Amazon circumvents Apple's restrictions with Kindle for iOS update

Amazon has updated its Kindle for iOS app and some of the new features introduced by the company have gone on to show the widening rift between it and Apple. The Kindle for iOS app now has the ability to search its catalogue of books online, a massive change from having to be redirected to Amazon’s website to search and buy books.

Ever since Apple introduced a rule that forced apps to give it a 30 percent cut of all sales, Amazon has been up in arms about it. The company also ends up splitting profits with publishers, so offering Apple a huge 30 percent cut was very difficult for Amazon. To get around this issue, Amazon had to introduce a round-about solution that sent a user searching for books to the website in order to search and purchase them.

No restrictions will stop Amazon

When you searched for a book within the application, you would only be able to see results from your own library. In order to purchase books, you had to end up browsing the website as you could not purchase via the app. Now, the app will let you search and download a free sample of books from within it. If you’re interested in purchasing the full book, the app will offer to send you an email with the link to get it after you’ve reached the end of the freebie.

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To circumvent Apple’s roadblock, Amazon had launched an HTML5-based MP3 store for iDevices in January this year, The store, with a 22-million song catalogue enabled users to make song purchases straight from their iPads and iPhones.

You can download Kindle for iOS from the App Store and start downloading free samples right away.