Looks like Craigslist finally found an app developer on Craigslist. The longtime internet classifieds site, which launched in 1995, has created its first mobile app, now available for free in the iOS App Store.
“Find jobs. Hire employees. Post your resume. Offer your skills/services,” the company says in a description for the app, which comes with its familiar peace-sign logo as the app badge. “Buy & sell cars, trucks, boats, RVs, motorcycles, trailers auto parts,” it continues before dryly listing a host of other things you can do.
9 to 5 Mac pointed out that Craigslist’s arrival — with a “no-frills, simple design” — comes 11 years after the launch of Apple’s App Store, though there had been many third-party Craigslist clients for iOS over the years.
Bellevue, Wash.-based OfferUp certainly didn’t wait that long to bring its online marketplace to mobile app users. The company is often called a “Craigslist challenger” as it connects buyers and sellers looking to unload or purchase everything from bikes to bunk beds.
But it’s been doing it with a mobile-friendly platform much longer than Craigslist and its day-old app. Along with Amazon, eBay and other retail giants, OfferUp is consistently a top app in the iOS and Android shopping category. OfferUp won App of the Year at the 2016 GeekWire Awards.
Craigslist will have its work cut out for it to catch up to OfferUp’s app performance, which has been downloaded more than 80 million times, according to a figure cited by GeekWire last month. Founded in 2011, OfferUp has 260 employees in Bellevue and is a rare Seattle area “unicorn,” valued at more than $1 billion.
