With macOS Mojave last year, Apple brought its Apple News app to the Mac for the first time. Because of this change, Apple News URLs open directly in the Apple News app itself, bypassing Safari completely. A new third-party tool, however, gives you the option to have Apple News links open in Safari by default.
Called StopTheNews, this app takes an Apple News URL that you might find on Twitter, Facebook, or another social network, and finds the original URL for the story. It will then open directly in Safari, as opposed to launching in Apple News. It’s a pretty simple idea, but one that can save you quite a bit of time in certain circumstances.
Here’s how it works:
Why would you want to do this? The Apple News app on the Mac can be a bit buggy and slow to open. If you want to just quickly skim an article, it’s generally easier to read in Safari than it is Apple News.
When StopTheNews gets an Apple News URL from Safari, it loads the page invisibly, finds the URL of the original article, and then opens the original article URL in Safari.
Personally, I love Apple News for browsing and finding articles I might not find other places. When it comes to Apple News links, however, I’d much rather open them in Safari than deal with having another application open on my Mac – especially if I just want to quickly skim that article or add it to my Reading List.
You can download StopTheNews for free right here.
