Flow for iPhone is the product ID app we have been waiting for

If you’ve ever played with Google Shopper, you’ll know that the GOOG has done a nice job with the app. It both skips the need for barcodes and lets users identify products by simply pointing their phone’s camera at their cover. Amazon has just released an app that does the same thing, only it’s exclusively tied to Amazon’s online store. The app recognizes products just as well as Shopper, and is generally smoother, quicker, and more attractive.

With Flow, simply point your phone’s camera at the cover of any product, and it will be identified. Not only did it work flawlessly in our limited testing, it throws in the bonus of working quickly (at least on the speedy iPhone 4S that we tested it on).

On pointing your iPhone’s camera at something, you will see a series of points on the display that indicate the image data that is being used to identify the product. That data is sent to Amazon’s servers and compared against a database.

At this point, most similar apps (including Shopper) first boot you out of the camera view and into a separate screen with product details. Flow handles this much more seamlessly. After identifying the product, its information is immediately placed on the display, creating an augmented reality view. This allows you to quickly move from one product to another. You know, it flows.

The information it returns is, of course, all connected to Amazon. Price, shipping, and (where applicable) trailers can all be viewed directly from the heads-up display. Those who like to do free advertising for Amazon can also share the product via email, Twitter, or Facebook. You can also “Buy Now” directly from the camera screen.

If you want more info on the product, you can simply click on the the pop-up info to be taken to a more detailed page, which is essentially a reskinned version of what you would see in the standard Amazon mobile app. Here, you can see more product details, customer reviews, pictures, and other buying options.

Your history of scanned products is presented in a “cover flow”-like format that lives at the bottom of the main augmented reality screen. It appears to be using the same UI as Amazon’s upcoming Kindle Fire, and it makes for easy access to all of your recent scans.

If you do much of your online shopping at Amazon, then you will want to get this app right now. It’s easily one of the most useful and attractive augmented reality apps we have seen. Right now, it’s only available for iOS, but we wouldn’t be surprised to see an Android version soon.

Flow in the App Store, more at Amazon A9