SnapTell Explorer brings Instant Product Lookup to the iPhone

July 2009

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When I decide to buy something, I often wander around the Internet to search for product information, user reviews and compare the price among major online stores.

I not only like to take an informed decision while buying something but also want to be sure I get the best deal.

If you're like me then SnapTell Explorer from SnapTell is definitely an iPhone app you need to install on your iPhone.

SnapTell Explorer is very simple to use. You launch the iPhone app from your iPhone's home screen, take a photo of any books, CD, DVD or video game cover. SnapTell automatically recognizes the item and gives you the links about the product to Amazon, YouTube, Wikipedia, eBay, Barnes & Noble, etc. You can get all the product information along with the product review at one place. The app also looks up the price of the item and shows you the lowest price. You can just click on the link to purchase the item online.

The recent upgrade of SnapTell Explorer adds support for local price search. By making use of iPhone's location service, users can now view the availability and price of the product at local stores. You can also get directions to local store or call the store directly. The local price feature is pretty great addon to this awesome application. However, it currently supports local stores in US only.

Amazon's Amazon Mobile which I had reviewed earlier includes a feature known as Amazon Remembers that is quite similar to what SnapTell does. But, unlike Amazon Remembers, which relies on a manual process to recognize the product image (making it slow), SnapTell Explorer can recognize the product image using its proprietary image matching technology. And, the recognition process takes few seconds. You don't need to wait for it. I have tested out the application with different product covers, including book cover, camera manual, CD and DVD.This handy application recognizes them accurately even in low/bad light condition. And, the search for item information takes less than 10 seconds.

For now, SnapTell Explorer only supports the search of book, CD, DVD or video game, as SnapTell claimed. I tried to take photos of some other items to see if it works. I tried to take a photo of my iPhone box. SnapTell Explorer returned a book about iPhone. And, when I took a photo of my Panasonic digital camera, it returned a photoshop book in the search results. Then I tried to take a photo of my Nikon D80 camera. This time SnapTell Explorer returned with "No match found". The interesting thing was that SnapTell Explorer tried its best to search for related items available in its database.