Requires a device with a camera, £1.19
Get it here
If you are into photography, Hipstamatic is essentially an application that you must own. If you are anything like me and have basically no knowledge of photography, you will still think that it is great. If you do have reasonable expertise in photography you will have to bear with my amateurish explanation as to what this app does. Essentially, Hipstamatic makes the photographs you take look like they were taken on a disposable camera. The nostalgic effect this produces is surprisingly refreshing in my eyes and adds some much needed character to photographs. After using this app to take passport style photographs for contact pictures and social network websites I find the regular style photographs taken with the iPhone to seem pretty boring.
The app comes with various “lenses” and types of “film” and “flashes” each which change the effect of the photographs taken. There is also a large amount of in app content that can be purchased including many more lense, film and flash types.
For the price I find the app great value for money, but those wishing to try all of the various add-ons may find the app to become rather expensive.
Navigation – Around me
Requires GPS, Free
Get it here
Simple, free and great. I have been using this app on both my iPhones for years. Basically what this app does is tell you what is “around you”, be it a bar, petrol station or even Apple retail store and highlights which ones are closest. From there you can view the item on a map, get directions there or find the address or telephone number. The app does contain adverts but there is a paid version that does not. The ads are quite non-intrusive however so I would suggest that purchasing the ad-free version may be a waste of money unless you intend to use the app a lot and hate adverts.
Navigation – NavFree UK & ROI
Requires GPS, Free
Get it here
The only satellite navigator you will ever need and it is free. Don’t bother with expensive rivals like TomTom or Navigon, simple as that. Read my review here.
News – Sky News
Free
Get it here
In my eyes, this is the best news application for iOS by an absolute mile. For me, many news apps seem to have awful interfaces (such as the times application for example). The sky news app is simple with a scrollable list of top stories and no confusing menus. As a bonus, the app also lets you watch live sky news on your device. Again this app is free and as somebody that likes to check their news frequently on the go and has made use of a lot of news applications over the past few years, personally I would say that this is all you need.
For those of you wanting more variety the BBC news app is also pretty good, but again, I don’t really like the interface. I would suggest avoiding the Times’ application, it used to be half decent but has been ruined by updates.
Technology – Engadget
Get it here
Considering Engadget is an online website dedicated to posting articles about up to date technology it is pretty ironic how seldom the official app for the site is updated. To be honest though, if you like to keep updated with your gadgets, you can’t really beat Engadget so you should download this app to your device. One gripe I would mention concerning this app however is that the comments for each article don’t seem to be formatted as well as they could be. Maybe when the app gets its next update (don’t hold your breath waiting) this problem will be rectified.
For anybody wishing to find news only on Apple products, I would also recommend the TUAW application.
Video Playback – VLC media player
Currently unavailable on the iOS app store
If you watch video on your computer, chances are you have heard of VLC, the media player that seemingly plays every type of file that you throw at it. On an iOS device this is especially welcome as out of the box there are few types of video file that an iOS device can actually play. There is however a problem. VLC is no longer in the App Store; it was removed earlier this year. This leaves you with two options; either get the app from install0us if you have a jailbroken device or try this similar video app for iOS. Hopefully one day we shall see VLC return to the app store.
To read how to get this app from install0us read this.
One thing to remember when using this application is that as videos are not converted before being put onto your device they tend to take up more memory. If you have time and wish to store as much video as possible it is usually better to convert your videos and play using the regular iPod app.
General – App Box Lite
Free
Get it here
Honestly this app isn’t actually that great and I would appreciate it if somebody were to suggest a better alternative to me, as I have never actually bothered to look properly. App Box Lite does what I need it to do however, adding things such as a converter (think length conversions, weight conversions etc.), a date calculator, a loan calculator and a “days until” feature to the iPhone plus many more features. Personally I find it kind of annoying that these features are not included on iOS devices as standard. Pretty much every other kind of phone from the past 10 years has at least had a basic conversion application installed on it and for me App Box Lite has been what I have always used to gain this functionality.
Browser – Opera Mini Web Browser
Free
Get it here
If you are on a carrier like mine with woeful GPRS Internet speeds, or would just like your Internet pages to be loaded a little more quickly, Opera mini is the browser for you. It works the same way as the desktop equivalent; compressing web pages before they load on your device so you spend less time waiting for them to load whilst simultaneously lowering your data usage, great if you aren’t on an unlimited plan. To be honest, apart from this, mobile Safari is much better especially at rendering pages (this is noticeable on the picture on the left), zooming and scrolling, but for me, in areas with poor signal, Opera mobile always seems to outperform the default iOS browser Safari.
It is worth remembering that some people consider Opera to be a less secure browser than Safari so if you need to be as secure as possible, Safari is better.
Travel – The Trainline
Free
Get it here
This app helps you plan your train journeys, look at train timetables and buy train tickets. Its extremely easy to search for stations and you can even locate nearest stations using GPS if your device has that capability. Personally I think this app is easier to use than thetrainline.com, which is about the highest compliment I could pay to any app. If you take a lot of trains then you have nothing to lose by trying this free application.
Weather – Celsius – Weather and temperature on your iPhone home screen
£0.59
Get it here
One of the things many Android users seem to like about their devices is the ability to add widgets to their homescreens. Widgets are similar to app icons that change to reflect certain things like the weather or signal strength of a wireless connection. On iOS the only thing similar to a widget is the app icon for the calendar which changes to show the current day and date. Other apps are forbidden from having app icons that can change in this way.
However, the developers of this app have been clever. This app displays the current temperature right on your homescreen in the little red circle that appears over an app icon to show notifications. It updates automatically every hour to reflect the temperature in your current environment.
To me, this makes this app the perfect weather app as apart from this the app is quite similar to the default weather app, which I like, but with far more information about the forecasted weather over the next few days. The interface is very clean and simple.
For American users, there is also an app that displays the temperature in Fahrenheit.
Thanks for reading! This post took me ages to compile, hope you enjoyed it!
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