The best Android apps for 2017

At Tech Advisor we review a lot of phones and tablets, but certain apps are always top of our list. Here's our pick of the best Android apps - the most useful downloads if you've just bought a new Android phone or tablet.

Chat

Your phone is capable of many things, but at its heart it is a phone, and designed for keeping in touch with friends, family, colleagues and whoever else you fancy a chin wag with.
Your phone will have a messaging app and a dialler built-in. What it may not have is online messenger and calling services that allow you to contact friends over an internet- rather than cellular connection.
Two of our all-time favourites are WhatsApp Messenger and Skype. WhatsApp is free for all users, and lets you send and receive free messages, pictures, videos and voice messages over the web. If you have a tablet, laptop or PC you should also check out WhatsApp Web for synching messages between the two. Also see: How to install WhatsApp on a tablet.

Skype, meanwhile, is the video chat service for people who don't have iPhones and iPads and therefore can't use FaceTime. It's an excellent way of speaking face-to-face with people who are too far away to visit.
If you're not fussy who it is you're chatting to, and you're a fan of online forums, you'll also be pleased to learn Reddit has recently launched its full Android app.
What is Reddit, though? "There’s a Reddit community for every subject imaginable: your favourite sports team, relationship advice, memes, silly gifs, the latest in news and politics - all in real time," states the official download page, and we couldn't say it better ourselves. It's free - go get it.

TV, film & video

Large, high-resolution screens are all the rage with today's new Android phones, which paired with their fast processors and graphics makes them ideal devices on which to watch TV, video and films.
YouTube is more than likely preinstalled on your Android device - and if it's not you should download it now. Some other free apps that we wouldn't be without include TVCatchUp, which rather than a catch-up TV service actually offers live-streaming of UK Freeview channels, plus some actual TV catch-up services such as BBC iPlayer (you'll also need BBC Media Player), ITV Hub, All 4 and Demand 5.

If you subscribe to Sky at home then Sky Go lets you watch Sky TV on your phone or tablet, while Virgin offers a similar deal with Virgin TV Anywhere.
Netflix and Amazon Prime Instant Video are the two big online film-streaming services, each charging a monthly subscription of around £7 and letting you watch as many films as you like within that period. We like Netflix, although you may prefer the associated benefits of having a Prime account, including free next-day delivery on eligible items bought on Amazon and Amazon Prime Music. We've compared your options to help you choose.

We're also big fans of NowTV which, like Prime and Netflix, is a subscription service that puts hundreds of TV box sets and catch-up TV from some of Sky's most popular channels at your fingertips. NowTV also has a movies option that lets you tune into a great many of the films broadcast over Sky's movie channels.
Film fans will more than likely appreciate IMDB, the world's largest collection of movie, TV and celebrity info, while for TV sport fanatics there's BBC Sport and Sky Sports.

Full article:
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