Overhauled communications software due in a week, new version for iPads coming, too.

Using Skype on Apple iPhones will be five times faster than they are now with Microsoft’s release next week of Skype 5.0 for iPhone.

The goal of rewriting the app “from the ground up,” says Microsoft in a blog, is to make Skype on iPhones familiar to anyone who has used Skype on Windows Phone and Android phones, but at the same time take advantage of features unique to iOS.

Some of the new features:

• For people using Skype from multiple devices, the new client will sync notification status to all devices. So if a message is read on users PCs, it will also automatically be marked as read on their iPhones.
  
• Messages sent when recipients are offline will be delivered when they log back on.
  
• Group chats can be initiated from the home screen.
  
• Scrolling from screen to screen is smoother and is punctuated by animations.
  

Microsoft says it is prepping a new Skype version for iPads “soon” as well.

Via: networkworld