Archive for category Best iPhone Apps

Review: Radio Alarm (Best of iPhone Apps)

Aug 26

Posted by Alan in Best iPhone Apps, Clock Apps | No Comments

Radio Alarm ($1.99) is a beautifully designed alarm-clock app that can run in the background and wake you up with your favorite radio station or iPod music. But that’s not all it does, as it has a nice set of complementary features, including a sleep timer, soothing nature sounds to go to sleep to, and Retina Display-friendly graphics.

Although you probably shouldn’t rely on your iPhone to wake you up every morning (a lot can go wrong), Radio Alarm has quickly become my favorite app to do so. The app supports a local Chicago station, WBBM, I like to listen to in the morning. So it’s nice to have the station fade up in volume to gently wake me until I’m ready to hop out of bed. And if I want to keep listening over my morning coffee, I just carry the iPhone with me.

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The 175 Best Free iPhone Apps

Jul 1

Posted by Alan in Best iPhone Apps, Free iPhone and iPod Touch Apps, iPhone Tips | 1 Comment

One of the best things about owning an iPhone is the amount of good and useful free apps available. But it’s tough to comb through the 200,000+ apps in the App Store to find them, so here is a list of our handpicked 175 best free iPhone apps, in no particular order, loosely grouped by similar apps. Did we miss any? Mention them in the comments and we may add them.
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Review: FantasyMonster (Best of iPhone Apps)

Jun 10

Posted by Alan in Best iPhone Apps, iPhone App Reviews, iPhone Fantasy Sports Apps, iPhone Sports Apps | 1 Comment

FantasyMonster ($3.99, link) is an app for accessing your Yahoo! Fantasy teams (supports baseball, football, basketball, and hockey) on the iPhone, and the best toward that purpose we’ve seen yet. There are other Yahoo! Fantasy iPhone apps available, including MyFantasyTeams and the official Yahoo apps for Fantasy Baseball and Fantasy Football, but FantasyMonster is the best of the bunch by a long shot in terms of usability and legibility. A free lite version is available as well.

While other fantasy apps are adequate enough to check your weekly scores, they aren’t good for serious editing of your team. Tasks such as complex lineup changes or scanning and picking up free agents is frustrating to the point of being undoable.

But FantasyMonster utilizes drop-down menus and vertical scrolling to make it easier and more comfortable to parse information. While viewing statistics on the iPhone’s 3.5-inch screen can never be as comfortable as a larger desktop screen, FantasyMonster handles the necessary compromises well. In short, it makes editing fantasy teams viable on the iPhone for the first time.

I’ve always liked the drag-and-drop interface of the official Yahoo Fantasy sites, and FantasyMonster uses it too, allowing you to drag and drop players into qualifying starting positions or to the bench. It’s pretty surprising that Yahoo’s official apps lack this feature, but FantasyMonster has it. Drag-and-drop makes lineup changes so much quicker than the html-based checkbox method used in other apps.

Stats are quite legible—the app doesn’t try to squeeze everything onto the iPhone’s small screen at once (a flaw of the Yahoo apps). Instead, FantasyMonster utilizes side scrolling so you can comfortably swipe through and view a player’s complete stats.

News headlines are shown in a scannable list form, and tapping on them reveals the entire article in a drop-down, which you can tap again to collapse. Player news, MLB headlines, injuries, and scores can be viewed in this way. It seems the developer has studied good iPhone design techniques and has implemented them into the app.

Another area where all the other fantasy sports apps failed was with the process of scanning and adding free agents. Any fantasy player knows that free agents and the waiver wire is the most important part of fantasy sports. FantasyMonster, with its readable text and stats, is the first app with a usable interface for scanning, sorting, and adding free-agent players.

There are a few things we wished the app handled better. One particular annoyance is how it displays messages (or doesn’t) with the loss of an Internet connection. In one particular instance while viewing player news, a lost data signal meant an error screen taking over the entire screen. I could no longer read player news, despite the fact the info had already downloaded. Likewise, while trying to log in, the app asked me to reenter my login information, while the real problem was that there was no Internet connection.

Conclusion

FantasyMonster is the most usable app we’ve seen for managing your Yahoo! Fantasy sports teams on the iPhone. It offers solutions for the limitations of the iPhone’s small screen and makes editing your team, parsing lots of stats, and picking up free agents doable for the first time.

FantasyMonster is a $3.99 download in the iTunes App Store.

Review: MyFitnessPal Calorie Counter App for iPhone

Apr 27

Posted by Alan in Best iPhone Apps, Free iPhone and iPod Touch Apps, iPhone Calorie Counters, iPhone Diet Apps, iPhone Fitness Apps | No Comments

MyFitnessPal (free, link) is a calorie counting and tracking app that uses an extensive online database to simplify finding the calorie counts of foods. It helps you lose weight by displaying a suggested calorie total for a desired weight loss pace, then subtracts your actual calorie intake against it. For a free app, MyFitnessPal offers some powerful features, and it syncs with the excellent MyFitnessPal website.

While keeping a calorie journal up-to-date on a daily basis can be difficult in the long-term, the conveinence of carrying around the journal in your pocket or purse makes it a little bit easier. Even if you can’t keep up the calorie journal for too long, using MyFitnessPal is worth it simply to clarify the total calories of all the food you eat in a single day, as you may be surprised how calories can really build up.

There is one important thing to note about the app: ~~it requires an Internet connection~~ (a recent updated add offline functionality)—there is no offline mode. Essentially, it is an extension of the MyFitnessPal website, which the app saves your data to. The first time you launch the app, you’ll be asked to create an account as well as set up your dieting goals. For example, if you want to slowly lose weight, you can set a desired weight loss rate of 0.5 pounds/week, or if you want to move faster, 2.0 pounds/week. Then the app takes over and tells you how many calories you can consume (or have left to consume) in order to be on pace to lose weight.

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Review: ShopSavvy Barcode Scanner (Best of iPhone Apps)

Feb 8

Posted by Tanya Menoni in Best Free iPhone and iPod Touch Apps, Best iPhone Apps, Shopping Apps, iPhone App Reviews | 2 Comments

When we reviewed the top 3 barcode scanners including Shopsavvy back in December, we were somewhat disappointed in the test results. Each performed well in a certain area, but none provided the complete picture, namely both quick scanning and solid price search results. We’re happy to say that due to a recent update, ShopSavvy‘s (free, iTunes link) scanner has improved dramatically to the point it’s a clear winner, and we have added it to our list of Best of iPhone Apps.

ShopSavvy is one of those apps that just makes your life a little easier, especially if you’re a big shopper or bargain hunter. Say you’re at the store shopping for a new speaker dock for your iPhone. You find one you really like, and you want to buy it today, but you’re not sure if the store has a good price. With the ShopSavvy app, you simple scan the products barcode using the iPhone’s camera and get a list of prices from online retailers for comparison purposes.

One of the things we liked about Shopsavvy over the better-selling RedLaser app is that, in addition to prices from dozens of online stores, it provides prices from Amazon.com. Anyone who shops online knows that Amazon is a great weather gauge for prices. RedLaser does not include Amazon.

The ShopSavvy iPhone app has other neat features that make it a must download. Some results have accompanying product reviews so you can check on quality. The app offers a Wish List where you can save items for future shopping. Another feature is Price Alerts, where you can set a low price and be alerted when a product dips below that threshold.

To scan an item, you launch the app and tap ‘scan,’ which opens the iPhone’s camera. Position the guides over the barcode and hold still while the app scans. I was surprised just how quickly and successfully ShopSavvy can scan barcodes. It takes literally seconds in most cases.

The app functions best when pricing items commonly available online like media (books, video games, cds, etc). We tested the app in an auto-parts store, a major electronics retailer and a bookstore, and ShopSavvy offered results for just about everything we threw at it. Once it identifies the barcode, the product page pops up with reviews and online prices. If you’re having a hard time scanning the barcode, you can also manually enter the UPC number.

The app is not perfect. We were somewhat disappointed in results for grocery items. I scanned a bunch of food boxes at home, and it either didn’t recognize the barcode or didn’t have a corresponding product page. The developer claims that “at the end of the day, price comparison on bottled water isn’t important,” but I disagree. Another problem was that some of the prices in the search results were “false positives,” showing expired deals or weird eBay prices that weren’t accurate. The app also has a problem scanning barcodes on curved surfaces.

ShopSavvy will also show local prices for products if they are available, in addition to prices from online retailers. These feature is probably great for people in large cities, but it had few local prices for my small town, which is understandable. According to the developer, ShopSavvy works best on the iPhone 3GS, which has an auto-focusing camera. However, I tested the app on a 3G with good results, especially in stores. At home, just use good lighting (the brighter the better) and don’t expect much success with food items. My advice: try it out in a store first to appreciate how well it works.

Conclusion

ShopSavvy is an impressive app that works incredibly well. I found it especially useful for books. If you come across an interesting book at the bookstore, you can scan it and read reviews, and you’ll have a record of it if you decide to buy the book later. While I would appreciate more grocery coverage, I’m not going to knock them for that—the true value of this app is in high-value comparison shopping. Needless to say, I wish I had this app when I was Christmas shopping, and it earns a spot on our Best of iPhone Apps list. Highly recommended.

ShopSavvy is a free download from the iTunes App Store.

Review: Top 5 Financial & Investing iPhone Apps

Jan 26

Posted by Alan in App Reviews, Best iPhone Apps, Financial Apps, iPhone Apps With Push Notifications, iPhone Financial Apps | 1 Comment

The iPhone comes with a default Stocks app to track stock prices, but many investors quickly seek an alternative because the app lacks any financial news coverage and its quotes are delayed by 20 minutes. We took a look at the top 5 financial iPhone apps: Yahoo! Finance, MarketWatch, CNBC Real-Time, Bloomberg, and AOL’s DailyFinance, and although each has its own qualities, two stood out from the crowd, CNBC Real-Time and Bloomberg. Below are our reviews for each app, sorted by ranking.

1. CNBC Real-Time

CNBC Real Time (free, iTunes link) is one of our favorite apps because of its slick interface, quality of original video content, useful push notifications, and real-time stock quotes (thus the “Real Time” in its name).

While apps like Bloomberg and MarketWatch offer more text content, Real-Time is all about video, and they do it very well, offering long clips from various CNBC shows. The videos feature important or interesting moments from the CNBC broadcast day, but again, the clips are usually long, usually 8-10 minutes and are almost always worth watching. Real Time does offer text articles too, but they’re somewhat sparse when compared with the other apps.
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Review: Top 5 White Noise Apps for the iPhone

Dec 11

Posted by Tanya Menoni in Apple iPhone, Best iPhone Apps, iPhone App Reviews | 3 Comments

If you’ve ever tried to study, read, or fall asleep in a noisy place, you know how frustrating it can be to concentrate on the task at hand. White noise and relaxation apps can help you block out annoying outside noises, but they’re also useful if you just need some help relaxing at the end of the day. The iTunes App Store has a plethora of relaxation apps, and these are our picks for the best white noise apps.

1. White Noise

whitenoise

The White Noise app ($1.99, iTunes link) has 40 sounds to choose from, including popular favorites like beach waves, crickets, thunderstorm, city streets and more. The app also includes more obscure sounds like air conditioner, vacuum cleaner or hair dryer. I’m not sure who would want to listen to those, but they’re there if you want them.
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Review: Groups 2 (Best of iPhone Apps)

Nov 24

Posted by Alan in Best iPhone Apps, iPhone App Reviews, iPhone Contacts App | 5 Comments

Groups 2 ($4.99, iTunes link) is an app from Guided Ways Technologies that lets you to create, edit, and delete groups of iPhone contacts, something you can’t do with the iPhone’s default Contacts app. You can then use these groups in useful ways such as sending emails or SMS text messages to those groups, or organizing your contacts by upcoming birthdays. Want to email your entire family about your upcoming vacation with a single tap? Groups is an app for that.

I found Groups 2 a pleasure to use. The app has a beautiful, intuitive interface that Apple should take note of for their own Contacts app. Perhaps the best example of the app’s slick design comes when adding a contact to a group. You hold down your finger on a contact for a heartbeat or two to make a Rolodex card icon appear. You then drag and drop the card into any group to add it. It’s a quick and simple way to organize your contacts.

The groups you create with the app are added to the iPhone’s default Contacts/Phone apps, which in turn means they’ll sync and backup to iTunes, Address Book (for Macs), and Outlook (for PCs). You can color-code each group’s label to make them stand out from each other and add a colorful look to the app.

Groups also comes with a smart dialer (the developer calls the technology Callway). The smart dialer searches through you contacts as you punch in the digits (or the corresponding letters, depending on what your goal is). Once you narrow down the list to find your desired contact, you tap the contact to dial.

Groups also has a feature called smart groups that works a lot like iTunes’ smart playlists. With smart groups, you can automatically create groups using parameters like area codes or whether or not the contact has an email associated with it. For example, you can create a smart group that will tell you what contacts have birthdays coming up in the next 30 days. Every time you open that list, it repopulates with the nearest birthday showing first. Pretty cool.

There aren’t many downsides to the app other than it’s a bit of overkill for the purpose of creating groups of contacts. But on the other hand, the app is so well designed, it could replace the iPhone’s default Phone app for making everyday calls. It offers everything the iPhone’s Contacts app does, including the ability to create new iPhone contacts.

Conclusion

Groups 2’s ($4.99, iTunes link) quick, slick, and powerful interface makes it an excellent solution for creating groups of contacts on your iPhone and could even serve as a replacement for the iPhone’s default Contacts/Phone apps. The most obvious use of Groups is as a solution for mass emails, but it’s also a good way to organize and clean up your contacts using features like smart groups. Overall, we found the robustness of the app’s feature set to be impressive, and we highly recommend the app.

Listen to Every NBA Game With Official NBA Game Time App (Best of iPhone Apps)

Oct 26

Posted by Alan in Best iPhone Apps, Radio Apps, iPhone Sports Apps | 1 Comment

NBA Game Time 2009-10 ($9.99, iTunes link) follows in the footsteps of MLB At Bat 2009 in offering streaming radio on the iPhone for every NBA basketball game of the season. This means you can listen to the home or away announcers of your favorite NBA team for every game using 3G/EDGE as well as WiFi. The app also offers push notifications to keep you updated on game scores of your favorite teams as well as a host of other features like a live scoreboard and video highlights.

List of features:

- LIVE Home and Away Radio from Every Game
- Push Notifications for the Teams and Games you choose
- Game Previews and Summaries
- Team Rosters and Player Search
- Detailed Player Cards
- Daily League Leaders
- League News from NBA.com
- LIVE Scores
- LIVE Stats for Teams and Players
- Quarter-by-Quarter Scoring
- Game Clock
- Starting Lineups
- Video Highlights from Every Game.
- Full-Season Schedule
- Schedule Picker by Team
- Conference, Division, and Overall standings
- Twitter™ updates from the NBA’s official feed!

NBA Game Time is a $9.99 download from the iTunes App Store.

Review: Top 5 Paid iPhone Twitter Apps

Oct 19

Posted by Tanya Menoni in App Reviews, Best iPhone Apps, iPhone Twitter Apps | 4 Comments

Do you really need to spend your hard-earned money on an iPhone Twitter app? My advice: probably not. There are a variety of free Twitter apps that get the job done — TweetDeck (review, iTunes link) is a prime example. However, there are a few paid Twitter apps that are slick, feature-packed, and useful for advanced Twitterers. Here are reviews of the top 5.

1. Tweetie 2 (Tweetie 2 is now the official free Twitter app)

~~Tweetie~~ Twitter is the king of ~~paid~~ of all Twitter apps, and this newly released update only improves on the original. Tweetie 2 (free, iTunes link) has been completely rewritten and boasts a ton of new features. These include an offline mode and very sweet iPhone contact integration that allows you to add Twitter friends to your contact list. Tweetie 2 also has a variety of nifty composition features, including URL shortening and the ability to browse recent hashtags. The new app also saves drafts of your tweets, which seems a bit ridiculous but may be nice to have.

Overall, Tweetie 2 is a joy to use and a prime example of what a good iPhone app should be. I particularly love the glowing blue indicators that tell you when you have a new DM or mention. The interface is gorgeous and intuitive, and there are few Twitter apps that can match its impressive array of features. While I love the app, I do think it’s lame that current Tweetie users need to buy the new version separately, but it’s certainly worth the price.

Overall rating: 9/10. If you’re willing to pay for a Twitter app, Tweetie 2 should be at the top of your list.

2. Twitterrific Premium

Twitterrific Premium ($3.99, iTunes link) can’t quite match Tweetie 2 when it comes to features, but few Twitter apps look as good as this one. It has an incredibly smooth, polished design that fits in well with the iPhone look. However, Twitterrific Premium loses some points when it comes to usability. The navigation is just not very intuitive, and some of the icons are not immediately recognizable. I could see Twitter newbies getting overwhelmed quickly. I’ve also had some slow response times recently. The last time I fired up the app, I saw “loading Tweets” for several minutes before I gave up and relaunched the app.

These complaints aside, Twitterrific Premium is a great Twitter app — once you figure out the navigation. I’m willing to forgive some questionable layout decisions because it looks so good.

Overall rating: 7.5/10. Tweetie 2 is easier to navigate, but Twitterrific Premium has the edge when it comes to design. While it’s a sweet-looking app, I have to question whether it’s worth the extra dollar over Tweetie 2.

3. Twittelator Pro

Twittelator Pro ($4.99, iTunes link) is not as nice to look at as Tweetie 2 or Twitterrific Premium, but it manages to incorporate a ton of features into an easy-to-use interface. The navigation is satisfyingly simple, thanks in large part to labels under each icon (something I wish Twitterrific would incorporate). Icons you use often — refresh and compose — are placed prominently at the top of the app. Twittelator Pro can be slow to respond at times, and it normally requires at least a few taps to bring up a link or photo from a tweet.

Like most paid Twitter apps, Twitterlator Pro lets you manage multiple accounts, create subgroups, save drafts, and follow conversations between followers. You can also record and tweet video (3GS only) or audio directly in the app.

Overall rating: 7/10. Twittelator Pro has all the features most users will need in a Twitter app, but at $4.99 I think it’s just a tad too pricey.

4. Echofon Pro

Echofon Pro ($4.99, iTunes link) looks very much like Twittelator Pro, and it’s just as easy to use. The interface is well laid out, although the standard color theme is a little hideous (fortunately you can change it). You can manage multiple accounts and save tweets to read later. Icon badges for new tweets, mentions and messages are a nice touch.

Echofon Pro is not lacking in features, and it has one that sets it apart from other Twitter apps — push notifications when you receive a direct message or mention. This cool feature is reliable and works well; if you need to stay on top of your Twitter account at all times, this is an invaluable feature.

Overall rating: 7/10. Push notifications give Echofon Pro a leg up on its competitors, but a hefty price tag and lackluster design lead to a lower rating.

5. TwitBird Pro

TwitBird Pro ($2.99, iTunes link) currently supports push notifications between TwitBird and TwitBird Pro users, which is essentially worthless. Fortunately, the next update will include global push notifications. TwitBird Pro has the basics that most users will need, including multiple accounts, groups, landscape mode, and a variety of search options.

After testing out Tweetie 2 and Twitterrific Premium, TwitBird Pro is rather underwhelming. It’s a perfectly decent, fast-loading app, but it lacks the polish of the best Twitter apps. The design could use a little refinement, and the menu structure requires a lot of tapping.

Overall rating: 6.5/10. Right now, TwitBird Pro can’t compete with Tweetie 2 or Twitterrific Premium. Check back after the developers add global push notifications and the story might be different.

Tags: Twitter Apps with Push Notifications