How to: Google+ easily from your iPhone (UPDATE)

UPDATE – 2011-07-20: Google has released the official app for iPhone which features push notifications and a nice clean interface. This can be installed directly from the app store, and requires iOS 4 or above. The following guide is obsolete, and is here for historical purposes. (and, of course, for those still running iOS 3)

If you’re like me, you like to integrate you online social life with your real social life as much as possible…

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…after all, some events we go to we hear about through social networks. Most people achieve this seamless integration by using a smart phone.

Earlier this month, I talked about Google’s 3rd attempt at entering the social networking market, but one thing it is lacking, is an official iPhone app:

Google assures us that the iPhone/iPod app is coming soon, and I don’t doubt them, but for the impatient, there is a quick and easy way of accessing your account from the home screen.

Note: This method runs through the Safari browser, and because of this, features such as “push” don’t exist. If you want push notifications, you’ll need to wait for the official app. This is just a workaround for the meantime.

First thing you want to do is go to the mobile Google+ site: http://m.google.com/plus

If you’re reading this on a computer, and you have a QR reader installed on your phone, here’s a quick link:

When that loads, there’s a button informing you to sign into the site, click that and log in with your details, and you’ll be presented with the mobile Google+ page:

On Mobile Safari, there’s an option button next to the forward button, this will bring up a selection of tasks you can do:

When this menu you appears, there’s an option to “Add to Home Screen”, when you click that it will ask you what you want to call the “App”:

The name “Google+” should be good enough, but change it if you want, and when you’re happy, press “Add”.

After that, iOS will show the link on your home screen for easy access.

Again, there are no push notifications in a web app, so you’ll need to keep checking Google+ every now and again for updates, but hopefully, it won’t be long until Google release an official app which will, hopefully, include all the features of the web app, and the rest of the features you’d expect a native iOS app to include.

Cheers