simple and clear. The tab structure is also very simple. Unlike the official application, where the devil himself will break his leg. In the Kate Mobile Pro version, you can even organize the elements of the application as you wish.
Application features
They are unusually wide. And this is the second reason people switch from the standard client. Only here the user can anonymously use the social network. There is an "Invisible" mode. In the program settings there is an item “Be offline if possible.” And it really works. The user is online, but the application makes the social network think that he is not there. For many, this is a great opportunity to get rid of annoying “friends.” The computer version of Kate Mobile also has this useful option.
It is impossible to imagine a good VKontakte client without music and video. And Kate Mobile is great at playing this content. For this purpose, the application has a built-in player. He does his job very well. Music is loaded immediately, and video with minimal delay. Unfortunately, due to a recent mental crisis among copyright holders, Kate Mobile (latest version) no longer supports music playback. But this is the misfortune of all VKontakte clients after the release of this inadequate law imposed by copyright holders. Perhaps in the future the situation will change for the better.
What features does Kate Mobile have on Android?
After downloading, the application icon will automatically appear on the main screen of your phone. To launch your profile, you need to log in to VKontakte, after which you will have access to all the functions of the social network and even more.
After logging in, you will see the News section, where you can view the activities of your friends, their publications and posts. All you have to do is swipe right and the Profile window will open, where all the functions of the social network are available.
Kate Mobile for VKontakte - like a candy wrapper
The Friends tab will allow you to see the friends you have added. You can also see who is online. Search is available in the application, so you can add new friends.
You can post on the Wall, comment, and leave notes. This section is identical in functionality to the official application.
In the Groups tab, you can go to any community in which you are a member. You can also look for new groups to join.
Using the Photo Albums tab, you can view the photos in your albums or add new images.
The Audio section displays your playlist, which consists of added songs. You can listen to music directly in the application. However, many users note that not all audio recordings are available in Kate Mobile. You can also download the audio recording to your Android smartphone or tablet. To do this, you need to download the download manager in advance. There are quite a few such applications in the Play Market; for example, you can download Advanced Download Manager. After this, you need to click on the Play with button and select this very program.
The Audio Cache section is not available in the official version of VKontakte, but this feature is incredibly useful. Any audio recording can be cached by clicking the Save to cache button. This will allow you to listen to music even offline, that is, in the absence of the Internet. Thus, you “pseudo-download” the audio recording. Incredibly convenient feature.
The Video section allows you to view your videos. You can also search for new videos using the Search line.
In Bookmarks you can find various files that are interesting to you, including people's pages, videos, photos, links and posts.
The Replies category contains all replies to your comments and posts.
If you want to edit your profile, you need to go to the Full profile section. Editing personal data occurs by analogy with the official website (more about this in the article about the VKontakte account).
Performance
Everyone knows that the official VKontakte client is insanely gluttonous. Even very powerful smartphones sometimes think for a long time before launching it. It's a completely different story with Kate Mobile. What kind of client is this, one might ask, if he requires super-powerful hardware? But Kate works quickly even on very weak smartphones. Its structure is such that it does not require any extreme speeds from the processor and RAM. In addition, you can freely install the application on your memory card, and it will continue to work as if nothing had happened.
Usually, social network clients are incredibly slow when loading photos or videos. But this is not the case here. To save traffic, you can set the lowest quality for photos and videos in the settings. And then the page will load at lightning speed. Kate Mobile for Android can even cache frequently visited pages to speed up loading. This is a very good option, which until recently was only available in browsers. All this makes this application very attractive for those who are still using the slow official VKontakte client.
Main differences from the official client
How is it different from the official Kate Mobile client? What is this general migration to this application? Let's try to understand these “miracles”. The official application has a standard design and cannot be customized in any way. This time. The official client does not know how to work with video and music. That's two. The official utility cannot provide the “Invisible” mode in any way. That's three. The application from the VKontakte developers does not have image and video quality settings, which does not allow users to save traffic. That's four. The official client is incredibly “gluttonous” and demands a lot even from powerful smartphones. And that's five. All these points are quite enough to immediately switch to Kate Mobile.
Among other things, the Kate Mobile Pro app works great not only on smartphones, but also on tablet computers. Moreover, working with a client in the latter is a pleasure. Thanks to the big screen. The developers plan to release a version for iOS. But so far work in this direction is moving very slowly. Difficulties arise with Apple Corporation. However, perhaps soon iPhone owners will be able to appreciate all the delights of this application.
Interface of the new popular client
A distinctive feature is a simple and intuitive interface . The main screen consists of three main tabs. Each of them is of great value to the user. So, the profile displays the person’s personal information. Moreover, this tab has a large number of sub-items. With their help, a person will be able to perform certain and very useful actions. To do this, he just needs to select an item, for example, it could be a group, friends, video, audio, and so on.
Kate mobile with music - full version for download
Full review of Kate Mobile
There is also “Full profile” . All information from the profile of a particular user is posted here. To make this information easier to understand, the developers divided it into subsections. So, a person will see notes, bookmarks, documents, and so on. There is also a small sign here. It displays the number of friends, photos, groups, songs, videos and posted messages on the wall.
The news tab allows you to see group posts and interesting information about people who are on your contact list. Tab number 3 is for dialogues and is called “Messages” .
Positive reviews
This is a very important part, since it is from the reviews of real people that you can understand how a particular application works and whether it is worth installing at all. Kate Mobile for the computer, for example, did not particularly please users. Compared to the mobile version. This is understandable. Computers have a full-fledged web. And there is no need for such an application. As for the mobile version, positive reviews prevail here. Many people note fast operation, interesting design, extensive customization options, support for the “Invisible” mode and much more. Almost all smartphone owners prefer this client to the official one.
What to do if Kate Mobile's offline mode stops working
As expected, disabling the “invisibility” mode caused a storm of indignation among many VK users. Some are threatening to stop using Kate Mobile, others are calling for leaving VKontakte, others are threatening to sue, and still others are asking to sign a petition to Mail.Ru Group and VKontakte Managing Director Andrei Rogozov with a request to return the invisible mode (petition has already received the required 25 thousand votes).
Of course, time heals, and the storm of indignation will soon subside. However, on May 4, the Kate Mobile administration had already released an update to its application, giving users a slightly stripped-down version of the “invisibility” mode.
Update "Kate Mobile" with a stripped-down version of the stealth mode
Now, to ensure the invisibility functionality, the program will not update “Messages” and “News”, and you will also lose invisibility if you send a message to someone or publish an entry on your page.
Conditions for staying in “stealth mode” in “Kate Mobile”
If you want to break any of the “invisibility taboos,” the application will warn you about this with an appropriate notification.
Notification about loss of invisibility in "Kate Mobile"
The invisible mode is activated by going to your profile, clicking on the button with the image of a phone number, and selecting the “Be offline if possible” option.
Select "Be offline whenever possible" to activate stealth mode
Other alternatives that exist on the Internet either do not work or are capable of infecting your computer with any of the malignant virus programs. But if you know alternative effective options, share them in the comments to this article.
Negative reviews
However, there were also those who saw shortcomings in this gorgeous client. First of all, they complained that music and video stopped working. But this has already been said: the copyright holders are to blame here. Also, many were upset by the incognito mode. Lately he has started to work very poorly. But again, this is not a problem with the application. The VKontakte administration is weird. They don't want to support this feature since everyone uses Kate and no one pays attention to the official client.
