30 Best Android apps this week

Xbox SmartGlass, Britannica Kids, Amazon Cloud Drive Photos, Snapchat, Calvin Harris, The xx and more

The Xbox SmartGlass Android app controls an Xbox 360 console

It's another bumper Best Apps post for new Android apps, covering 30 releases from the last week alone. Heady times for Google-powered devices.

The list doesn't include games, as they get their own separate post: this week's selection included Android titles like Need for Speed: Most Wanted, Theme Park, Hellfire, Zombie Driver THD, Chrono Trigger and Zombiewood.

iOS apps also get their own post, which can be found here this week. Windows Phone has a monthly roundup – the latest one is here. For now, here's the pick of the Google Play store from the last week.

Xbox SmartGlass (Free) 

Launched by Microsoft, this is an official companion app for its Xbox 360 console, enabling you to control the device from your Android smartphone – alas, not tablets for now. The app can control TV shows and films, music, web browsing and other features of the console, and in time will also be usable as a second screen for games.

Britannica Kids apps (£1.24 each) 

There are actually nine brand-new Britannica Kids apps available for Android. I'm including them as one entry. The nine apps cover the solar system, Aztec empire, dinosaurs, knights and castles, ancient Rome, snakes, rainforests, volcanoes and ancient Egypt. Their content is a mixture of text, images and interactivity, all aimed at children.

Amazon Cloud Drive Photos (Free) 

Amazon has extended its Cloud Drive storage service out with a new app focusing on photos. It offers 5GB of storage (for free) to store images in, and access them from Android devices as well as computers. It supports both phones and tablets, and can share to Facebook and email.

18 Months (Free) 

This is the official app for Calvin Harris' new album 18 Months, complete with a nifty feature to play every track in full. It requires some work though: dancing. Well, moving your Android smartphone, anyway: the idea is that by dancing (or waggling the handset) you keep the song playing. Fun and innovative.

Snapchat (Free) 

Snapchat bills itself as "the first real-time picture chatting app", and has been doing rather well on iOS, where its users have shared more than 1bn photos. The idea: send photos to friends with a built-in time limit up to 10 seconds. The photo then wipes itself off the recipient's handset. Ideal for sexting people you don't quite trust, but there must be a few other uses too.

The xx (Free) 

The xx have released a stylish app that lives up to their latest album Coexist, offering "HD Visualiser videos" for every track on the album for fans who own it digitally, as well as interactive artwork, news and notifications from the band, official music videos, lyrics and ticketing info.

Bamboo Paper (Free) 

This app is the work of Wacom, and is designed to work with its Bamboo Stylus accessory. Promising "note taking on your smartphone made easy", it involves scribbling sketches or writing notes which can then be flipped through. Made for Android smartphones, it (kind of) brings them the functionality seen in Samsung's Galaxy Note devices. The stylus costs around £25.

Rockford's Musical Audiobooks (Free / £2.99) 

And more numerical cheating here, since there are four Rockford's Musical Audiobook apps: chapters one to four of children's story Rockford's Rock Opera, with the first available for free, and the other three chapters costing £2.99 each. It's an audiobook with an hour of narrated story, as well as music and pictures. Read more on the aims behind it here.

Belkin MediaPlay (Free) 

Belkin's new Android app builds on the myTwonky technology, with the aim of helping you pipe films and music from your Android device to a connected TV (via its browser), or play content from your home library on your smartphone or tablet.

Game Reward Mobile App (Free) 

British games retailer Game has had some rough times in 2012, but apps are forming part of its comeback strategy. This ties into Game's loyalty programme, helping you earn points on purchases from the stores, while also offering recommendations. If you add your console gamertags, there may be other "cool stuff" in the future too.

Photo Warp+ (Free) 

More than 14m people have downloaded developer Tonuzaba Entertainment's first Photo Warp app, so this sequel should find a healthy audience. It's all about, yes, warping photos, with a range of effects to play merry havoc with images.

Find a Tradesman (Free) 

This is definitely one of the most useful apps in this week's lineup: released by the Rated People website, it helps you dig into its directory of tradesmen for home improvement jobs, posting what you need done and getting responses from companies or people who can help.

BB - Give Thanks (£2.47) 

The Berenstain Bears books have a firm following among several generations of Christian parents, and they're being digitised as apps by Oceanhouse Media book-by-book. This one focuses on Thanksgiving, with voice narration, audio and words highlighted as they're read out, to help early readers.

HotUKDeals – Official (Free) 

So called because there seem to be plenty of unofficial Android apps pulling down listings from the UK's deals'n'vouchers website. This is its official app, offering vouchers from the likes of Asda, Tesco, Domino's Pizza and Sainsbury's, filtered by location. You can also comment on the offers and tip those you find in the real world.

Insync for Android (£1.49) 

Insync's new app ties in to the Google Drive service, to access documents and other files stored in Google's cloud service, upload new ones, and share with friends and colleagues. All of which you can do in the official Google Drive service. Insync claims a host of additional features though, from exporting files to the SD card in your device, to saving folders for offline use, and streaming music or video files.

Antengo Classifieds - Tablet (Free) 

The native Android tablet apps are coming, as Google encourages developers to think harder about their larger-screened software. Antengo claims to be "reinventing classified listings" in the US, with more than 2m items in its classifieds directory, and an app designed for tablets.

Flip Launcher (Free) 

This is a smartphone app for power Android users who want to save a few precious seconds when navigating to and opening specific apps and shortcuts. The idea here: you flip to them, having set up to 24 as your designated flips.

The Montblanc Worldsecond (Free) 

Luxury watchmaker Montblanc is working on an interesting digital marketing campaign that aims to get people around the world taking photos at the same instant, then making them available to browse. This app helps you do that, with four Instagram-ish filters to apply, uploading pics to the Montblanc Worldsecond site, as well as (if you choose) to Facebook, Twitter and Google+.

Goalmaster | Goal Tracker (Free) 

This is a simple but potentially-useful app focused on tracking goals – of the personal motivation kind, rather than the football kind. You can create entries for your ambitions, then analyse your progress, and share your success (hopefully) on Facebook.

amie Oliver's digital magazine is available for iPhone and iPad

It's time for our weekly roundup of the best new iPhone and iPad appsreleased this week on Apple's App Store, and this one's a bumper selection.

As ever, the list doesn't include games, as they get their own separate post: this week's picks included iOS titles like Need for Speed: Most Wanted, Bubble Island, Hellfire, Gizmonauts and ARC Squadron.

Android apps get their own separate post, which can be found here. Windows Phone has a monthly roundup, with the latest edition found here.

On with this week's iOS apps!

Jamie Magazine (Free)

Celebri-chef Jamie Oliver has his own magazine, and now it's available on iOS as well as in print. Individual issues are sold for £2.99 or £3.99 via in-app purchases, or you can subscribe. Expect recipes galore, with the latest issue focusing on Christmas cooking.
iPhone / iPad

Onavo Count (Free)

Onavo has become an essential iPhone download thanks to its ability to compress the data you use, and thus eke out your monthly allowance further. Now the company behind it has a new app, which helps you understand which apps are sucking up data, breaking down usage over the month, with pretty graphs.
iPhone

Summly (Free)

Summly promises "pocket sized news for iPhone", trawling hundreds of news sites, pulling in articles from their RSS feeds, then turning them into 400-character summaries, which can be flipped through using a neat gestural interface. For more on the company behind it's intentions, read our interview.
iPhone

in:play (£1.49)

If you're pondering an alternative to the default iPhone music player, in:play is well worth a look. Not least because of its striking typography-focused design, gestural controls and some seriously nifty navigation to root through even the largest digital music collection.
iPhone

Brian Cox's Wonders of the Universe (£3.99)

Scientist Brian Cox's planetary app has been out for a while on iPad, but now publisher HarperCollins has released a native iPhone version too, boiling down its text, videos and photography to something that works well on smaller screens.
iPhone

HowDo (Free)

This is very neat: an app "to show you how to do stuff in the real world", with the tutorials coming from other people using the HowDo app. The idea being that you can shoot photos, associate up to eight-second sound recordings with them, and then share them with the community, following other users who seem knowledgable.
iPhone

Threadlife (Free)

Threadlife is picking up a fair bit of buzz this week, thanks to its aim to make "shooting video as easy as taking photos". That involves shooting three-second video clips, which are then "stitched" together into longer stories, or "threads", including your own videos and/or those of other users.
iPhone

Viz Profanisaurus Das Krapital £1.49

Dennis Publishing pleased fans of Viz with the launch of its Profanisaurus iPhone app earlier in 2012. Now there's an iPad version of the sweary dictionary, offering 12,000 definitions too rude to read to your grandparents.
iPad

Path (Free)

Social app Path has fervent fans, who love its status as a more private version of Facebook and other services. It's traditionally been a smartphone thing, but now it's available on iPad too, with bigger photos and film/music/book previews, as well as the ability to see your whole day's posts in an attractive landscape view. It makes very good use of the larger screen.
iPad

James Bond: 50 Years of Movie Posters

As cinemagoers get excited about the new Bond film Skyfall, there's an app from DK showcasing some of the poster art that promoted previous films. 105 posters are featured, with accompanying text from "Bond expert" (now that's a job worth having) Alastair Dougall.
iPhone / iPad

Wreck-It Ralph Storybook Deluxe (£4.99)

Talking of movies, Disney has launched an iOS book-app for its animated film Wreck-It Ralph, which tells the story for children with voice narration, animation, clips from the film and a racing game where kids get to build their own kart.
iPhone / iPad

Happy Places by Coca-Cola (Free)

This is pretty surprising: a photo-sharing app from Coca-Cola, with a clean and stylish design, and the ability to share shots out to Facebook or Twitter, as well as Coke's own Happy Places community. The question is whether this kind of branded app will tempt anyone away from Instagram, Facebook Camera, Path and other popular apps.
iPhone

Bubble Guppies: Animal School Day (£1.99)

There are a number of big entertainment companies getting into app-education (appducation?), with MTV the latest. Its new app aims to teach children about animals: what they're like, where they live, and what they eat. Rewards, a doghouse to decorate and the option to register up to four children separately with the app should be a hit with parents.
iPhone / iPad

LinkTV World News (Free)

iPad app LinkTV has a focus on international news, aggregating videos from broadcasters around the world tied to topical events, as well as text articles, documentaries and personalisation features.
iPad

18 Months (Free)

Calvin Harris has a new album out, and there's an app for that. And unusually, the app lets fans stream the album in full, with one caveat: they have to dance. A simple yet fun motion-detecting feature ensures that songs will play as long as the user is dancing – or at least moving the phone.
iPhone

The xx (Free)

The xx's last album Coexist has a very slinky iOS app that's just come out, offering high-definition videos for every song on the album, interactive artwork, and the promise of messages and news from the band, as well as ticketing details.
iPhone / iPad

Junior Astronaut - Breaking through the space barrier (Free)

This is another excellent education app for children, this time from UK firms Immediate Media and Crank Publishing. Aimed at 9-15 year-olds, it focuses on space travel: rockets, gravity and other topics, with a look and feel inspired by children's space books from the 1950s and 60s. It's free, with an in-app purchase of £3.99 unlocking the whole book-app.
iPad

Oakley Airwave (Free)

This one's for snow-sports fans, claiming to be "the perfect app to enhance your day on the mountain". It tracks your alpine stats, connects to friends and syncs with Oakley's new Airwave goggles' innovative heads-up display.
iPhone

Monogram (Free)

Described as "a shoppable magazine for your iPad", Monogram blends editorial with shopping links – "everything you can see, you can purchase". Like most fashion mags, really, but of course the key thing here is that the buying is built into the magazine. Monogram is a hint at how many of the more established fashion magazines will develop in their digital incarnations.
iPad

HuffPost Live (Free)

This is only available in the US for now, but it's an interesting sign of the way Huffington Post is developing: "a live-streaming video network that uses the most engaging stories on The Huffington Post as the jumping-off point for real-time conversations and commentary". The idea being that readers (viewers? users?) join in with the debates.
iPad

Beamr (Free)

Beamr sounds like a novelty at first, turning your photos into "a glossy-style magazine with a custom cover". But look closer, and there's a much better hook here: the ability to share photos at their original resolutions as shot on the iPhone, including the new panoramic shots. People you share them with can view, download and print the pics, too.
iPhone

Creatorverse (£2.99)

Linden Lab's main business is virtual world Second Life, but you won't see any 3D avatars in its new iPad app. Instead, this is a playful physics app that gets you to create... things, using joints, motors, forces, teleporters and other items. Then watch them in motion: "From the simplest bouncing ball to an elaborate pinball machine".
iPad

DJZ TxT (Free)

DJZ is a brand new website devoted to dance music (or, as the US would have it, "EDM"). It has just launched, with a spin-off app that isn't about presenting the site's content at all. Instead, it's a messaging app with the twist that you can include graphical "emojis" (emoticons) that act as beats and loops. "Every conversation is a new remix," notes the App Store listing. Which sounds silly, but it's actually enormous fun.
iPhone

Thoughtful Gift Finder (Free)

When you've finished making dubstep-scronk messages, how about thinking of someone else for a change? Thoughtful Gift Finder does exactly what its name implies: released by Notonthehighstreet.com, it's a way to research gifts for friends and family, based on some of their key characteristics. More than 60,000 products are covered.
iPhone

Sooty Paint (£1.99)

Sooty is 64 now, y'know. He's making his first appearance in an iPad app though, along with friends Sweep, Soo and Richard from his TV show. The app focuses on digital painting, with 20 pictures for children to colour in, and a blank canvas to come up with their own creations.
iPad

PC Pro Enhanced (Free)

Another app from Dennis Publishing, but this time with less swearing and more computers. A digital version of PC Pro magazine, it includes more photography and podcast snippets alongside kit reviews, as well as product comparison features. The app charges £9.99 a quarter for the digital issues.
iPad

HotUKDeals (Free)

British website HotUKDeals gathers discounts, deals and vouchers from a host of retailers and sites. Now it's got an app, which adds location into the mix to pinpoint nearby savings, while also letting you rate and comment on deals, or add those you've found yourself.
iPhone

First@Scene (Free)

This app comes from the Australian branch of St John Ambulance, and wants to help reduce road accident deaths and serious injuries, providing advice for anyone who finds themselves in a position to help after a car crash. Text, photos and revision questions all feature.
iPad

Trucks - Byron Barton (£0.69)

Byron Barton's Trucks book will be familiar to parents around the world: a colourful children's book covering trucks of all shapes and sizes. This is a digitised version of the book, with interactivity and features to help young (2-5) children practise their fledgling reading skills.
iPhone / iPad

Shatoetry (£1.99)

And last, something ridiculous: an official app from William Shatner in which the Star Trek veteran has recorded a host of words, which you can then string together into sentences to hear him say them. The idea being you compose poetry (sorry, "Shatisms" – one senses the developer hasn't tested the lingo on Brits), or create them with friends through the app's Game Center integration.
iPhone

That's our selection, but what new iOS apps have you been using this week? Make your recommendations in the comments section.