We already gave you some ideas on how to work from home, and how to stop yourself from going insane while you’re stuck in COVID-19 lockdown. Today we’re going to take a look at some great iOS apps to use while you’re working from home.
This week we “watch” our to-dos with Things, read the news really, really fast with NetNewsWire, make Keynote-style presentations with Markdown, and more.
YouTube’s latest change on mobile swaps the familiar “Trending” tab with a new “Explore” tab. As of Friday, it’s available to all users on iPhone and iPad (and Android) following a lengthy test. It hopes to make great content from popular categories easier to find.
Nerds of a certain age will have a warm place in their dorky hearts for NetNewsWire. First released in 2002, for years it was the best RSS newsreader on the Mac. At some point, a terrible version turned up on iOS, then withered and died. Now, original developer Brent Simmons is back in charge, and a new, free iOS version of NetNewsWire just launched for iPhone and iPad.
This week we check our grammar with Antidote, turn tweets into email newsletters with Mailbrew and much more.
Microsoft Outlook’s newest update is out on iOS with new text formatting options. It’s now possible to use bold, italic, and underlined text — as well as inline links — in your emails.
Shortcutify is a free iOS app that lets you use web-based services in your Shortcuts. For instance, it can connect with Spotify, Todoist, AirTable and more, and provides an easy bridge between these services’ complicated APIs and the Shortcuts app on your iPhone or iPad.
If you use any of the supported services, you’re going to totally love Shortcutify. If not? More app integrations are planned for the future.
This week we keep old folks safe, brew perfectly measured coffee, celebrate Photoshop’s 30th anniversary, and complain about SoundCloud.
Pokémon Home, the new service that lets you send all your Pokémon to the cloud for transferring between devices, has gotten off to a terrific start on mobile. New figures reveal it raked in $1.8 million during its first week alone.
Apple is finally “considering” giving users the ability to set third-party web browsers and email clients as defaults on iOS, according to a new Bloomberg report. It could also open up HomePod to rival music streaming services.
iPhone and iPad owners can already install third-party alternatives, but iOS currently does not allow them to override Apple’s built-in services. That could change as Apple faces increasing pressure over the tight control it imposes over its mobile devices.
Photoshop turns 30 today, and to celebrate this massive milestone, Adobe is rolling out some handy new tools for the iPad version of its app.
The latest update brings an Object Selection tool and Type settings. They help bring Photoshop for iPad a little bit closer to the desktop version, and they’re part of Adobe’s mission to deliver a “continuous stream” of new features.
There are some nice additions for Photoshop on desktop, too.
The official SoundCloud app for iPhone and iPad now lets you upload your latest tracks directly from the Files app.
Its new upload feature supports any audio file, including lossless formats like FLAC and AIFF. It also lets you add metadata, artwork, descriptions, and more — all from the palm of your hand.
This week we dock apps with SwitchGlass, convert photos from Aperture to Lightroom with Avalanche, rip music to shreds with Scatterbrain, and more.
Everyone’s favorite mapping service turns 15 on Thursday, and there are gifts in store to celebrate. The latest Google Maps update for iOS brings a revamped icon and brand-new features.
Users can look forward to a fresh new interface that makes exploring and commuting a little bit easier.
Samplr is one of the best-loved iPad music apps. You load up a sample, and then you can play it and manipulate it with your fingers. It’s simple to learn, but capable of incredibly complex and beautiful results. Unfortunately, the developer landed a job at Apple, and Samplr development ceased.
Until now. The groundbreaking iPad music app just received its first update in five (5!) years.
Microsoft’s combined email and calendar application finally offers full support for iPad multitasking. Outlook now supports Split View, so users can have their mail and calendar open next to each other.
This week we type on our Apple Watches, scrapbook everything into Notebooks, flex our brains with MoneyBall and more.
This week we trim our SSDs, make PDF statements from our Apple Cards, and drown everything in delicious, springy reverb. These are the apps that got us buzzing this week.
This week we create music-synced video art with Glitch Clip, import music to our iPhone with Doppler 2, take proper control of Shortcuts with LaunchCuts, and more.
Glitch Clip is an iPad app for VJs. That is, Glitch Clip lets you combine video clips with in-app effects and visuals, and sync them to music. Thus, you can create live video performances, or you can just make killer music videos for when you put your own songs up on YouTube.
Previously this kind of power was found in apps like Isadora for the Mac, which costs over $500. And while Glitch Clip is no Isadora, it’s only 1/100th the price.
If you love making music, then you’re in the right place. If not, then next week I promise to write more about some non-music apps again — if the developers release some. Until then, we can bomb the bass, make some tunes with Tune Maker, get Unisonic with JAX, and take control of our stereo widths, all with the tap of a touch-screen.
This week we boss a metronome around with only our voices, let a music app write our songs for us, and create beats and tunes like little children might. Yes, the only good new apps I’ve seen this week have all been music apps, so try to enjoy it.
Cubasis, the audio workstation app from Steinberg, just got rewritten as a brand new app. Cubasis 3 looks just like the old version, but is all-new, and includes support for the iPhone as well as the iPad. And hopefully, this rewrite also means that in the future, updates that adjust the user interface for new iOS features and screen sizes will be supported a lot faster. It took more than a year for Cubasis to support the 12.9-inch iPad Pro, for example.
So, what’s new in Cubasis 3?
A promised update to Photoshop on iPad debuted today. A notable new feature employs artificial intelligence to enable users to easily select the subjects of images. The latest version also makes accessing cloud storage much faster.
This is the first in a planned series of improvements for the iPad version of this professional image-editing software
This week we import photos from SD cards straight into Lightroom for iPad, make loops with L7 Looper, find the next bus or subway ride with Transit for Apple Watch, and more.