See every side of the story.

The Problem and the Idea

Most people read the news from a few places that already fit their view, and rarely see how the other side tells the same story. Finding out means opening many sites and comparing them yourself. NewsGauge does that comparison for you. It puts left, center and right coverage of a story side by side, so you can see who is reporting it, who is not and how they word it. It does not rate stories. It counts the outlets and shows you the headlines.

• 100+News sources, each labeled left, center or right
• 3Outside bias raters combined for every label
• FreeNo account, no paywall

How It Works

1. 

   1. Scan the feed

   Every story shows a bar from left to right, so you can see where the coverage leans before you open it.

2. 

   2. See who is covering it

   Open a story to see how many left, center and right outlets are reporting it, and each outlet's headline.

3. 

   3. Compare the words

   The words each side picks are highlighted, with one short line on where they split.

Design Decisions

A count, not a verdict

NewsGauge never says a story is biased. It counts how many left, center and right outlets are covering it and shows you the numbers. You decide what to make of them. That keeps the app from becoming one more voice telling people what to think.

👀

Real headlines

See how each side words the same story.

🔍

Gaps show up

When a side is not covering a story, the app says so.

Three colors that mean the same thing everywhere

Blue is left, purple is center and red is right. The same colors appear on the feed bar, the labels and the counts, so a color always means the same thing. Each story also gets a marker on the bar that shows where its coverage leans.

🏷️

Not just color

Each outlet also has a Left, Center or Right label in words, so you never have to guess from color alone.

🎨

Color on every row

Each outlet's headline has a blue, purple or red line beside it.

The exact words, side by side

Two headlines about the same story can feel very different. Instead of describing that difference, the app shows it. The words each side chose are highlighted, and one short line sums up where the sides split.

📰

Named outlets

Each headline shows where it ran, like The Atlantic or the New York Sun.

📝

Both views explained

A short summary explains how left and right outlets each cover the story.

Your reading habits stay on your phone

After a few days, Insights shows how your reading splits across left, center and right. It also pairs each story you read with how the other side covered the same topic. There is no account, and your reading history never leaves your phone.

⚖️

Check your balance

See at a glance whether you mostly read one side or all three.

🔄

A different view

Each story you read, paired with the other side's take.

How I Built It

I designed NewsGauge from start to finish, all the way to the app stores. Here's how it came together.

1. 1.Product definition. Decided what the app is and isn't. It shows coverage and counts it. It does not rate stories, take sides or ask you to sign up.
2. 2.Choosing the sources. Picked more than 100 news sources and labeled each one left, center or right by combining three outside raters: AllSides, Ad Fontes Media and Media Bias/Fact Check. No single rater decides.
3. 3.Design. Designed the screens around two questions: who is covering a story, and how do they word it. Also kept the color meaning the same on every screen. The screens were designed in Figma before they were built.
4. 4.Privacy. Left out accounts and logins on purpose. Reading history stays on the phone and is never sent to NewsGauge, and nothing is sold.
5. 5.Build. The app runs on React Native with Expo and is styled with Tailwind. Firebase collects and stores the headlines. Gemini groups the ones about the same story, filters out junk and explains how each side words a story. The code lives on GitHub.
6. 6.Launch. Store listings for iPhone and Android, with a privacy policy and a support address.

How Claude helped

I made the product and design decisions and directed the work. Claude, Anthropic's AI coding assistant, wrote much of the code and drafted documentation. I checked everything on a real phone before calling it done.

The design system

The app uses one shared set of tokens for its colors, spacing and type, rather than one-off styles. A few simple rules keep every screen feeling like the same app.

• Blue, purple and red are reserved for left, center and right, and are not used for anything else.
• Tailwind styles the screens. The accent color and the fonts are set once in the Tailwind config, so changing the accent there changes it across the whole app.
• Each color has a light and a dark value. The app follows your phone's theme, with a light or dark override in Settings.
• Every count is shown the same way, as a number inside a ring, so one glance reads the same on any screen.
• Each label is a small colored pill with a plain word in it: Left, Center or Right.
• A story's lean is always shown on the same bar, from blue on the left to red on the right.
• Headlines are large and plain, and every screen leads with one clear heading.

Try It Yourself

Live and free on Google Play and the App Store. It's a new launch, with no subscription and no account required.