Comcast Releases Free App for Android Phones

Comcast has released its free mobile app for smartphones in the Android Marketplace. The app, which was introduced for the iPhone last year, allows users of the cable providers Xfinity service to access phone, e-mail and TV functions from their cellphone.

Users will now be able to:

• Access their home voicemail and forward home phone calls from the Xfinity Voice service to an Android device
• Review voicemail and e-mail messages through the Xfinity mobile widget
• Synchronize their Universal Address Book among locations to have all their personal and professional contacts in one place
• Review and response to Comcast.net e-mail
• Remotely program and manage their DVRs so they never miss a show
• View local TV listings, sort by different categories and watch Video-On-Demand movie trailers.

With the introduction of the Android version of the software, Comcast is renaming it to the Xfinity Mobile App, which, no doubt may confuse some users who will be searching for “Comcast” when looking for the program.

The Xfinity mobile software is the second app Comcast has released in recent weeks. In November, it released a TV app for the iPad. That app allows cable subscribers to browse listings, perform text-based searches, record programs on a digital video recorder, and change channels using their iPad. It also allows them to make live recommendations of programs to other users on the network.

This increase in app activity is just the start of the company’s future plans to expand outside its customers’ domiciles. “We won’t stop here,” Cathy Avgiris, Comcast’s senior vice president and general manager, said in a statement. “We’ll continue to extend access to our services outside the home with convenient apps that our customers can use anywhere, anytime and on as many different devices as possible.”