Top 5 Travel Apps
Good morning folks. Today, we're going to be looking at five essential Android apps for travelling. While some of these apps will be more or less useful depending on what kind of travelling you're doing, there are enough general purpose apps here to make this worth your while. Let's get started, shall we?
1. Waze
Waze is a rather clever driving app that offers a unique advantage - real time traffic data and incident reporting. While other apps (including the default Google Maps) include some variant of traffic data, Waze goes a step further by allowing users to make both active and passive contributions to this data. For starters, your position will be anonymously shared with Waze servers. When multiple Waze users are stuck in a single location while using the app, this route will automatically be flagged as having poor traffic and the routing and ETA will be adjusted accordingly for everyone using the service. Waze also allows you to mark specific causes of traffic, like roadworks and accidents, so that others can see whether the situation is likely to improve any time soon. It's a rather clever app, and definitely beats dead reckoning in the vast majority of circumstances, whether you're on your normal commute to work or an a special trip to a cottage on Hadrian's wall.
2. Crosscountry Train Tickets
In the UK and other parts of Europe, each train operator tends to have his or her own app. These apps offer ticket booking and live train times; the latter of which is extremely useful whilst on a journey by rail. While these apps all tend to share a single national source of rail information, the layout of these apps can differ fairly considerably. Of all the ones I've tried, Crosscountry's app seems to be the best laid out and crashes the least frequently. One addition I really wish it had, however, is the ability to look at all tickets you've purchased using your account, instead of just those in the app itself - it is impossible to choose a set using the app, so I tend to buy tickets online and mainly use the app as a mobile station board, to see what platform my train is coming in on and that kind of thing.
3. Field Trip
Field Trip is a Google developed app that offers up information on nearby attractions, restaurants and accommodation. For example, if you're visiting Hadrian's Wall in northern England then you might want to find a place to stay for the night; using the app you'll be able to find a nearby Hadrian's Wall bed and breakfast. Field Trip works in a similar fashion to Trip Advisor in this way, although Field Trip exchanges user reviews for critical ones, provided by well known magazines, websites and newspapers. Another difference is that Field Trip will integrate with Google Now, popping up alerts of interesting places nearby as you travel for you to peruse at your leisure.
4. Eye in Sky
Particularly when you're travelling outdoors, a good weather app is essential. My favourite on Android is Eye in Sky, a rather simple app that offers as its chief advantage a selection of stylish and highly readable widgets. There are options for current temperatures and weather conditions, as well as those for the week ahead. With multiple shapes and sizes to choose from, it's easy to find one that'll match the space available on your home screen. Best of all, the app is free and ads only linger inside the app itself; the widgets are unbranded and gorgeous.
5. Cerberus
With travel comes risk. One of the most worrying prospects is losing your mobile phone, whether by leaving it accidentally on the train or having an unscrupulous individual take it from you. The best way to protect against these worries - beyond common sense - is through an app that'll allow you to retrieve information from your phone when it is next turned on. I use one called Cerberus, which allows me to access all manner of data about my mobile via a web browser. You can track your phone using GPS and/or cell towers, download call logs and text messages, and even take photographs from the front or rear-facing cameras. Cerberus has been well used in the past to track down stolen phones, and for a couple of quid seems like a very economical investment.
Conclusion
I hope these selections will prove useful. If you've got any recommendations or feedback, please feel free to leave this in the comments below. Thanks for reading and have a good trip!
1. Waze
Waze is a rather clever driving app that offers a unique advantage - real time traffic data and incident reporting. While other apps (including the default Google Maps) include some variant of traffic data, Waze goes a step further by allowing users to make both active and passive contributions to this data. For starters, your position will be anonymously shared with Waze servers. When multiple Waze users are stuck in a single location while using the app, this route will automatically be flagged as having poor traffic and the routing and ETA will be adjusted accordingly for everyone using the service. Waze also allows you to mark specific causes of traffic, like roadworks and accidents, so that others can see whether the situation is likely to improve any time soon. It's a rather clever app, and definitely beats dead reckoning in the vast majority of circumstances, whether you're on your normal commute to work or an a special trip to a cottage on Hadrian's wall.
2. Crosscountry Train Tickets
In the UK and other parts of Europe, each train operator tends to have his or her own app. These apps offer ticket booking and live train times; the latter of which is extremely useful whilst on a journey by rail. While these apps all tend to share a single national source of rail information, the layout of these apps can differ fairly considerably. Of all the ones I've tried, Crosscountry's app seems to be the best laid out and crashes the least frequently. One addition I really wish it had, however, is the ability to look at all tickets you've purchased using your account, instead of just those in the app itself - it is impossible to choose a set using the app, so I tend to buy tickets online and mainly use the app as a mobile station board, to see what platform my train is coming in on and that kind of thing.
3. Field Trip
Field Trip is a Google developed app that offers up information on nearby attractions, restaurants and accommodation. For example, if you're visiting Hadrian's Wall in northern England then you might want to find a place to stay for the night; using the app you'll be able to find a nearby Hadrian's Wall bed and breakfast. Field Trip works in a similar fashion to Trip Advisor in this way, although Field Trip exchanges user reviews for critical ones, provided by well known magazines, websites and newspapers. Another difference is that Field Trip will integrate with Google Now, popping up alerts of interesting places nearby as you travel for you to peruse at your leisure.
4. Eye in Sky
Particularly when you're travelling outdoors, a good weather app is essential. My favourite on Android is Eye in Sky, a rather simple app that offers as its chief advantage a selection of stylish and highly readable widgets. There are options for current temperatures and weather conditions, as well as those for the week ahead. With multiple shapes and sizes to choose from, it's easy to find one that'll match the space available on your home screen. Best of all, the app is free and ads only linger inside the app itself; the widgets are unbranded and gorgeous.
5. Cerberus
With travel comes risk. One of the most worrying prospects is losing your mobile phone, whether by leaving it accidentally on the train or having an unscrupulous individual take it from you. The best way to protect against these worries - beyond common sense - is through an app that'll allow you to retrieve information from your phone when it is next turned on. I use one called Cerberus, which allows me to access all manner of data about my mobile via a web browser. You can track your phone using GPS and/or cell towers, download call logs and text messages, and even take photographs from the front or rear-facing cameras. Cerberus has been well used in the past to track down stolen phones, and for a couple of quid seems like a very economical investment.
Conclusion
I hope these selections will prove useful. If you've got any recommendations or feedback, please feel free to leave this in the comments below. Thanks for reading and have a good trip!
Great and i use Field Trip!
ReplyDeletereally its a powerful app