Articles about Best iOS Apps

Sixteenth in a series. Apple reported its second quarter results this week, and they beat analyst expectations with the iPhone doing especially well. Apple shipped 4.14 million Macs, 16.35 million iPads and 43.72 million iPhones during the quarter. iPhone sales grew by 16.8 percent while iPad sales declined by 15.9 percent. Although the iPad’s slump looks very bad in the quarter you have to remember Apple struggled to meet holiday demand the previous year, leading to an inflated number of shipments in the March 2013 quarter.

New and updated apps worthy of your attention this week include a Sonic racing game, a "ridiculous animal simulator", an activity tracker, a travel app for iPad, a world-time clock, and an alternative to Fruit Ninja with better graphics.

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Fifteenth in a series. Featured apps this week include the latest installment in the excellent post-apocalyptic fitness app Zombies, Run!, a Heroes of Warcraft card game, a full iPhone video editor from Pinnacle, a piano tutor, a new MediaFire app for iPad, and a DJ mixing tool for iTunes and Spotify.

As always, if I miss an app that you think should definitely have been included, let me know in the comments below, or drop me an email.

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Fourteenth in a series. While catastrophic bug Heartbleed can potentially affect some versions of Android, iPhone users are safe. Apple has confirmed that "iOS and OS X never incorporated the vulnerable OpenSSL software and key web-based services were not affected". So that's some good news.

Featured apps this week include Adobe Lightroom for iPad, RollerCoaster Tycoon 4 Mobile, Carousel (a photo and video sharing app from Dropbox), Family Guy: The Quest for Stuff, Drync for iPad (a wine cataloguing and ordering app) and Warhammer Quest (a hack 'n' slash RPG).

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Thirteenth in a series. Apple has confirmed that its Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), will be kicking off on Monday June 2, at San Francisco’s Moscone West. The five day event will give developers (and the press of course) the chance to "learn about the future of iOS and OS X". At last year’s conference Apple unveiled iOS 7, Mac OS X 10.9 Mavericks, a new MacBook Air lineup, iTunes Radio, iCloud Keychain, and much more.

In other news, Microsoft says its newly released Office apps have been downloaded 12 million times since launch.

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Twelfth in a series. Microsoft rolled out Office for iPad this week, and it's excellent. Like Apple iWork, it's not a single app but rather three individual apps for Word, Excel and PowerPoint (an updated OneNote is available too). You need an Office 365 subscription to get the most out of it, as without one you can only view documents.

Other featured apps this week include a modern remake of Little Big Adventure (a classic game from the nineties), a touch typing tutor, a drawing app for children, a sweeping and rather too addictive Game of Thrones RPG, a Captain America tie-in, and a group text messaging app.

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Eleventh in a series. Apple rolled out a cheaper 8GB version of its iPhone 5c this week (in selected territories) and also replaced the aging budget iPad 2 with the newer, 4th gen iPad with Retina Display. The replacement iPad, which is available everywhere, is priced the same as the iPad mini giving potential buyers an interesting purchasing dilemma.

Featured apps this week include one of the best looking games yet released for iOS, an app which claims to boost your fitness in just four minutes a day, one which will help you avoid people you don’t want to see, and a game which could help find a cure for cancer.

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Tenth in a series. A big week for Apple as it released the long-awaited update for its mobile operating system. iOS 7.1 adds support for CarPlay, enhancements to Siri, iTunes Radio, Calendar, and Accessibility, and a new HDR camera setting for iPhone 5s. The big news for owners of iPhone 4 is iOS 7.1 runs far less sluggishly on the older hardware.

Of the new and updated apps that have arrived in the store this week, highlights for me include a free adventure game from two ex-LucasArts designers, an app which transforms everyday snaps into works of art, one that stops you forgetting...er… something… and a kitchen app that that will let you find, and conjure up, delicious culinary delights.

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Ninth in a series. This week Google updated its Gmail app, adding background refresh, so it can now fetch new mail even when it’s not open. This is a great addition, and stops you having to manually refresh to check for new messages. Google also added simplified sign-in. Log in to any Google app -- Gmail, Maps, Google+ or Chrome, for example -- and your account details will be used to log you in to all other Google apps automatically.

Of the new apps that have arrived in the store this week, there's a great, easy to use file transfer tool, an app that will help you monitor and (maybe) manage your caffeine consumption, a social local discovery tool, a dance game, and a cartoon racer that will let you go head to head against Top Gear's The Stig.

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Eighth in a series. The app that’s got me most excited this week isn’t even out yet. Audio Defence: Zombie Arena, from the makers of Papa Sangre II, is an audio-only first person zombie shooter that promises to be awesome. If it can hit its Kickstarter target that is.

Of the new and updated apps that have arrived in the store this week, the Professor Layton inspired The Voyage is a great puzzler, and God of Light will similarly tax your gray matter. Parents worried about what their children get up to on the web while using an iPad (or iPhone), will be interested in the MetaCert browser. Google has improved its Hangouts messenger apps, and a chunk of the world's knowledge has been curated into Learnist.

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Seventh in a series. There was no round-up of iOS apps last week, not because there weren’t any worthy releases -- this is iOS, there are always great apps to cover -- but because I was away. I’m back now though, and so normal service is resumed.

This week there were some great new apps and games released, including a stunning adventure set inside a pop-up book, a 3D tour through some of nature's wonders, and a game that aims to improve your listening skills (something my wife says I need to do -- or at least I think that's what she says).

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Sixth in a series. I'm a massive fan of the Broken Sword series of games, so this week was a great one for me as I finally got to download and start playing the brand new Broken Sword adventure on iOS. I'm pleased to report it doesn't disappoint. Thanks to mobile devices (and Kickstarter and Indiegogo campaigns) classic adventure series are getting a whole new lease of life, which is fantastic. Fans of classic games will be thrilled to know there's a "new" Final Fantasy game out this week too.

With the Winter Olympics upon us, Apple has gathered together a collection of official Sochi 2014 apps, including the Athletes’ Hub which is well worth a download.

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Fifth in a series. A big week for Apple as the company delivered record fiscal first quarter results -- $57.6 billion revenue and $13.1 billion net profit. The tech giant revealed it had shipped 51 million iPhones, an all-time quarterly record, compared to 47.8 million a year-ago, and 26 million iPads, up from 22.9 million in the same period a year ago. Wall Street wasn’t impressed, but that’s to be expected.

Of course a big part of Apple’s success is the number and quality of apps available for its hardware. As the owner of both iOS and Android devices, I find the apps for the iPhone and iPad to be vastly superior (although there are always exceptions). There’s less garbage, and far fewer ad-riddled apps. Part of that reason is Apple’s strict approval process, and the amount of money it pays to developers -- $2 billion in its fiscal first quarter -- helps too.

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Fourth in a series. Unsurprisingly, after last week’s post-holiday rush of big and important new releases and updates, things have quietened down a little in the App Store.

There’s the usual collection of interesting apps and games, of course, but nothing massively groundbreaking this time around. That said, as ever, I’ve found plenty of apps to take up space on both my iPad and iPhone 5s.

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Third in a series. The holiday season is well and truly behind us now and there's lots of big and important new releases and updates in the App Store this week. One of the most significant is a new app from Google which sees the search giant challenging Apple’s own iTunes Store (albeit with some very important Apple-appeasing limitations).

Elsewhere, cloud storage service Box announced that it has rewritten its app to make it "super-fast, simpler to use and more immersive", and as an incentive for users to try it out the app now comes with 50 GB of storage for free, which definitely makes it worth the download. You can read more about the update here.

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Second in a series. Big news for Apple this week as the tech giant announces that App Store sales topped $10 billion in 2013, including over $1 billion in December alone. iOS users downloaded almost three billion apps in that one month, which is an incredible figure.

Now the holidays are over, it’s back to business in the App Store, and lots of new apps have been released or updated and there are loads of great new games out too.

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