Smartphones undeniably have been a very integral part of our lives for the past few years, and apps are one of the reasons why we can never put our handsets down. Here’s a look at some of our apps we love to use everyday for fun and productivity, and you might like them too.
There are tons of apps to choose from, and what we present here are just a few of the awesome ones that you can easily download from your respective app stores. Apps are mentioned in this article in no particular order. Icons are from the Google Play Store and are arranged in order of mention on each section. Apps might be exclusive only to the Android platform, to which the writer has more familiarity due to his current smartphone.
Music
How about an app that can stream music? Spotify is one music app you shouldn’t miss. Easily listen to any of your favorite local or international artists anywhere on any platform, including PC. An affordable monthly premium is also available, allowing you to download your favorite tracks for offline use and get uninterrupted streams, eliminating advertisements in-between songs. Soundcloud is also a great online app if you like to listen to covers of your favorite songs, or record one yourself.
If you like your songs on your memory card, music players like the stock Google Play Music for fancy Material design and animation, Shuttle Music Player as an alternative, or PlayerPro for the ultimate music player can save the day.
Heard that tune before but can’t recall the title or the artist who sang it? Shazam‘s got you covered with music and TV information in seconds. Soundhound is a great alternative as well.
Photography
We might all agree on this one: VSCO Cam is probably one of the best, if not the best, photography apps around. Its community of curators give life and new meaning to photography through the app’s powerful set of photo-editing tools that never fail to bring out the best in each shot you take.
Productivity and Lifestyle
To wake up early in the morning for many is quite challenging, and there are no words to describe the beauty that is of Timely, an alarm app. The in-app music that wakes you up in the morning is far more pleasant than the default alarm ringtones on my phone. It is also a challenge to stop the app from ringing, as various methods and puzzles can be implemented to stop the alarm. A good alternative is Alarm Clock Plus, and it can really wake you up with all the math equations configured to the difficulty of your choice.
Our team is a bit torn between the Google Inbox and the GMail app: While a few consider Inbox to be very useful as all emails marked done and cleaned out ends their day, I personally prefer the traditional columns and streams of email lines in GMail. Dropbox’s Mailbox is also a great alternative email app if you don’t want yourself to bother with all the Material Design and stick to a clean, minimal interface.
Note-taking apps are very handy in times of need and Evernote is one app that’s never leaving my phone. Cross-platform syncing and easy notetaking simply made me fall in love with this app. Google Keep is also worth a try if you are for simpler notetaking apps that still sync. When we’re not typing small notes, we often leave the task to document editors such as Microsoft Office Mobile, and put them in online storage apps such as Dropbox so we can share them to more people in an instant.
Need a separate to-do list? Wunderlist might just do the trick for you. It keeps your reminders and lists so you can organize everything you need to do. If you need a new calendar, SolCalendar‘s support for stickers on calendar dates makes planning and organizing fun and enjoyable.
Travel and Navigation
The MMDA Android App is very useful if you want to check and avoid traffic along EDSA or C5 during the rush hour. Couple that with Waze, a crowdsourced navigation app, and you’ve got yourself a pretty good tool to detour the metro and avoid the hassle of getting stuck along a major highway. If you don’t feel like driving and want a cozy ride home, a taxi-grabbing service such as Uber can help.
If you’re up for a travel, why not spend some time with a few apps as well? Skyscanner is a great app to compare flight, hotel, and car rental prices to places you plan to spend your vacation time with. Discover thousands of places to stay in — Whether paid homes by checking the Airbnb app, or receive and experience warm local hospitality through Couchsurfing.
We know that not everyone uses these partly due to having a different OS ecosystem, or has better apps and alternatives in mind. You can jump in the conversation and recommend your favorite apps at the comments section below. We’d love to know the apps you’re using, and we might try them out too!
Have spare change in your iTunes account, check out 25 Paid iTunes Apps Worth Paying For.
I tried vsco cam and it is very nice. Useful din yung snapseed and autodesk pxlr. No doubt sa google keep! But if you want less ram, Colornote is your choice. For travel and Nav, i never tried any of those apps. I prefer free app since it has no difference sa paid app. Other useful apps for me are Clean master, vlc or mx player, and pocket,
may mobile website ang yugatech? ang hirap mag basa kase
Wala mobile site ang yugatech
unless your phone is a windows phone. some apps above isnt available in windows yet.
PLEX – if you have a large collection of movies in your PC, this is probably the best app to manage, organize and share media content from your pc to multiple devices in your home network.
AIRDROID – another useful tool for pc and android devices
thanks for the info.
For music:
I have either Fusion Player. It’s a well-rounded music player.
For photography though:
Almalence’s A Better Camera has it covered for me. It’s controls are good, plus it has ISO support.
For lol’s and funny trips, look for “henshin camera”.
As for to-do lists:
Any.do got me covered. Productivity at it’s finest.
Box.com > Dropbox.com in terms of free space and file storage. Box doesn’t destroy the .doc format like Dropbox does when I’m using my iDevices.
Timely!
looloo for food
Pic tap go for photography (paid app but worth it)
hide it pro. alam na. hehe
Zomato! the best app for looking for restaurants in Metro Manila.
hello, i downloaded the Microsoft office mobile app last week in my s4. using my msi primo 81 how come I cant see it anymore in the play store?
Compatibility issues, maybe.
If you’re looking for food download ZOMATO, it’s the best food app out there.
Onedrive, microsoft office, outlook and here maps for microft users.
Google is spying ur emails and files when u use its products
Iftt
Audio Manager – Best way to hide apps/videos/files.
Nice selection of apps and I must admit that 80% of what you recommended I already have on my Nexus device. I do wanna add these Photography apps on the list: Afterlight, Fotor, Handy Photo, Over, Perfectly Clear, Fragments, Snapseed, Repix, Facetune, Aviary, and After Focus.
Really? You really need that explained to you? Can you please just get off the internet so the general iq average goes up. Please?
NEED talaga ha?
paki-explian nga bakit sinabing ‘NEED TO DOWNLOAD”?
‘Need to download’ is meant to encourage people to go beyond the usual social media, messaging, and games apps and see your smartphone in another perspective. There are tons of apps in the app markets waiting to be discovered, that’s why we set up this article and even ask you to share your apps. There’s no use debating over this, downloading these are still within your discretion. I mean, I’m not forcing you or anything…
@wetete
Ang BANO mo naman. It’s an expression lang just like “must-see” or “must-watch.” So pag may nakita kang 10 must-see movies this year, tatanungin mo din?
i’d say poweramp blows playerpro and any other music player out there except noozy w/ noozxoide.
plus, officesuite 8’s new UI is awesome and is the most feature-rich mobile office i’ve used. wps office is awesome too.
Airdroid,for wireless transfer between your Android device and a PC. Also lets you read and write text messages.
MightyText is a similar app, which also has a fairly capable graphics manipulation module for your gallery.
Come to think of it, not sure now if MightyText provides for transferring files between mobile and PC, but it does have the SMS read-and-write feature
This is mainly me, but I can’t use a keyboard other than MessagEase. It’s the first thing I would install on a new Android device
Contacts+ augments the stock Contacts app by integrating your contacts’ social media accounts — Facebook, Twitter, LinkedIn, Instagram (I think — I don’t pay much attention to it:), etc. From Contacts+, you can view your contact’s FB, Twitter, LinkedIn, etc, profiles, and I think even leave PMs (haven’t tried that yet). Picks up their profile photos from FB.