EACH WEEK, WE highlight five apps that are worth downloading for your smartphone and tablet. There are a lot of apps released on a daily basis, but not all of them are worth paying attention to.
This week includes an instant messenger that lets you chat via GIFs, a handy way to organise emails on mobile and a faster way to read non-fiction books.
Relay GIF Messenger
For: iOS, Android
Cost: Free
- You know how GIFs are really popular on the web now? Considering there are so many reaction GIFs out there, it’s surprising it hasn’t been included in any messaging apps until now.
- Relay is like any other messaging app except you get to communicate through the medium of GIFs. It’s more amusing than you would expect.
- Finding GIFs is pretty easy. All of them are broken up into categories like anger or excitement and you can search YouTube videos as well if you struggle to find one that conveys your mood.
- You can create your own GIF if you want by using your camera, but if that fails, you can just use normal text instead.
- How no other instant messaging service has included this is unclear, but you will have a lot of fun with it.
Blinkist
For: Android
Cost: Free (€6.99 p/m or €44.99 p/y)
- There are so many books out there to read, but how often are you able to sit down and dedicate a few hours to them? Probably very rarely unless you have a lot of downtime.
- Blinkist boils down non-fiction books into the space of 5-20 minutes, broken down into segments that will only take two minutes to read.
- It covers a number of categories such as entrepreneurship, health and happiness, productivity and politics and history among others.
- All summaries are curated and written by experts and are rather comprehensive so you get the gist of what the book is about.
- If you read many self-help, tips, or guide books, then this app will cut down reading time significantly, or if you want a summary of your favourite non-fiction books.
Afterlight
For: iOS, Android, Windows Phone
Cost: €0.89 (iOS) €0.72 (Android) €0.99 (Windows Phone)
- There are numerous image editors out there, and one of the most popular versions out there has made its way to Windows Phone.
- Afterlight is both a straightforward and powerful image editing tool that is up there with the best of them.
- To summarise, it has (deep breath) 66 textures, 57 filters, 8 adjustment tools and the traditional cropping and transformation tools.
- You can also sync up your Instagram account and view photos and comment on them within the app itself.
- If you’re serious about photo editing, give it a try.
Accompli
For: iOS, Android
Cost: Free
- Despite being around for years, email hasn’t really changed that much. Some like Mailbox has changed how you interact with them, but it’s still the same.
- Accompli splits up your email into two main sections, important and others, allowing you to focus on the emails you need or want to reply to.
- Over time, it learns which ones you define as important and it’s intuitive, bringing your calendar and attachments in the one place.
- It works with all the main email providers, Gmail, Yahoo, Outlook.com and others.
- If you’re regularly replying to mail over mobile, then you have to download this.
Block X3
For: iOS, Android, Windows Phone
Cost: Free
- There are some great puzzle games appearing on Windows Phone recently, and there’s another one to add to the list.
- Block X3 is a simple game: match up three blocks of the same colour to complete a level. Cue “easy to learn, hard to master” approach to games like this.
- The game uses a pixel style design which keeps things clear and straightforward, not to mention it’s easy on the eye.
- Things get tricky quickly as you need to complete levels in a set amount of moves. With 200 levels available, you’re not going to complete it in a hurry.
- A good brainteaser which will certainly keep you occupied for a few minutes.
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