Discussion: What are the best apps released recently

Last week, the App Store and Google Play released their usual list of apps for 2022, and we saw a lot of familiar apps and some unfamiliar ones as well. Our editors took the opportunity to talk about the App Store and Google Play’s App of the Year lists, their understanding of the lists, and their own App of the Year and criteria. Without further ado, let’s take a look.

If you compare the App Store and Google Play’s annual App list, it’s easy to find an interesting phenomenon, that is, many of the apps or games on the list appear on both platforms at the same time, and even the game of the year on both platforms is the same one. Obviously, good apps are no longer limited to a certain platform, and the idea that iOS apps were better in the past is no longer tenable now. The app experience itself is becoming less and less constrained and influenced by the platform. Of course, from another perspective, this year’s list is still a haven for niche apps, even for a social app like BeReal, the best user choice in the list, which is quite trendy in terms of gameplay, quite a bit like Path back in the day.

When you look at Google Play’s list after writing it every year, it’s inevitably a bit boring: it’s hard to find anything new at first glance from all the changes over the years, and many of them are even regulars that have been on the list for several years. But the reason why we still look at them every year is that Google Play’s list not only directly reflects the annual trend, but also takes into account some corner details that we usually ignore or have no time to take into account, such as Wear OS, ChromeOS and Play Pass game updates. It’s one of the best to-do apps on Wear OS. So in a sense, these lists are more of a “year in review” for people like me who pay attention to app updates every day, but if you don’t usually pay much attention to app trends or interesting app updates, I believe you can find more surprises from the lists.

I think it’s a very interesting trend that Wear OS apps are nominated in Google Play list this year. 21 years ago, Samsung abandoned its long-held Tizen and let Wear OS ride on the Samsung’s brand, and Wear OS is really being promoted by Samsung and its market share is increasing. So riding on this east wind, Google definitely wants to “make Wear OS great again”, and this year’s list is a signal that I am back with a watch!

I don’t know if I’ve been writing App Review for several years, but every year when I face the App Store and Google Play’s annual App list, I still feel unconscious: this is it? Compared to the earlier years when all kinds of novelty apps appeared in spurts, there are few fresh apps in the past one or two years, so there is no shortage of apps that have been released for years in both lists. Google Play’s Todoist, however, makes me admire the Todoist development team even more, as they are one of the few apps that can be used on different platforms. It’s one of the few apps that can use different design specifications for different platforms, so that’s worthy of being on the list.

Apple’s list is more about the games, especially this year’s games are very playable, “Caged Peeping Dreams” actually completed the experience last year, this time the best game on iPad can be said to deserve. It’s also another puzzle game that has been screaming for attention both visually and playably since the “Monument Valley” series. Both lists provide a more global perspective, compared to the small environment of domestic applications, from these two lists you can see what players around the world are playing/using now, and of course, more importantly, the current trend of App design, to see what good app design has to offer.

Google has a huge business scope and data volume, while Apple is the leader in the digital ecology field, they are both companies that can summarize the digital life of everyone in the past year. For example, this year, there is a boom of AI painting on the Internet, and the related tools have evolved from requiring complicated configuration at the beginning to being ready to use out of the box now, so we can foresee that AI painting will definitely become an everyday tool like a browser in the future. Therefore, this year’s Google Play list includes the app Dream, which is a very good example of finished AI painting and I think it represents the development trend of AI painting. Maybe that’s the point of the App of the Year list, to summarize the best of the past and hope that they will continue to grow in the future.

Although I have just lamented “this is it” above, the two editors’ picks are carefully selected by considering the quality of the apps and their fit with the platform, unlike the starting point we considered. To a certain extent, it also helps me to go beyond my own perceptions and see more different kinds of apps, so that I don’t have to go around in the same categories I know. In addition, the list itself also reflects the current trend of application development, presenting a more diversified perspective, which is also good to open up the eyes.

What other sources do our editors use to get information about apps?
My personal RSS feed, and some of the discussions on reddit groups. I like to search when I’m thinking about a new technology, and I’ll find some interesting apps or software in sync.

I usually use Twitter the most, so I put Android Central, Android Authority, Android Police and their editors and developers into a list, and some of them are interesting (like Ramen Teacher), so I can get 90% of the new information first.

I personally have two important channels to get information, on the one hand, some developers’ Twitter, they will often reveal some new apps and important updates in development or testing on social media platforms; on the other hand, I follow some App recommendation and TestFlight related channels on Telegram, I can get very timely information about new apps, offers and testing in these channels.

The most common information channels are firstly, some app stores and communities, although the quality of the content varies, it must be grounded enough to understand what kind of needs everyone has through the comment section; secondly, there are specific areas in XDA, such as the Wear OS area to get some watch app recommendations; I also occasionally go to the r/androidapps topic in Reddit, or search in Product Hunt. I also occasionally look at the r/androidapps topic on Reddit, or search Product Hunt for keywords, and there are many good developers abroad who recommend their own independent apps on there.

Sometimes I start with one app and click on the editor’s recommendation or similar apps, and then there will be a bunch more in my wish list. In addition, I also pay attention to the recommendations of websites like Minority, and will download new apps to try when I see them.

Posted on December 9, 2022 uninstalledly editor