Foursquare plans to move check-in feature to new app called Swarm

Anyone who likes checking into the places they visit may be familiar with Foursquare. Foursquare addicts would probably find it hard to imagine the mobile app without that prominent feature, but it seems that they'll need to do so pretty soon, as the developer team behind Foursquare is ditching the check-in feature along with some of its social aspects.

According to Foursquare CEO, Dennis Crowley, most users either want to find interesting venues nearby or see where their friends are and what they are doing. However, they seldom did the two things simultaneously – apparently, only 5% of all user sessions had "both social and discovery". At the same time, the check-in button that obtrusively shows up whenever you open the app prevented users from further engaging with Foursquare, making it unnecessarily complicated.

Because of this, the developer team plans to move the social aspects of Foursquare to a separate app called Swarm. You will be able to use Swarm to check in, connect with their friends, and see if any of them are currently nearby. One of the key aspects of the app is that it won't reveal your exact location – it will only show that you are somewhere in a given area and won't give away your current whereabouts.

Swarm will be available for iOS and Android in the coming weeks, while a Windows Phone version is also reportedly under development.

Crowley also revealed that Foursquare is currently being rewritten from scratch in order to focus on local discovery and exploration. This way, the app will provide its users with even better recommendations about adjacent points of interest. What's more, the CEO reveals that thanks to its location-guessing engine, dubbed Pilgrim, Foursquare does not need your check-in – it uses various methods to pinpoint your location. This, combined with the impressive database of roughly 60 million points of interest, will enable Foursquare to give you better recommendations of nearby venues that might catch your attention even if you don't check in anymore.

The developer team will also release a completely transformed version of their Foursquare app this summer, which will reportedly work seamlessly with Swarm, just like the Facebook app works with Facebook Messenger.

source - Foursquare | The Verge