Top 15 Android Application Of 2018
ExpressVPN (Editor's Choice)
Price: $6.67+ per month
ExpressVPN
is one of the most trusted, secure brands in the virtual private
network industry, and that's for good reason. It's super fast and
extremely safe, boasting an SSL-secured network with 256-bit encryption
and, get this, unlimited bandwidth and speed. ExpressVPN has servers in
94 countries (including Hong Kong, Taiwan, Japan, and others) in over
145 locations around the world, so there will always be a locatoin near
you to give you the best experience possible. What's more, the service
even has stealth servers in Hong Kong. They are to evade the GFW
specifically. It doesn't even look like you're using a VPN!
1Weather
Price: Free / $1.99
1Weather
is arguably the best weather app out there. It features a simple,
paginated design that shows you the current weather, forecast for up to
12 weeks, a radar, and other fun stats. Along with that, you’ll get a
fairly decent set of lightly customizable widgets and the standard stuff
like severe weather notifications and a radar so you can see the storms
approaching. Perhaps its best feature is its minimal design which just
shows you the weather (and fun facts, if you want). The free version has
all of the features. The $1.99 charge removes ads, but it doesn't add
anything. Most will also likely enjoy the range of weather fun facts the
app offers as well. Other great weather apps include Dark Sky, Weather
Underground, and Today Weather.
Google Drive Suite
Price: Free with in-app purchases
Google
Drive is a cloud storage solution available on Android where all new
users get 15GB for free permanently upon signing up. You can, of course,
buy more if needed. What makes Google Drive so special are the suite of
Android apps that are attached to it. They include Google Docs, Google
Sheets, Google Slides, Google Photos, Gmail, Google Calendar, and Google
Keep. Between the office apps, the Photos app (which allows unlimited
photo and video backup), and Keep for note taking, you have apps for
practically anything you need to do in terms of productivity. Some of
the features of these apps include live collaboration, deep sharing
features, and compatibility with Microsoft Office documents. Microsoft
Office has a similar setup with OneDrive and Office. However, Google's
solution is just easier to use.
Google Maps
Price: Free
Google
Maps virtually owns the navigation apps scene and it remains of the
best Android apps ever. It gets frequent, almost weekly updates that
seem to only add to its incredibly generous list of existing features.
Aside from the very basics, Google Maps gives you access to places of
interest, traffic data, directions to things like rest stops or gas
stations, and they even let you have offline maps now (albiet
temporarily). If you add to that the Waze experience, which includes
tons of its own features, and you won’t need another navigation app.
Ever.
Google Assistant
Price: Free
Google
Assistant is one of the most powerful Android apps. It also works on
most Android devices. You simply download the app and then enable it.
From there, you can ask it whatever you want. It also supports a variety
of commands. You can control lights, ask about population control, and
it can even do simple math problems for you. There are a variety of
products like Google, Bose QC II Bluetooth headphones, Home and
Chromecast that extent the functionality even further. There is also a
second Google Assistant app for those who want a quick launch icon on
the home screen. The hardware stuff costs money, but Google Assistant is
free. Amazon Alexa is another excellent app in this space, but it
doesn't support flagship devices in the way we'd like to see.
Google Play Music and YouTube
Price: Free / $9.99 per month
We
don't typically recommend streaming services to people. Everyone has
their preferences and saying that one is better than another is a matter
of opinion at this point. Except for Google Play Music. The app can
read both your local files and the music you like online. Additionally,
you can upload tens of thousands of songs to the service for free.
YouTube is kind of a given. There's more content there than a human
person can watch in several lifetimes. That includes music videos,
educational videos, news videos, reviews, video game let's plays, and a
whole lot more. There is a single subscription that covers both
services. It's a fantastic deal. Word is that YouTube is working on
their own streaming service. We'll keep this list updated when that
happens.
LastPass Password Manager
Price: Free / $12 per year
LastPass
is one of those must-have Android apps. It's a password manager that
lets you save your login credentials in a safe, secure way. On top of
that, it can help generate nearly impossible passwords for you to use on
your accounts. It's all controlled with a master password. It has
cross-platform support so you can use it on computers, mobile devices,
tablets, or whatever. There are others, but LastPass always feels like
it's one step ahead. Additionally, the premium version is cheap. You can
also grab LastPass Authenticator to go along with it for added
security. There are other great options like 1Password. However,
LastPass feels a little more friendly and secure (usually), especially
with its authenticator app.
Nova Launcher
Price: Free / $4.99
Initially,
we weren’t going to put any launchers on this list. Nova Launcher seems
to be extend beyond what normal launchers are. It’s been around for
years, it’s been consistently updated, and thus it’s never not been a
great option for a launcher replacement. It comes with a host of
features, including the ability to backup and restore your home screen
set ups, icon theming for all of your Android apps, tons of
customization elements for the home screen and app drawer, and more. You
can even make it look like the Pixel Launcher if you want to. If you go
premium, you can tack on gesture controls, unread count badges for
apps, and icon swipe actions. There’s not much else to say. It’s just
that good.
Pocket Casts
Price: $3.99
Those
who enjoy podcasts probably have the easiest decision in regards to
which podcast app that should use. The answer to that question is Pocket
Casts. This insanely stable and good looking app allows you to download
or stream various podcasts for your enjoyment. It features both
audio-only and video podcast support so you can catch up on just about
anything. There is also a light and dark theme, a sign-in feature so you
can sync your podcasts across devices, and a pretty decent
recommendations function. It’s the last podcast app you’ll have to
download and one of the best Android apps out there.
Solid Explorer
Price: Free trial / $1.99
File
browsing is something everyone inevitably has (or wants) to do, so you
might as well do it with a capable, fantastic file browser. Solid
Explorer is pretty much as good as it gets in the file explorer apps
realm. It features Material Design, archiving support, support for the
most popular cloud services, and even some more power user stuff like
FTP, SFPT, WebDav, and SMB/CIFS support. It looks great, it’s incredibly
stable, and it just works well. You can get a 14-day free trial, but
ultimately the app costs $1.99 which is very reasonable. It’s one of
those Android apps everyone should have.
SwiftKey
Price: Free with in-app purchases
SwiftKey
Keyboard is one of the most powerful and customizable third-party
keyboards available. It hit the market several years ago with a
predictive engine unlike anything any other keyboard had and the app has
grown a lot of over the years. It’s a free download and you can
purchase themes for it if you want to. Other features include a
dedicated number row, SwiftKey Flow which allows for gesture typing,
multiple language support, cross-device syncing of your library and much
more. It’s about as good as it gets in the keyboard space. It’s true
that Microsoft now owns SwiftKey, but so far they have managed not to
mess it up. Gboard, Google's keyboard app, is also exceptionally good.
Tasker
Price: $2.99
Tasker
is a glorious application if you have the patience to learn how to use
the app. What it does is allow users to create custom made commands and
then use them in various places. There are many apps out there that have
Tasker support and you can even use Tasker to create very complex
commands for NFC tags. It’s difficult to truly explain what this app can
do because it can do so many things. Between the apps supported,
plugins you an add, and the sheer volume of stuff that you can do, there
aren't many apps out there as useful as this one. IFTTT is another
excellent automation app. In some cases, it may even be better than
Tasker.
Textra
Price: Free / $2.99
All
phones come with a texting app. Those apps usually aren't very good.
Textra is among the most solid Android apps out there. It covers the
basics well. You can send SMS and MMS messages to your friends. That
includes group texts. The app can also be themed. You can choose a dark
or light background, a primary color, and an accent color. Thus, no two
Textra set ups look alike unless you want them to. Additionally, a
helpful bot exists in the app to deliver news about updates and what
have you. It's better than your stock texting app.
TickTick
Price: Free / $27.99 per year
TickTick
isn't as popular as other to-do list apps. However, it may be the best
one. It covers the basics like recurring tasks, reminders, push
notifications, various organizational features, and categories. The app
also lets you share tasks and entire categories with other people. This
makes it great for family use, small teams at work, or other such
groups. It's also setup in such a way that stuff like grocery lists are
easy to do. All of the good stuff comes in the free version. The premium
version is mostly for heavier business and enterprise use.
WallpaperCraft 4K Wallpapers
Price: Free
WallpapersCraft
4K Backgrounds is probably the best backgrounds app right now. It
features tons of wallpapers at high resolutions. It boasts a collection
of 80,000 wallpapers with more every day. The app can detect your
display resolution automatically. Thus, the images you see are for your
screen resolution. That takes all the guess work out. We liked that a
lot. There are also some additional organization features and automation
features. It's completely free. You just have to deal with a little
advertising.
Zedge
Price: Free
Last,
but certainly not least on our list is Zedge. This is a wallpapers,
ringtones, notification tones, and alarm tones app that gives you an
unbelievable number of options to customize the most basic parts of your
device. On top of having an exhaustive collection of things, Zedge also
promotes various items during holiday seasons making it easy to theme
your phone up for Christmas, Halloween, and other holidays. It’s not a
100% perfect app. It does have the occasional bug and some irritating
advertisements. On top of that, their wallpaper selections may not be
great for higher resolution displays (you can find better ones).
However, no app in the Play Store does ringtones, notification tones, or
alarm tones as good as Zedge.
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