Application development continues to increase for both iOS and Android. With so many applications to wade through, it’s getting harder and harder to find the best apps for your phone. Here are the most useful of 2013: from music apps, to games, to utilities, here are some iPhone apps to take a look at throughout the new year.
Around Me
Around Me will let you find the hottest places around you to eat, shop, gas up your car, and more. With the click of a button, Around Me uses GPS to find a series of related businesses that are nearby. Its database includes banks, bars, coffee shops, hospitals, and hotels. If you combine this with Google Maps, you can easily navigate even the most unfamiliar of places. Especially useful for people that drive for a living, this app is sure to make its rounds in 2014.
Shazam
What’s a list without some music applications? Everyone knows of Spotify and Pandora, but here’s a cool app you can use in conjunction with those. This allows you to put your phone near a music source and output the song and artist name. While it’s not 100% accurate, it does come up with the correct response most of the time.
Bwin
I’m a sucker for card playing games. Even though real money is no longer legal in the US, I still like to play for fun. My game of choice is Holdem and my favorite app is made by bwin casino. You can play in tournaments or simply play single table. Play with online opponents, or start a game with friends. If you’re a fan of the Android, there’s also an application for that platform.
Find My iPhone
With iPhones being so incredibly pricey, it’s important to have a fail safe if you happen to lose it. This nifty application is capable of giving you a few tools to help get your phone back. It can display messages to the screen or play loud songs remotely. You can also get the GPS coordinates of your phone’s position on a map right from your web browser. This application will come in handy multiple times from just misplacing your phone to someone actually stealing it.
IM+
These days it’s not as simple as everybody using AIM. There are a half dozen popular instant messaging services ranging from MSN to Yahoo, to Facebook. With so many protocols it’s nice to have an application that can be logged in to all of them. IM+ supports most of the popular IM protocols and comes with a sleek easy to use interface.
Google Translate
This is such an incredibly useful tool in workplaces that are multi-lingual. If you’re issuing quick instructions to an employee but don’t have enough time to bring in someone who can translate, this app is amazing. Of course, like any other translation software, Google Translate is not perfect. However, nearly all of the time the person reading the translation is able to comprehend what is being communicated.