Updated 1/9/12

Since I did my last list of must have android apps, a lot has changed – we’ve gone from Android 2.0 to Android 4.0, the Android Market has gone from 70,000 or so Apps to over 400,000 so I thought it was time to make a new 10 best android apps (and all of these are completely free or offer a fully functional lite or free version).

So if you just got a new Android phone, here are ten must have apps I’d make sure to download immediately (though depending on which phone you have you may already have a few of them)

So let’s get started…

1. Pandora – Pretty much ever “top ten” or “must have apps” list includes this program.  Who am I to argue?  If you like music, get this app.  I actually canceled my satellite radio subscription (which I loved) and spent the $36 a year for a Pandora One subscripton because I almost exclusively use Pandora for listening to music these day.
2. Chrome To Phone – This is one of those little known apps that is so incredibly useful I’m amazed that not everyone and their brother has it already.   Ever been browsing a website and wanted to send that page to your phone?  How about looking at a map or directions and just wanted to load it onto your phone?  With this app you can if you’re using Google Chrome.  Just press the chrome to phone button on your browser and a couple seconds later that page will be loaded on your phone.
3. Voice Actions / Voice Search – While pretty much every Android phone (and just about every smartphone in general) has voice search and voice commands, they don’t have anything like this. With this program you can send emails and text messages all with one command.  It’s called Google Voice Actions but will show up a “Voice Search” when you look for it in the market.   It’s not a Siri clone, (that app is called Iris, neat but still not useful enough to use on a regular basis) it’s been around for a while and allows you to use voice dialing, send texts, play music, and even set alarms on your phone.  It’s not quite as cool as Siri is, but it’s still pretty nice.
4. Doubletwist – This program likes to bill itself as iTunes for Android.  I say let’s not get carried away but this is easily the best program for any iTunes user to put their playlists on their Android phone.  It will read your playlists from your current iTunes and syncs to your Android phone just like iTunes syncs to an iPhone or iPod.  If you want to listen to music on your phone, then this is the app to get.   There is a premium version that offers wifi syncing, which if you listen to a lot of music might be worth the $5. 
5. WiFi File Transfer – Ever wanted to transfer a file from your computer to your phone or vice versa without having to hook up your USB cable?  There are a few apps that allow you to do just that – I like this one best because it makes it easy to do.
6. Carr Matey – I went to a college football game last weekend and I parked quite a ways from the stadium.  I made sure I used this app so I could remember where I parked after the game.  It’s a pirate themed car locator – sure there are other car locator apps out there but how many of those other apps allow you to “drop anchor” and “find your vessel” and displays an old fashioned looking compass telling your how many yards you are away from your vehicle?  (It’ll show you a regular map if you prefer but that’s no fun)
7. Google Voice – Let’s be honest, Google Voice is great and if you have an Android powered smartphone, it’s a no brainer plus you get free Visual Voicemail with it. 
8. Google Maps Navigation – this is the app that originally got me to take the plunge and buy a Droid in the first place.  Up until that point I’d been happily using my Motorola RAZR and didn’t feel the need to buy a smartphone.  However, when I learned that Google had released a free GPS navigation app for their Android powered devices, I was sold.   While it’s not quite as good as Navigon for the iPhone or as good as top of the line devices from TomTom or Garmin, it’s still makes my list as one of the top apps for any Android device… and the FREE part is hard to sneeze at.
9. Swype – This app was developed by Samsung and is of course included on all of their Android phones as well as some others, like the Droid Bionic.  It replaces your current keyboard with their very cool Swype technology.  It’s a little difficult to explain so just watch this video if you’d like to see it in action.  You won’t find it in the market but a little searching for the “Swype APK” will get you the file you need to add this keyboard to your phone – I put it on my original Droid and was thrilled when I got my Bionic and it was already there. 
10. Barcode Scanner – I was reading an article not too long ago that said even among college students, a lot of them didn’t know how to scan a qr code using the camera on their smartphone.  This app is a QR Code Scanner.  The last time I went to Sears I used this.  My friend and I saw a product that looked like it’d be nifty if it worked like it said it does so I scanned the barcode using my phone’s camera  and we were able to find the product online and more importantly to read user reviews that alerted us that the product was garbage… so we put it back on the shelf.

28 More Apps I Like

I probably won’t go into depth about most of these but I get asked about which apps I use so often that I figured I’d just give you a list of ones I’ve actually found useful even though they didn’t make my top ten list.

• ChompSMS – I use this for my text messaging instead of the default “Messaging” app.  The old messaging apps used to be pretty crappy and though it has improved I still prefer ChompSMS to the built in Android text messaging app – another good alternative that I’ve been testing out and like is GO SMS – try one of them out and see which you prefer.
• Netflix – The Netflix app isn’t perfect and isn’t available for every Android phone.  However, you can get it on most phones and all of the new ones.  If you have a Netflix subscription, this app allows you to take streaming movies and TV shows with you in your pocket so the next time your sitting in the dentist office waiting to be called, you can watch a TV show instead of paging through a magazine.
• Listen – This is another official Google App for listening to Podcasts and such.  Personally, I use and love PocketCasts for all of my Podcasting needs (I use that app nearly every day) but since PocketCasts isn’t free, it doesn’t make this list.  I’ve found Google Listen to be the best free Podcast manager.
• Google + – I don’t use Google + very much.  Heck, I use it so little that there’s really no point in adding me to your circles, but the reason the Google+ app is neat is that whenever you take a picture with your phone, it’ll automatically upload it (privately) to your Google+ account meaning your pictures are now easily and automatically transferred from your phone to the cloud where you can access them from any computer once you login to your Google Account.
• Google Currents – I’ve been playing around with this for a little while and I’ve decided it’s not quite spectacular enough to make the top 10 list, but it is worth mentioning.  Essentially Google Currents is Google’s attempt to translate rich magazine content into something that can be easily read on your smartphone.
• Hipmunk – I don’t use this app very often, but if you frequently need to search for airline tickets or hotels on your phone, this app is fantastic.  You won’t miss your computer.
• WaveSecure – Should your phone ever, heaven forbid, be stolen, this is the app you’ll want to have installed as it makes recovery more likely and can help you lock down your phone remotely so even if thieves have your phone, they won’t be able to access your personal information.
• SportsTap – A great app if you want to keep up with the score of the game (for just about any sport).  I use this all the time during football season to keep up with all the scores.
• NewsRob – If you use Google Reader to keep up with your favorite blogs, this is the perfect app to use to read them on your phone.  I use this app several times a day.
• Slacker – This is another music discovery app.
• Last.FM – Yet one more music discovery app.
• SoundHound – Absolutely one of my favorite apps.  If you’ve heard of Shazam, then you already know what this app does… excpet this app will let you sing the song you’re thinking of or hum the tune and it’ll do it’s darndest to identify it for you.  Next time you can’t think of the name of a song, give this app a try and no, you don’t have to be a good singer for it to correctly identify the right song – just know the lyrics or be able to accurately hum the tune.
• Rehearsal Assistant – My favorite voice record app for Android
• MotoTorch LED – Uses your camera’s LED flash as a flashlight – you’d be surprised how often this app comes in handy – make it easy to use by putting the widget on your phone’s homescreen.
• Ringdroid – I don’t use this one all that often but this app allows you to take any part of any song on your phone and turn it into a ringtone, alarm, or even as the text message alert sound.  Never pay for another ringtone!
• Astro – Best file manager for Android.
• Where’s My Droid – Ever forget your phone but you’re not sure where you forgot it?  If you have this app installed, you should never lose your Droid again (or at least not for very long).  Send it a specially coded text message (from your computer or friend’s phone) and it will tell you where it is by sending you its GPS coordinates and a link to its location on Google Maps.  If it’s in your house or apartment but you have it set to silent, you can also send it a text message that will turn the volume up to maximum so you can figure out which couch cushion your phone slid under.
• Google Voice Callback – I did a post on this a while back on how you can get unlimited calling with your Android Phone by using Google Voice and this app.  If you find yourself always running out of minutes, this is a good app to try.
• KeepScreen – Ever get annoyed when your phone’s screen times out and goes dark when you’re trying to watch or read something?  Just install this app and you can select apps where the screen will always stay on even if there is no activity.
• Layar – Looking for the nearest coffee shop, pizza place, bar, hotel, or just about anything else.  Just load up this app and your phone will take you to it using their augmented reality browser.  It’s a little hard to explain, but download it and give it a whirl, you’ll probably like it.
• Notepad – exactly what is says.
• Owner – What happens when you set your phone down somewhere and someone else finds it and would like to return it to you?  Well, if you have this app installed, as soon as they turn on the screen for your phone they’ll see your name and who to contact to return the phone.
• Places Directory – Another app made by Google and pretty straightforward.  Allows you to find any category of business wherever you are and find not only the closest one but also to view contact information and reviews of the business you’re considering going to.
• Seesmic – Yes, Twitter has it’s own official app… but Seesmic is better and doesn’t suck up as many resources.
• Startup Cleaner Pro – Sometimes your phone can get a little bogged down with too many apps loading during startup.  Download this app and tell some of them not to load on startup – just like using msconfig in windows!
• What Zip – Now that just about every phone has a GPS antenna in it, they can all tell you where you are but what about what zip code you’re in?  This app does just that.
• Lookout Mobile Security – This one has been advertised in Verizon’s latest commercials for their Droid X and Droid 2 phones but it’ll work on any Android Phone.  This free app will scan your phone for viruses, backup your phone’s information, and can help you locate your phone in the event you lose it (though it’s not nearly as good as Where’s My Droid in my opinion for this task – for the other two, it’s pretty sweet).  If you want an app that’s similar and adds in the functionality of allowing you to block SMS messages (something Android doesn’t have built in functionality for) try out Webroot Mobile Security
• Groupon – I can’t think of the last time I actually went to Groupon’s site to check the daily deal and that’s coming from a person who works on their computer all day.  I always check it with this nifty little app on my phone.

What do you think?  Any apps that I should have mentioned?  Any that shouldn’t have made the list?    Let me have it in the comments section below.

However, if you’ve been reading my posts lately you’ve probably seen more stuff written about phones than dedicated GPS units… a sign that the times they are a changin’.  Dedicated handheld units are being phased out and fancified smartphones with AGPS chips in them are taking over.

So if you can’t beat ‘em, join ‘em.

And I’ll be honest, smartphones (like my Motorola Droid) can do a lot of really cool stuff that regular old GPS units can’t.

Here are my 10 favorite Android Apps (or Droid Apps) that use GPS (all are free or at least offer free versions):

1. Google Maps Navigation Beta – Free GPS Navigation software that doesn’t suck.  In the three months I’ve been using this software I can tell you it’s getting better… slowly but surely.  Will it completely replace PND units from Garmin and TomTom – not yet.   And it’s not up to Navigon levels either (iPhone app), but for a free app, it sure as heck has a lot going for it… and the always up to date maps sure are great.
2. Carr Matey – Ever parked your car but can’t for the life of you remember where you parked it?  I know I’ve done it several times (especially at airport long term parking) which is why this app is so darn cool.  Just park you car, fire up Carr Matey and “drop anchor.”  It’s a great app and the pirate theme is just fun.  You can load up a map to find your car or use the compass and feel like you’re searching for buried treasure.  It even has a built in timer so if you’re at a parking meter, you can set the timer and make sure you get back to your car before time is up. There are other apps like Car Locator but that one costs money and does the same thing but it does add support for parking garages.
3. WeatherBug – Android 2.1 has it’s own weather app built in but until we’re all on 2.1, Weatherbug is perfect.  The latest version will track weather (require you to install an additional plugin, but it literally takes 15 seconds to do) as you travel so you always know what the temperature is.
4. Google Goggles – In an attempt to get people to use Android, Google has developed some really nifty apps.  Google Goggles is one that will seriously blow your mind.  Take it downtown or any place there are a lot of businesses.  Now fire up Google Goggles.  Point your phone’s camera at any business – Layar will pull up the businesses name, phone number, and reviews (great if you want to eat at a restaurant but don’t know if it’s any good).   You can also fire it up and find all the pizza places, coffee shops, or apartments in a certain area.  Definitely fun to play with and actually useful.
5. Where – This is another great app for finding local businesses.  You can find what’s playing at the movie theater and what the closest one is.  It also will tell you the price of gas, and again, how far away each gas station is… and it does a whole lot more – well worth downloading from the Android Market.
6. My Tracks – If you like to go hiking, biking, or running, you’ll love this app.  You can record the route you took, how long it took you and you can export the data to Google Spreadsheets.  It sounds simple but it’s really cool – try it out!
7. Instamapper / Where’s My Droid – Should you ever lose your phone or, heaven forbid, it gets stolen.  These are apps you’ll want to have installed to find it.  Both allow for remote activation so you can send a text to your phone via your computer or a friend’s cell to figure out where the heck your phone is.  And if you’re like me and keep your phone on vibrate or silent all the time, Where’s my Droid has a feature that will turn the speakers on max so you can hear it no matter what setting it’s on… great if your phone is hiding in your couch cushions.
8. Spectrek Light – I’m pretty sure this is the only game I have on my phone.  This is an augmented reality ghost hunting game.   Basically you use your phone’s GPS and camera to hunt and capture virtual ghosts.  Go find a park, field, or forest and give it a try… lots of fun.  (will keep kids busy for hours too)
9. Locale – Have you ever been in a movie theatre, class, or a meeting, and had your cell phone go off?  Locale is built to fix that problem.  You can set your phone to go to silent at certain times of the day or based on certain locations.  For example, you can tell Locale that any time you’re in or a movie theater to put your phone on silent – that way if you forget to do it, you don’t have to worry about it.  It can also work in reverse, if you’re in a place where you need your ringer on all the time so you can hear it, you can do that as well.
10. Google Sky Map / Celeste Lite - Have you ever wanted to impress your date by telling here where the constellations are in the sky?  Of course you have!  This app will help you do just that.  Take your phone outside at night and point the camera skyward.  Google Sky Map will tell you what you’re looking at.   It also identifies planets and the moon.   I also put Celeste in this list.  It tracks the sun, moon, and planets (the free Lite version only tracks the sun and Saturn).   It can tell you where the sun will be at a certain time and where it currently is in the sky even if you’re inside or it’s cloudy.

Have an app you feel belongs in this list?

Did I make any egregious omissions?

Just want to chime in and add your two cents?

Post a comment and let me hear it.

Updated 1/9/12

So I got one of those fancy Droids a couple weeks ago and when you go from a Razr (the original one, not the slick new Droid Razr) to a Droid, everything is cool and fancy.  I honestly don’t know how a lot of the features that are “gee whiz” cool compare to other smartphones like the iPhone.  They’re all cool to me, but wow is the Facebook and Google Voice integration slick.

Google Maps Navigation Beta brings free turn by turn navigation to your Android powered device.

Anyway, instead of posting my thoughts about the phone side of things, I figured I’d post about the thing I am qualified to review – the GPS, specifically Google Maps Navigation Beta.

I’m on my fourth GPS device and have extensively researched others.  In fact, I decided to get the phone with its built in navigation instead of one of the new high end TomToms.

So I have fairly high standards for what I want in a GPS device, and I have to say that Google has managed to include cool features I would never have thought to ask for… unfortunately they also neglected to include some fairly important industry standard features.

I like it, I love it

As you’d probably expect, Google Navigation uses their Google Maps data for all the routes.  The maps are up to date (I hated buying updates to my old ones) and since it accesses their online database, they’re about as up to date as you can get.  Up to date maps doesn’t sound like a big deal until your GPS device tries to convice you to take an impassible snowmobile trail in the middle of nowhere Colorado – then you’ll appreciate having accurate maps.

The voice search is also awesome.  It knows where businesses are (even local ones, not just chains) and can find them with a simple search.  My car broke down a week ago and I was able to find a towing service close to me (I didn’t want to be stuck there any longer than I had to), and call them using the same device… and I was able to read reviews before I made any calls.

It can find landmarks, categories of businesses, schools, pretty much whatever you want.  And if you decide to type in the information, it’s not all that picky and can even figure out what you meant to spell if you spell something wrong (just like their search engine can).

It will also find places along your route.  For example, if you’re on a road trip and need to find a Starbucks, instead of Navigating you to the closest Starbucks, it’ll find one that’s along your route so you don’t need to take an extensive detour or turn around.

However, one thing it can’t do is navigate to someone in your contacts list even if their address is in your phone.  My guess is that feature is coming, but so far it doesn’t do that.  Sadly, even Siri can do this but Google Maps Navigation doesn’t just yet.

Google Street View is pretty cool especially as it can display a picture of the intersection and a picture of the business you’re navigating to.  However, I’d like to more advanced instructions for complicated interchanges.  For example, my last GPS would tell me to take and exit and which lane I needed to be in when necessary.  It isn’t necessary all that often where I live but let me tell you, it’s immensely helpful when it does come up.

You have the option to use Satellite view just like with Google Maps on your computer and you can even overlay the terrain if you’re out hiking.

And one feature I really like was the ability to navigate “nearest” whatever.  For example, you can tell Google Maps Navigation to “navigate to nearest movie theatre” using voice commands and it will.

Fail!

Night mode

While there are some excusable omissions, one that is just a complete brain fart is the lack of a night mode.  Honestly, I was expected that the phone would not only have a night mode, I figured it’d automatically kick in when the sun set based on its location – the phone has a lot of location aware features like that and I figured Google Maps Navigation would have that… it didn’t.

I learned this on a trip from Nebraska to Wisconsin.  Fortunately, I don’t need directions for the trip, so when it got dark and night mode didn’t kick in and I couldn’t find it in the menus, it wasn’t a problem for me just to turn the program off and finish the drive sans navigation.

But seriously, no night mode?  I’m assuming this oversight will be fixed in the near future, but as far as I’m concerned, the program should never have left alpha testing without that feature.

Update (Feb 2010) – Night mode exists now (came as part of Google Maps 4 app update) and yeah, it works like I expected it would – location aware and based on sunset and sunrise.   Glad to see they added it.

Speedometer

Another industry standard is how fast you’re going.  And TomTom and Garmin devices also happen to know the speed limits where you’re driving and can tell you when they change.  Google doesn’t even display how fast you’re going.  I know, I know, that’s what the speedometer on your car is for.  Well, I find the one on cars is frequently off by 1-3 mph.  On a long trip, a 3mph difference is half an hour I could have saved and the GPS speedometer is always extremely accurate.

Update (Jan 2012)

No, no built in speedometer yet.  But you can get one via a third party app called Ulysse Speedometer.  You can set it up so that it will startup whenever your phone is connected to the car dock and it will display your current speed in the status bar at the top.  It’s the perfect add-on for getting a speedometer on your Android phone while still being able to use Google Maps Navigation.  Oh, and it’s a free app so it’s a no brainer.

To set it up so it runs in the status bar, click the “menu” button, then click preferences.  Make sure the “Work in Background” box ix checked.  Then click “Background notifications” and make sure the “show current speed” box is checked.  Then scroll down and make sure the “start on car dock” box is checked.  Now anytime you put your phone in the car dock, this application will start right up and will display your current speed no matter what application you’re using.  For example, most of the time when I’m driving I don’t need navigation, but instead have my podcasting app up and running and I still have a speedometer on my phone.

Data Connection Required

Here’s another real head scratcher.  The need to have a data connection for navigation.  I can totally understand the need to have a data connection for things like Street View, Satellite View, and some of the more advanced features – it’d just be too much to store on the phones memory and updating would be a pain.  However, needing a data connection for even basic navigation is bad design.   Google needs to offer an option to download the maps to your phones memory card and to use those maps when data is lost.  GPS and navigation needs to work in the middle of nowhere.

Those are my biggest complaints.   But here’s why I’m still happy about getting Google Maps Navigation vs TomTom.  I know that Google will continue to update it and that it’s likely to be a true rival to TomTom and Garmin within a year and those complaints I have will likely be addressed soon.  If I had a Garmin or TomTom, I’d be waiting a lot longer and I’d probably have to pay for the upgrade.

Google Maps Navigation may not be quite ready to challenge the big boys for navigation supremacy just yet, but for the price (FREE), you could certainly do a lot worse.

Update (Nov 2010)  Google Maps Navigation now has an offline mode so that even if you lose data connectivity, you will still get navigation along your route.  It still requires an initial data connection as it needs to download a vector map of your route but once you’re on the road and moving, it won’t require a constant connection.

More cool features they’ve added over the years:

• Walking Navigation – You can get direction if you plan on walking to your destination.  It will also work if you plan on going via bike and will take bike paths in your city for navigation instead of streets.
• Transit Navigation – This is a cool feature!  If you need to use public transit (bus, subway) to get to your location, this feature will tell you where to get on and off and what route number to look for.  This is so helpful when I’m in a big city as just trying to reed all the transit routes makes my head spin.  (I grew up in a small town and am used to simply taking a car wherever I need to go).