![\"\"](\"https:\/\/techcitement.comadmin\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/top10-e1325009674463.jpg\" "\\"top10\\"")
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Congratulations on getting your new Android device! Pretty awesome, isn’t it? Except something seems missing. It’s cool and all, but why isn’t it doing all that awesome stuff like in the commercials? You need to download some apps, but with over 380,000 apps to choose from, that can be a daunting task. Fortunately, Techcitement is here to help you out with a list of the top 10 Android apps you need to have.<\/p>\n
A couple quick notes before we get started — not all of these apps may run on your device, some because they may not be compatible with the $80 tablet you bought at Big Lots and others because your manufacturer or carrier want to keep them from you. Sorry about that. Some of these apps may also not be the greatest thing to use on non-unlimited data plans, so be careful how you use them. Also, everything listed is free or at least has a free version. All the links (except for in number two) take you directly to the Android Market, which allows you to install the apps to your device with a click.<\/strong><\/p>\n 1. Google Apps<\/a><\/strong> 2. Amazon Appstore<\/a>\u00a0and Getjar<\/a><\/strong> 3. Music<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n I know this is technically a Google app, so I already should have told you to download this, but I wanted to make this extra clear, because getting the right music app may require downloading what seems to be a second Music app. Prior to Android 4.0 (Ice Cream Sandwich), the latest version of Android, the stock music player did just that — play music. There is a second version of Music, however, that allows you to stream 20,000 of your own songs from the cloud for absolutely free. Assuming you have any kind of music collection, this makes pretty much every other streaming music app obsolete.<\/p>\n 4. Adobe Flash Player 11 Flash on phones may never have quite worked right, which might be part of why Adobe is abandoning further updates of the product. But it still allows for as much of a “true internet experience” as you’ll ever get on a mobile device. This is one of those apps that allows you to point at iPhone users and laugh, assuming you were some kind of really nerdy jerk.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n 5. QR Code Private<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n QR codes are those weird square boxes you see in advertisements. You scan them and they take you to a website where you can get more information, a coupon, or an irritating video. You can also use QR readers to scan UPC codes and see if the store you are at actually has the best price. For the most part, QR code readers are all the same. What sets QR Code Private apart is all it does is read QR codes, meaning it doesn’t have a wacky set of permissions that allows it to potentially take over your phone. The fact that this is so much better than the stock video player is a sin. Just how good a player MX Video Player is depends somewhat on the power of your device, but it theoretically allows you to play any video in any format, complete with alternate audio capabilities and subtitles. You never have to bother with converting a video to a format your phone can understand again — just drop it in the phone and press play. It has some other cool capabilities as well, like being able to change the volume and brightness by swiping your finger across the screen, but the really big selling point here is not having to convert files.<\/p>\n 7.\u00a0Tiny Flashlight + LED<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n <\/p>\n 8. Carr Matey<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n It’s the eternal question in life — does anyone remember where we parked? With Carr Matey, you don’t have to. With a click, it puts a GPS marker on your location and will guide you to your spot, all with a wacky pirate theme! While it won’t work in places like parking garages, GPS satellites not being able to penetrate multiple layers of concrete and all, it does let you do things like take pictures of your spot and set parking timers, so you’ll never have to pay a ticket again.<\/p>\n <\/p>\n 9.\u00a0Tone Picker<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n <\/p>\n Honorable Mention<\/strong> Did I miss any of your favorites? Let me know in the comments!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Congratulations on getting your new Android device! Pretty awesome, isn’t it? Except something seems missing. It’s cool and all, but why isn’t it doing all that awesome stuff like in the commercials? You need to download some apps, but with over 380,000 apps to choose from, that can be a daunting task. Fortunately, Techcitement is […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[31,1917,38],"tags":[1294,244,34,241,74,221,131,1955,1956,108,230,60,1948,1949,195],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/techcitement.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7160"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/techcitement.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/techcitement.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techcitement.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techcitement.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=7160"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/techcitement.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7160\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":7377,"href":"https:\/\/techcitement.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/7160\/revisions\/7377"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/techcitement.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7160"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techcitement.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=7160"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/techcitement.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=7160"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
\nThis may seem obvious, but if they aren’t pre-loaded on your phone, download everything available in the market developed by Google. At the bare minimum, you’re going to want Search<\/a>,\u00a0Maps<\/a>, Voice Search<\/a>, Gmail<\/a>, Docs<\/a>, Reader<\/a>, Voice<\/a>, Listen<\/a>, Chrome to Phone,<\/a> and YouTube<\/a>, but there are others you may find useful as well. I want to double point out Voice, because it isn’t usually pre-installed on phones. With Google Voice, you never have to waste minutes logging in to voice mail again, and you get free visual voice mail and text messaging.<\/p>\n
\nYou won’t be able to find either of these apps in the Android Marketplace, because both of them are technically competition to it. Neither are as well integrated into most devices as the Market and quite often get app updates less frequently. So, why bother with them? First, because they often have sales on some great paid apps, but more importantly, they also offer great paid apps for absolutely free. I just happen to write a column<\/a> devoted to the free app of the day on Amazon.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/techcitement.comadmin\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/unnamed-1.png\")
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\n6. MX Video Player<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/techcitement.comadmin\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/unnamed-2.png\")
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<\/a>It lets you use your camera’s LED flash as a flashlight. This may sound like a stupid little trick, but it can be a lifesaver. I mean literally, it can save your life or at least keep you from stubbing your toe as you are walking back to the bedroom after turning off all the lights.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/techcitement.comadmin\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/unnamed-3.png\")
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<\/a>While there are other apps that do this, Tone Picker is my preferred app to turn any audio I have on my phone into a ringtone or notification. It doesn’t trim them, but I have other tools I prefer to use for that. Lightweight, simple to use, and hasn’t failed me yet.<\/p>\n
\n10.\u00a0\u00a0NPR News<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/techcitement.comadmin\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/unnamed-4.png\")
<\/a>This is less of a political statement and more an expression of my love for the five minute audio newscast updated every hour. The NPR app gives you access to not just all of NPR’s national news, but podcasts and streaming audio from local NPR stations. That’s a lot of brain food for your noggin. The best part by far is the five minute updates. If I want a broad overlook of what is going on in the world, but don’t want to take my eyes off of whatever else I am doing — driving, going to the bathroom, what have you — nothing works better.<\/p>\n
\nRom Manager<\/a>\u00a0and Titanium Backup<\/a>\u00a0are probably more important than most of the apps on the list, but they require your phone to be rooted. The two of them, used together, give you more control over your phone than anything else, but they also require a certain degree of technical know-how. Also, I didn’t include any social media tools, if only because there are too many, both social media platforms and apps for them. I could do a top 10 list on social media apps alone.<\/p>\n