Stack Exchange launches on Android with a combined feed and notifications, says iPhone alpha is ‘coming soon’

Stack Exchange today released an Android app for Ice Cream Sandwich (verison 4.0) and up. You can download the new app now directly from Google Play.

With over 120 communities in the Stack Exchange network, the company decided it needed to create “an entirely new experience” for mobile that didn’t exist on the Web. The result was a single combined feed where users can check in on everything relevant across the network, regardless of how many sites they participate on:

The Stack Exchange feed has the following features:

• Customized recommendations of questions you can answer, based on the sites and tags you participate in.
• Interesting questions tailored to your interests that will learn from your activity and get better over time.
• Updates when you get upvoted or your answers get accepted, so you can feel good about helping others wherever you are.
• All your replies (answers, comments, chat messages, etc.) in one easy timeline.
• Community events, blog posts, and even recommended jobs for you from Careers.

The feed aside, you can search for questions, ask or answer new questions, leave comments, vote, and even flag or vote to close. You can also configure your device to automatically open the app when you tap a Stack Exchange URL.

Last but not least, the app supports notifications for replies, just like on the site. You’ll get pinged whenever you get an inbox message on Stack Exchange, which includes answers, comments, chat replies, and so on.

This is just version 1.0; the company says a tablet-optimized version of the app is next, followed by missing features users ask for. To make suggestions, you can submit feedback on Meta under the “android-app” tag.

Stack Exchange today also promised an iPhone alpha is “coming soon,” possibly in the next six to eight weeks. Users will be invited in waves on a first-come, first-served basis – if you’re interested, sign up here.