Shopping App for Health, Science Unveiled by Purch

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Purchx app screenshot
(Image credit: Purch)

Live Science's parent company, Purch, just launched a shopping app called Purchx that will allow users to comparison shop for fitness gadgets, baby gear, skin care and various other health and tech products.

The iOS-based app, which was acquired by Purch in March and called Consumr at the time, boasts 3 million products with consumer reviews from other users of the app. It also features price comparisons with products in nearby stores and online sellers such as Amazon, as well as those for Purch's online store — called Purch Marketplace — which just launched today (July 14). (Users of the Purchx app can choose either to Buy Nearby or Buy Online to see those prices.)

In addition to searching for the app's products on your iPhone or iPad, you can scan barcodes to pull up those items.

The app also lets users compare a product with the Top 20 in that category. For instance, if you're looking at the Fitbit Aria Wi-Fi smart scale, you can swipe through other smart scales, one at a time, and see the specs of each product compared with the Fitbit Aria scale. These specs include price, reviews and review ratings.

When you're shopping for baby car seats, you can see how each car seat in the top 20 rates for fit, ease of use, sturdiness and installation. Other baby products include nursery items, strollers, baby health (vitamins and ointments) and products for nursing moms such as breast pumps and vitamins. The health category includes a slew of product types, from those for the digestive system, like acid reducers and fiber, to health devices such as blood pressure monitors and hearing and vision items, to allergy and sinus medicines.

Some products are sold directly by Purch Marketplace; these products span three categories — electronics, software and smart home — and have been reviewed by Live Science or other Purch websites, such as Space.com (for telescopes and binoculars), Top Ten Reviews, Tom's Guide and Tom's Hardware. Products with high ratings from one of these websites will have a Purch Badge attached to it.

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Jeanna Bryner
Managing editor, Scientific American

Jeanna Bryner is managing editor of Scientific American. Previously she was editor in chief of Live Science and, prior to that, an editor at Scholastic's Science World magazine. Bryner has an English degree from Salisbury University, a master's degree in biogeochemistry and environmental sciences from the University of Maryland and a graduate science journalism degree from New York University. She has worked as a biologist in Florida, where she monitored wetlands and did field surveys for endangered species, including the gorgeous Florida Scrub Jay. She also received an ocean sciences journalism fellowship from the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution. She is a firm believer that science is for everyone and that just about everything can be viewed through the lens of science.