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Top 25 Must Have Android Apps
Here is a list of our Top 25 Best Android Applications. The list is in no particular order as we consider all of the listed apps, Must-Have’s. Best of all… They are all Free.
1. Advanced Task Killer 
Price: Free | Type: Application Task Manager
This Application will increase the speed and battery life of your phone. Android Applications often start on their own, hog system resources, and slow down your phone. This app should be considered mandatory for any Android Owner. Some people however, say that this app is unnecessary, we find their arguments to be more theoretical than fact based. We find this application significantly improves the phones performance and gives users the needed control to close applications when they choose.
2. Go SMS Pro 
Price: Free | Type: Text Messaging Application
Go SMS Pro is hands down the best text messaging application on Android. Once installed, this App will replace your default Android text messaging app with a full featured application that will make you question why it does not come with the phone. Top features of the application include;
- Go SMS will allow you to remove the text caption from your new messages from the menu bar and replace it with a notification icon.
- Notification Icons are customizable and can be changed for different contacts.
- Sound notifications can be customized for your contacts.
- The ability to block/filter text messages from unwanted senders.
- The ability to add plugins – such as Emoji!
- When you are using your phone and you receive a text message, a popup will appear on your screen displaying the message and offering you the ability to, respond, close or open the message. Once you respond to the message the pop-up will close allowing you to resume what you were doing.
- Better attachment integration making it easy to send picture and video messages.
- Private Messaging Ability- you can make a person a ‘private contact.’ Messages from this person will be saved in an encrypted private folder which requires a password to enter. You can also disable notifications of messages from this person, so any one snooping through your phone will be unable to view these messages.
3. Dolphin Browser 
Price: Free | Type: Mobile Browser
Dolphin Browser is the best Android Web Browser. It is fast, reliable, and sleek.
–Dolphin offers the ability to;
- Integrate Add’on’s: such as Lastpass, PDF Readers, Wikipedia/Youtube Search
- Use Gestures: Press a button and swipe a gesture to preform actions like; bookmark, previous page, new tab.
- Tabbed Browsing
- Multi-touch Pinch Zoom- Easily zoom in an out with multi-touch ability.
- Speed Dial: Put favorite sites on Speed Dial. No need to look through your book marks or type long URL’s. Just put your favorites on Dolphin’s Speed Dial.
- Smart Address Bar: Auto Complete bar for faster browsing
- Bookmark Folder
- User Agent: Switch between desktop view and mobile view.
- Your Languages supported
- 16 languages supported, eliminate the strangeness on other languages.
4. Barcode Scanner
Price: Free | Type: Barcode Scanner
Put any barcode in front of your camera and this application will give you more information about the product. You may have noticed the barcode’s next to each application listing, with Barcode Scanner simply place the barcode in front of the camera and it will automatically provide you the link to download the application. Additionally you can share information such as; Applications, Bookmarks, Contacts and your Clipboard.
5. Tango 
Price: Free | Type: Cross-Platform Video Chat Application
Tango is a video chat application that allows users to make video calls to and from Android, iPhone and iPad devices. The application allows you to switch between your front facing camera and your back facing camera. Tango will automatically search your contacts and display those who also have tango.
6. VTOK
Price: Free | Type: Google Video Chat Application
VTOK allows you to video chat with Gmail users.
7. TubeMate
Price: Free | Type: YouTube Downloader
TubeMate allows users to download YouTube Videos right to their phone and convert them to any of your favorite formats! Each play of a YouTube video can take up over 10MB of bandwidth. Instead of repeating your favorite songs on YouTube simply download them with this tool.
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8. Winamp 
Price: Free | Type: Music Player
Winamp is the best music player for Android. With it you can Play, manage and sync music from your desktop to your Android device. It also allows you to import your iTunes Library. When moving music or audio books to your Android Device, Winamp will automatically find them and place them in the library so you are not limited which folder you place your content in.
9. K9 mail
Price: Free | Type: E-Mail Application
K9 mail is the best Android E-Mail Application. K-9 Mail is an open-source e-mail client with , IMAP push email, search, multi-folder sync, filing, signatures, flagging bcc-self, PGP, mail on SD & more.
K-9 supports also POP3, IMAP and Exchange 2003/2007 (with WebDAV).
11. Dropbox 
Price: Free | Type: File Synchronization Application
Dropbox is a file syncrhonization applicaiton. Free up to 2GB. They allow you to create an account and link that account across multiple platforms. With this you can share documents between computers and/or mobile devices connected to your Dropbox account. Many people put their frequently accessed documents in Dropbox so that they can access them from multiple computers and their phones. From your phone you can also upload documents to you Dropbox as well as Android offers you the ability to share files like photos directly to you Dropbox once its installed. This application is extremely useful, if you do not have it, we highly suggest looking into it.
12. Google Voice 
Price: Free | Type: Awesome.
The Google voice app allows you to fully utilize all the features of your Google Voice account. If you did not already know, Google offers a free phone number that has the ability to place and receive calls as well as text messages as long as you have a Gmail account. With this application you can place calls, receive calls, as well as send and receive text messages. This application is great if your Google Voice number is your business line or if you prefer to not give out your phone number to certain people you can use your Google Voice number instead. Another fantastic thing about Google Voice is that when some one leaves you a voice mail, it will automatically transcribe the message so you can read it in the application.
13. Google Translate 
Price: Free | Type: Translation App with Voice Output
Google Translate is the best translation application on the Android Market. This application will translate to and from a wide array of languages. Not only will it translate the text for you but it will also convert the voice to text and speak it for you too. This comes in handy when you need to know how to pronounce a word or even to play back to someone that your asking a question. The application also offers text to speech.
14. Google Talk 
Price: Free | Type: Google Chat Application
Google Talk is an easy to use Gmail messaging application. If you use Gmail to chat this is a must.
15. Google Listen 
Price: Free | Type: Podcast Application
Google Listen is the best Android Podcast Application. If you have never listened to a podcast you need to and here’s why. It allows you to subscribe to your favorite podcast’s, automatically download them on WiFi, while charging or both. It will keep track of where you last left off and update you when new Podcast’s are released.
16. Lookout 
Price: Free | Type: Antivirus/Phone Recovery/Backup Application
Lookout is the best Android Antivirus Application. With the openness of Android, much malware has found its way onto its systems, plaguing users phones and reeking havoc. Lookout helps put an end to the madness. Lookout has 3 main services; Antivirus, Phone Recovery and Backup. Lookout Antivirus will automatically scan applications that you download for viruses, it will also periodically conduct a virus scan and report back to you the findings. Lookout Phone Recovery systems are also very cool. If your phone is stolen or lost a user is able to log into their free Lookout account and recieve a GPS location of the phone. Lookout is able to enable the GPS even if GPS is disabled! The location of the phone will be displayed on a map. Lookout will then offer the ability to do several other cool things. From here a user can; remotely wipe the phone and delete all of its contents, or cause the phone to lock and create an extremely loud noise to assist you in finding it. Lastly, Lookout will backup your phones contacts if you do so choose. If your concerned about your security and privacy this application is a must have.
17. Google Docs 
Price: Free | Type: Awesome.
Google docs allows you to access and edit your Google Docs account. With this application not only can you edit your files you can create new Word, Excel, Powerpoint and PDF files and save them to Google Docs or to your phone.
18. LastPass 
Price: $1/month | Type: Password Management Application
LastPass is the best password management tool period. This award winning service is a cryptographically secure service that allows for easy synchronization of credentials across almost all browsers and platforms. For a full review of this application click here. At first I was not a believer of LastPass, I did not trust it, I did not understand the need. We all log into tens of sites and have created passwords for hundreds more. We often use the same passwords, maybe slightly changing them, maybe making strong passwords and writing them down. The problem is, if a site we use is hacked, hackers will have your password. If you use that password or similar passwords to other sites it makes it much easier to comprimise your accounts. Where as if you used a strong and random password hackers will be unable to leverage this information to hack your other online accounts. Now that we understand the need for these secure passwords, the problem is remembering them. There is no possible way. That’s were LastPass comes into play. LastPass will generate random strong passwords for you and automatically save them for your securely. Simply log into LastPass, visit the site you wish to log into and LastPass can fill in the information for you. And since LastPass works on almost every browser, and multiple platforms, you never have to worry about interoperability. LastPass itself is free, mobile use requires a premium account which is $1 per month. If you ask us, its worth it.
19. Team Viewer 
Price: Free| Type: Remote Desktop Administration Application
Team Viewer allows you to control computers you have installed the LogMeIn client on from your phone! If you have never used Team Viewer click here for a full review. Team Viewer offers a free account which once you sign up for you can place the client on an unlimited amount of computers. Those computers you can control remotely from any web browser no program needed. This application lets you access your Team Viewer account right from your phone to remotely control those computers making it easy to access your systems.
20. Astrid Tasks 
Price: Free | Type: To-Do List/Calendar Integration
Astrid Tasks is the best todo list on Android. This critically acclaimed application increases productivity by helping you stay organized. After creating an todo, Astrid synchronize it with your calendar, giving you popup notifications of your events. You can also rank the priority of your events and enter notes. Another great feature about Astrid Tasks is its integration with Google Tasks, once configured all tasks are synchronized and viewable from your Gmail account.
21. Seesmic 
Price: Free | Type: Twitter/Facebook Social Management Application
Simply the best Twitter app for Android. Offers the ability to easily share photos and videos. It also has great integration with Facebook. If your not on Twitter here is why you should be.
22. Pandora 
Price: Free | Type: Preference Learning Internet Music Streaming Application
Pandora is the best streaming music application on Android. This app allows you to select an internet “radio station” based on a genre or artist. Once this is selected Pandora will play music from that artist and other similar artists. With each song that is played you can rate it a thumbs up or thumbs down. Based on your selection and what Pandora has learned from other people with similar tastes, it will learn the music you like and begin to pick better and better songs. Not only do you hear the music that your into but it will also introduce you to other artists and songs you might not have heard of.
23. Sound Hound
Price: Free | Type: Music Identification App
SoundHound will identify almost any song its played, give you track and artist details and offer you the ability to purchase the song. So the next time you hear a song on a radio, tv or even at the club or bar, open SoundHound and get all the details you need.
24. IMDb 
Price: Free | Type: Movie/Television Information App
If you have not heard of IMDb you live under a rock, crawl out – IMDB.com. This is a full featured Moive/Television/Actor/Actress information service. IMDb provides you all the necessary e-mails about your favorite Movies, TV shows, Actors, Directors and more. This app is great for picking movies that you want to watch. It has lists of the top rated movies, movies by genre, movies that won awards. Find out who stared in what, what movies your favorites played a role in, quiz your friends, keep it handy- its very useful.
25. Flashlight
Price: Free | Type: Useful.
Who doesnt need a flashlight. Turn it on- light up a dark place.
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And that’s our review of the Top 25 best Android Apps. Have any suggestions? Post what your favorite app in the comments section.
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Advanced Task Killer? Really? That’s very, very irresponsible of you. ATK can be a harmful program and should only be used by power users who know what they’re doing. Most decent Android phones these days (2.3+) don’t need a task killer as Google has been tweaking the memory management system, making it more autonomic. True that older (> Shazam. This is after trying both of them for almost one year, and finally uninstalling Shazam since on an average it couldn’t pickup half the songs that SoundHound could. Maybe because I mostly listen to electronica, I dunno, but a lot of other users have said that SoundHound picks up more songs than Shazam.
Hmm, wth the above comment got cut off.. anyways, here’s the proper comment:
Advanced Task Killer? Really? That’s very, very irresponsible of you. ATK can be a harmful program and should only be used by power users who know what they’re doing. Most decent Android phones these days (2.3+) don’t need a task killer as Google has been tweaking the memory management system, making it more autonomic. True that older (> Shazam. This is after trying both of them for almost one year, and finally uninstalling Shazam since on an average it couldn’t pickup half the songs that SoundHound could. Maybe because I mostly listen to electronica, I dunno, but a lot of other users have said that SoundHound picks up more songs than Shazam.
Okay, WTF is going on here? Why is your comment box cutting off my text?
Here’s my comment in all its glory: http://pastie.org/2659243
yawn
Thanks a lot for this awesome list!
for email application Check out Emoze Secure PushMail
With Emoze you can easily synchronize multiple email accounts simultaneously as well as your contacts, calendar events and sub-folders.
Emoze provides a complete secure experience, enabling you, among other things, to remotely locate, lock, and wipe the data on the device if lost or stolen.
The application is available free of charge.
https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.emoze.Emozesync
This ‘app’ business reminds me of the stories of the years just after radium was discovered – there were thousands of utterly useless applications. Luckily, afaik smartphones don’t give you cancer, but they can waste a hell of a lot of your precious time.