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Best Apps To Make Your Life Easier

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Are you looking for the best apps for your smartphone or tablet?

Do you find the app stores utterly overwhelming when it comes to choices and knowing which are the best free apps?

This post introduces you to our top 9 best apps that are a must when it comes to your Android, iPhone or tablet.

best apps

We are all busy people, and with a million and one things to get accomplished in a week, we can use all the help we can get. Luckily, one of the benefits of living in the era of the smartphone is that there are a multitude of apps out there that can help us make life easier.

9 Best Apps to Make Life Easier

Here are a few apps that are a must to make life run a little more efficiently.

#1: Meal Planning & Grocery List from Food on the Table

Do you plan your weekly meals based on sales at stores? Or are you more likely to shop based off of delicious recipes you find on various recipe sites around the web? Either way, the Food on the Table app will help you organize your shopping list so that it makes sense for you. Easily browse meal ideas or add your own recipes; then, simply add them to your meal plan to auto-populate your grocery list. This app helps you save time and money- what’s better than that? As a bonus, by logging in with the same username, you can access your grocery list on multiple devices.

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#2: Check- Bills & Money

Keeping track of everything that needs to be done in a day is tough enough without worrying about getting bills paid on time. With the Check app, it remembers when you’re bills are due so that you don’t have to! This app is amazing, in that it sends you reminders when your bills are due. However, instead of it just being a simple alert, you can pay the bill right when you receive the reminder or even schedule the payment to be made. You are even able to get low funds or credit limit alerts as well. This app for your phone is a convenient, centralized location to manage all of your bills.

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#3: Pocket

When working or browsing the internet, how often do you find something you just know you want to read- but have no time to read it? Pocket lets you save content that you want to view later, and syncs it automatically across your phone, tablet and computer so you can read it when you’re ready, on the device you want. A fantastic feature of Pocket is that it saves everything from recipes to articles to images to even videos, so you can save anything that catches your eye.

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#4: MapQuest

Whether you travel frequently far away from home or just spend a lot of time running errands around town, the MapQuest app is pretty much a necessary part of life. In addition to maps and driving directions, the app also will let you know anticipated time in current traffic. In addition, there’s voice-guided navigation and you can even select walking directions- perfect when you’re in a city and are desperately trying to find the restaurant where you’re meeting friends for dinner (or so I’ve heard).

best apps

#5: Evernote

Many of us often have ideas or notes we need to make when we’re far from our computers or a pen and paper. Who knows when blogging inspiration will hit or you need to remember what store you saw a must-have pair of shoes? Since our phones are usually easily within reach, Evernote solves this problem perfectly. You can even snap a picture or record some audio and save it. It syncs seamlessly across all of your devices so you’re never without any information you might need- and it’s free!

#6: Bloom

How often are you actually inspired to tackle things you need and want to do in a day? From career points like making new connections to healthy reminders like remembering to take a yoga class, Bloom delivers regular inspiration for you to get motivated. You can customize each inspiration item with an image, and then add in a song from your iTunes account to round it out. This app takes reminders to a new, much more fun, level.

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#7: NoteHub

Browsing articles and blogs on my iPad is one of my constant evening habits. Often, I will want to make a note about something or share a screenshot with comments about various items on the screen. NoteHub lets you do exactly that. Once in the app, you can open your browser with the NoteHub toolbar and make drawings or notes right on the screenshot.

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#8: The Weather Channel App

The key to this app being the most useful is to be sure you have notifications enabled! Weather can be unpredictable, especially in the summer, so having a notification that a severe thunderstorm is going to interrupt your planned miniature golf outing can help avoid a lot of chaos. With daily weather overviews, 10-day forecasts, and even pollen alerts, you can easily plan your days around the weather.

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#9: Familiar

How quickly does your phone fill up with amazing photos and videos that you can’t wait to share with your family- but then they get lost in the shuffle and long forgotten? Familiar saves your best memories from such a fate. Familiar turns every screen into a 21st century photo frame directly connected to family and friends. With Familiar, the best and cherished memories are displayed on the screens of loved ones into a customized channel. It’s simple: capture a moment and send it directly to the screens of your private network. You and your loved ones can experience the best memories again and again- photos AND videos- for free!

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Interested in More Posts Like This on Best Apps?

Then you do not have to look far! Here are three posts similar to this one on best apps that are a must read.

About Ashley Abele

Ashley is a mom of 3 young children, social media consultant and blogger. She focuses on strategizing for bloggers and small businesses to help them reach their online potential and subsequent sales potential as cofounder of Other Half Media. When she’s not busy creating blogger outreach programs, email or social media campaigns, she blogs her life, parenting, and frequent moves at My Front Porch Swing. Connect on @AshleyNAbele on Twitter and on Facebook.

About Ashley Abele

Ashley is a mom of 3 young children, social media consultant and blogger. She focuses on strategizing for bloggers and small businesses to help them reach their online potential and subsequent sales potential as cofounder of Other Half Media. When she’s not busy creating blogger outreach programs, email or social media campaigns, she blogs her life, parenting, and frequent moves at My Front Porch Swing. Connect on @AshleyNAbele on Twitter and on Facebook.

Reader Interactions

Comments

  1. Lissa says

    I am the techy geek, I am in love with remote control apps such as LogMeIn or other cheaper forms of the app. There are many for Android too. I just recently found the walkie talkie app Zello simpler then Voxer, I love my WP app just to approve comments but have posting trouble. I have ton of camera apps using Camera + the most. Love Revel, Instagram and have all the fun collage apps, PS Express, Photobook, PicStitch, framatic, textFoto, and tons of others to play with but I never seem to have a consistant run of photos to fill a collage as I prefer my camera over my phone. Lightbox is great for a crafter and most of all I am a junkie with stylus, and yes you can get good ones with a pen at the end at the dollar store every now and then! The pen is better then the stylus but Sketchbook Mobile is awesome, PS Touch, I love to doodle. Keeper keeps all my passwords in tact, I never will forget a password again, plus it will log me in for me if I use it on my phone to pay bills,Amazon, Ebay and Craigslist, Nomorerack.is fun to browse, I have bought fromt them a few times. Pinterest annoys me on my phone because Google images does a better job but it is still a good reference. My Micheal’s and JoAnns apps are the bomb because I always have a coupon as a crafter it’s a must. Fb messenger makes life easier, until I got my selected friends on Zello made me happier. I am an Amazon Prime member so the kids can’t complain about a movie in a boring situation and Netflix then of course the silly little games I keep stored when I don’t have service on my way to camp or just bored. They mostly just sit there in folder and get overlooked. If you have a little one, Read me stories is a great app for part of their school’s 20/20 requirements. I have way to many apps and spend way to much time on my phone.I am sure I even replied on the fb page about apps! What a nerd! I wish you could deactivate but still see the ones you don’t use all the time, like in WP plugins. I LOVE sharing app likes, I think it’s great! I always go for the trial version first but it is annoying to open a new app and they want you to rate it before even using it!

  3. Ajay says

    Awesome list!
    We can make use of all these apps in our daily life. But, among the above list Evernote is my favorite one.

  5. Lisa says

    I would add the Pinterest app and Runtastic if you love running or walking. It’s amazing what the apps can do for us once we learn about them and start to use them.

  6. Alex Morris says

    These are great, thanks! There are a few games I’d recommend as well, for a bit of escapist fun. The very best app game I’ve come across is Cut The Rope, which is physics based and really excellent! Plus Tetris, of course, which is just a timeless classic. And it’s very good for mental health, apparently!

  7. Inked Pixie says

    I’m definitely gonna down load 1 & 2 two!! Check sounds like a really amazing tool!! I’m gonna download Evernote too…. Always seen it in the App Store but never saw its appeal but it seems to be popular among bloggers… gotta be worth a try!!

  8. Grace says

    Food on the Table is great & my children enjoy the Weather Channel app. Bloom seems fun. I’m looking forward to trying Check, Pocket & NoteHub.
    Thanks for sharing these apps!

  15. Deee Dee says

    Okay #1 & #2 will definitely be downloaded. I hear lots of bloggers talk about Evernote, bloggers love it. Great list.

  16. Michelle says

    These look great and there are a few on here that I was not familiar with! I’ll definitely be checking them out! That Food on the Table app sounds really interesting!

  18. Jennifer says

    These are all great. I have no idea why someone would pay for a GPS app or program when they have a smartphone and can use MapQuest.

    • Ashley says

      I know! That voice-guided navigation saves me constantly, especially here in Texas 🙂

  19. Charlotte says

    I definitely need to download Pocket; all too often I come across a site or something I want to save for later, but either I forget, or I close the window, or I email the link and just never get around to reading it. What a great idea! And thanks for some other great app suggestions.

    • Ashley says

      I am guilty of the emailing a link too- and then losing it in my inbox! It really is such a great tool.

  22. Tiffany says

    Thanks so much for sharing…Pocket and Notehub are two apps i definitely need to look into…they seem like they can help make my days go much better…

  23. Rabia @ TheLiebers says

    I’ve heard lots of good stuff about Evernote, but I didn’t know it had an audio component. That’s what I really need when inspiration hits in the middle of traffic!

  24. Jeanette Nyberg says

    I use a bunch of these apps, but I just discovered the Food on The Table app, which makes me soooooo happy. I went through a bunch of grocery-type apps before finding this one, and I think it’s definitely the best one. Thanks for all of these great suggestions!

    • Ashley says

      Notehub is a good one, particularly when you’re checking out site design, etc. Great for making comments right on the page! I hope you enjoy Familiar!

      • Darlene with BlogBoldly says

        OH!! NoteHub! I thought you were saying “EverNote”

        If I put EverNote on my list it would just be another BIG chore to add.. but this little NoteHub looks doable.

        Will check that one out.

        darlene 🙂

      • April @ illistyle says

        Thanks for the list! When I saw Note Hub I instantly went “Oh, I could show my IT guy exactly what I am talking about with site design changes!” Great minds.

    • Ashley says

      Yes, my 7 year old is the same way! He has always been obsessed with weather, it’s so fun to watch.

    • Ashley says

      Pocket has literally changed my online reading life. It’s fantastic! Let me know what you think!