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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 features a quick overview of your Instagram feed, a solution to your YouTube subscription woes, and some inspiration from those old rotary phones.
Feeday
For: iOS
Cost: Free
- If you’re an Instagram user, you’re might find it a bit of a chore to open the feed and scroll down through it to keep updated.
- Feeday is a widget for your iPhone, designed to show you your Instagram feed in real-time.
- Depending on how you set it up, you can have it display three, six or nine photos when you view the notification centre.
- You can open up an individual photo by tapping on it, saving you the trouble of going through the newsfeed to find it.
- If you regularly check Instagram, this is great for those wanting a quick overview.
Tuber
For: Android
Cost: Free
- YouTube’s official app on Android is great but when it comes to subscriptions, it tends to fall short.
- Tuber sorts out this problem by allowing you to browse through videos with tabs, which makes things a bit easier to manage.
- You can view subscriptions, or browse by new videos. Everything is kept basic and clean and is easy to navigate.
- The downside is that videos play in the mobile web player, which isn’t great. You can change it so they play in the YouTube app although that switches you out of the app entirely.
- If your visits to YouTube are mainly subscription based, this is a handy app to have.
Video 360
For: Windows Phone
Cost: €1.99 (trial version available)
- When it comes to YouTube apps, there aren’t really many to choose from. TubeCast would be the main one and that’s about it.
- So here enters Video 360 which claims to be the first native 360° player on the Windows store.
- You have to load up videos to use it but if you connect it up with Tubecast, you can view 360° videos on YouTube.
- It supports 4K videos and the tracking is generally good. It’s also a universal app so it works on Windows desktop as well.
- Although YouTube isn’t exactly awash with 360° videos yet, this is a good way to see what you’re missing.
Trring
For: Android
Cost: Free (pro version cost €1.02)
- Ever feel nostalgic for the old rotary phones? Probably not but how about using it as a way to access your most-used apps?
- Trring ( a play on the sound rotary phones made) places your most popular apps and settings on the one place.
- Just turn it on, place your apps and the next time you unlock your home screen, you can do a quick rotate to get the app you want.
- The pro version includes speed dial, notification bubbles, and music controls if you want to take it a step further.
- For those who are getting bored of the standard home page.
This War of Mine
For: iOS (iPad), Android
Cost: €9.99
- It’s rare that you come across a game that’s best described as depressing and tough, but if you want an alternative view of war, you’ll be hard-pressed to find a better tablet game.
- This War of Mine is a survival game where you control a group of civilians in a war-torn country.
- Snipers stop you from exiting your refuge so you spend your day maintaining your hideout and preparing for hunts. Nighttime sees one of your civilians venture out for much-needed supplies.
- It’s the latter part where things become incredibly tense. There’s nothing flashy about how the game handles the theme of war. Hunting for supplies can bring you in contact with other survivors, and they’re rarely welcoming or peaceful.
- For those who like their games to be emotionally draining, this is a brilliantly crafted experience.
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