Monday, December 31, 2018

The people we love: Mobile Nations 2018 Community Awards Winners!

Kicking off a new year is always a great time to reflect on the previous year. While on the blogs we tend to look at the best devices, the greatest apps, and things of that nature, there is another section of our sites that deserves attention and appreciation as well — the forums and the volunteers and members that make our communities so amazing.

We take great pride in our community and know that without the people who invest their time voluntarily helping out, answering questions, welcoming newcomers, and generally keeping our sites clear of spammers and junk posts, we wouldn't be the site we are today. With that in mind, we'd like to take the time to show some love and highlight folks who go above and beyond daily to make sure our communities remain awesome for everyone!

We opened up the table for suggestions from our volunteer team for outstanding community members, and the nominations poured in! So without further ado, here are some volunteers and community members that have stood out over the last year!

CrackBerry

Best New Member - Crusader03

Biggest BlackBerry Fan - bb10adopter111

Most helpful member - Conite

CrackBerry volunteer team MVP - ECM

Top Poster in the CrackBerry forums - Conite

Android Central

Best New Member - Kodak2

Biggest Android Fan - Mustang7757

Most helpful member - B. Diddy

Android Central volunteer team MVP - Javier P

Top Poster in the Android Central forums - B. Diddy

Windows Central

Best New Member - DavidBS1989

Biggest Windows Fan - Fatclue_98

Most helpful member - Ryujingt3

Windows Central volunteer team MVP - Worldspy99

Top Poster in the Windows Central forums - MSFTisMIA

iMore

Best New Member - Jude526

Biggest Apple Fan - Ledstepplin

Most helpful member - Just_Me_D

iMore volunteer team MVP - Rob Phillips

Top Poster in the iMore forums - Just_Me_D

Special recognition from the community

- BreakingKayfabe for being an iMore faithful and a dependable voice when it comes to participating in threads whether a simple Ask a Question Thread or one than can get quite heated. He's been a member for 10 years and he deserves some recognition, in my opinion.

- Almeuit, Pkcable, Golfdriver97, BigBadWulf, Guytronic, Jason Cockerham, Spencerdl, and Howarmat all received commendations for going above and beyond to do their part for our communities.

In Memoriam

2018 also brought a huge loss to our community with the unexpected passing of longtime CrackBerry member (and arguably BlackBerry's biggest fan) Mark Davidson, known around here as Carjackd. Not only was Mark a respected volunteer, he was also a good friend to many, and his memory will live on for a long time to come. You can read more about Carjackd HERE and if you'd like to contribute to his family's fund, that can be found HERE.

Thank YOU!

Of course, every one of our members and volunteers is important to us, and we wish we could put all of your names in a post, but that would be a pretty long post. From all of us at Mobile Nations, to all the volunteers and community members listed above or not, we want to say THANK YOU. We couldn't do what we do here without you, and we're grateful every day that you choose to spend your time here with us. So here's to 2018, and to 2019 and beyond!



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Rocket League is fun, hectic, and only $10 right now

Big demolition energy.

If you haven't played Rocket League yet, literally what are you even doing with your life? This game is a combination of soccer and racing, complete with physics-based gameplay, rocket boosters, demolitions, and the world's wub-wubbiest soundtrack. It's one of the most fun games I've ever played, and if you haven't joined the club yet, now's the time. Rocket League is down to just $9.99 right now, which is half off the normal price.

You can download it from the PlayStation Store, where the Game of the Year Edition is also 50% off. It's up for grabs from Microsoft for Xbox consoles, or from the Nintendo Store if you want to play on your Switch. PC gamers can snag a digital code for the same price. Choose whichever option works best for you.

Note that to get the most out of this well-rated game, you'll need to have an online membership for the console you're playing. Now get out there and score some goals.

See at PlayStation Store



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Best tip ever: Set up Find My Device as soon as you get your phone

Signing into Find My Device is one of the first things you should do after setting up your phone.

There are several options available for remotely tracking your phone, but Google's own Find My Device service is one of the most convenient around. In addition to locating your phone, Find My Device lets you ring your device, remotely lock it, or even erase the data if your phone goes missing or stolen.

Find My Device is enabled out of the box on most devices, but it doesn't hurt to see if it's running on your phone. Doing so is a straightforward process that doesn't take more than a few minutes, so let's get started.

Install and enable Find My Device

If your phone doesn't already come with Find My Device pre-installed, you can download the app from the Play Store. The service is available for download even on older devices — all phones running Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich and above are eligible.

Once the app is installed, you'll have to sign into it with your Google account. Doing so allows the service to essentially link your phone to your Google account. As Find My Device relies on Wi-Fi and GPS to pinpoint the location of your device, it requires access to location services. Once you grant access to location services, you should be able to see a map with your phone's location highlighted.

Find My Device: Everything you need to know

Track your phone with ease

If you need to remotely track your phone, all you have to do is head to the Find My Device site and sign into your Google account (the same you used while setting up the service). Alternatively, you can also perform a Google search with the query, "Find my phone" to start tracking your device.

Once your phone has been located, you'll be able to ring your device so it plays a loud sound even if it's on silent mode. This is handy if you've misplaced your phone inside your house. If you have a Google Home, you can just ask Assistant to ring your device by saying, "Hey Google, ring my phone." It will find the last phone that you logged in with your Google account, and ring it.

Find My Device's lock feature is useful if you haven't secured your phone with a passcode or fingerprint, as it prevents access to the home screen should anyone else come across your phone. There's also the option to display a message on the lock screen and add a callback number so that anyone that finds your phone can get in touch with you.

If you're looking for additional features, there are several third-party apps available that let you remotely track and lock down your device.

How to find your lost Android phone

Remotely erase data when all else fails

As Find My Device relies on location services, your phone has to be connected to a Wi-Fi network or use cellular data for the service to accurately track its position. If you're unable to locate your phone or if it's been stolen, then the only option is to remotely erase all data on the device.

The remote erase command deletes all data on your phone — as well as any connected SD cards. If your phone is offline when you issue the command, it automatically kicks in the next time it goes online.

Make sure you're always ready

Find My Device is one of those services that you won't use often, and as such it's easy to forget to set it up during initial configuration. If you're picked up a new phone over the holidays or haven't gotten around to enabling it on your existing device, now's the time to go ahead and set it up on your phone.



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Get buff and stuff with the $200 PowerBlock Personal Trainer Set

Crush your goals.

Amazon has the PowerBlock Personal Trainer Set on sale for $199.99, which is $75 off the average price. It has excellent reviews and this price is the best in history.

If you're part of the huge amount of people that set fitness goals for your New Year's Resolutions, this set is perfect for you. You'll get a pair of adjustable dumbbell weights that can adjust from 5 to 50 pounds in 2.5-pound increments. The selector pin lets you change weights easily, and these are more compact and balanced than traditional dumbbells. The padded handle protects your wrists, too. Your purchase includes a ten-year limited warranty.

To keep your workout space protected, consider picking up some ProSource Puzzle Exercise Mats while they're discounted.

See at Amazon



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Spruce up your PlayStation Classic with these awesome accessories

The PlayStation Classic is Sony's buy-in for the nostalgia-filled retro console sector. While it has some issues, it's a lot of fun to use and recent hacking and modding by the online community has made it even better. Having these accessories will maximize your enjoyment. The Anker wall charger is especially helpful so you can actually play the Classic! There aren't a massive amount of accessories yet but we will update as they arrive.

Wireless goodness

8Bitdo wireless adapter

8Bitdo have a proven track record of making excellent hardware for retro systems. This adapter will allow you to use any Bluetooth controller, including your PS4 controller, with your PlayStation Classic.

$20 at Amazon

Mobile gaming

Anker PowerCore 10000

Because the PlayStation Classic runs on just five watts and one amp, you can actually power it using a battery pack. This means you could play it out on the road or design your own mobile version! This pack will also charge your phone for some multitasking.

$32 at Amazon

Organization is key

TPFoon carry case

This carry case has room for everything you need in the PlayStation Classic, including extension cables and the AC adapter you will have to purchase before using it. The extra flap makes it really helpful.

$23 at Amazon

Play in comfort

10ft extension cable - 2 pack

The cheapest way to be able to sit comfortably on your couch while you play your PlayStation Classic, these 10ft extensions should give you the distance you need to play.

$10 at Amazon

Our Choice

Anker Elite AC adapter

A wall adapter is required to use the PlayStation Classic since it doesn't come with one in the box. This Anker one is an excellent adapter and comes with two ports so you can charge your phone at the same time.

$11 at Amazon

Important recharging

PlayStation coffee mug

OK, so this isn't strictly for your PlayStation Classic. It's more for you to enjoy a hot cup of Joe while you play your Classic. Plus, it just looks cool.

$14 at Amazon

Even more distance

15ft Extension cable 1-pack

If you're like me and your TV is miles from your couch, then a 15-foot cable might be exactly what you need. These only come in packs of one but two of them are still cheaper than one wireless controller.

$13 at Amazon

Unique or Younik?

Younik carry case

The Younik Carry Case is a simple, cheap carry case to hold the basic parts of the PlayStation Classic. No frills here; it's just what you need to keep the Classic safe.

$22 at Amazon

Basic power

AmazonBasics wall adapter

Speaking of basics, this AmazonBasics AC wall adapter is cheap, cheerful, and will power the Classic if you need to be budget conscious. It works for your phone as well, but not both together.

$8 at Amazon

Extra Power

Ravpower 22000 external battery

Another fantastic power bank, the Ravpower is almost twice as powerful as the Anker. For just $10 more you can have twice as long to play your favorite games.

$42 at Amazon

Tangle free gaming

JoyRetro wireless controller

The JoyRetro lets you use a Classic style controller wirelessly. Not having cables lying everywhere is so much nicer than you think. Wireless is the future, or technically, the present.

$30 at Amazon

This collection has a few options for the different accessories available for the PlayStation Classic. Most of them are optional of course but the Anker wall charger is really a necessity, as without a wall charger you can't even use the Classic.



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Set the mood with discounted Philips Hue White Ambiance bulbs and more

It's lit!

If you're getting started with you smart home and want to add some more Philips Hue bulbs to your setup, today's deals are for you. You can pick up a pair of Philips Hue White Ambiance bulbs in A19 or BR30 sizes for just $37.99. That's thanks to a price drop to $39.99 from a regular price of $50, and an on-page coupon taking a further 5% off the price at checkout.

White Ambiance bulbs from Hue allow you to not only control the brightness of your lighting, but also choose from a range of white shades from cool to warm to set the perfect mood. You can control your lights via the Hue app or hook them into your smart home with Amazon Alexa, Google Assistant and Apple HomeKit compatibility. To do so, you'll need to link them to a Hue hub if you don't already have one set up.

Other Philips Hue items on sale today include the Philips Hue Bloom. It's a dimmable table lamp that adds indirect ambient lighting to any room and can even be used in sync with your favorite music, movies, and games for an immersive experience. You can grab one today for just $51.29, down from $60.

If you are a fan of a traditional light switch (or you want to stop others in your house from turning off your Hue bulb at the wall), it's worth adding a Philips Hue Wireless Dimmer Switch or two to your setup — especially at under $20 each. These can be used instead of your wall switches to turn lights on or off, set the brightness level, or switch between pre-set lighting scenes. If hooked up with the Hue hub, each switch can control up to 50 lights at a time, too.

See at Amazon



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Android winners and losers in 2018: The products, companies and features

Who hit it out of the park in 2018, and who totally blew it?

Let me start with both a cliché and an understatement: It's been a busy year in mobile tech. 2018 seems to have blown by us without any of the normal periodic lulls, as the spring launch season rolled into an unusually packed summer, and peaked with the busiest October we've ever known here at Android Central.

So as the year draws to a close, it's time to reflect on the past twelve months in Android: the hits and the misses. It's been a triumphant year for some. Not so much for others. And a truly disastrous cycle for an unlucky or two.

Here are our Android winners and losers for 2018. Enjoy -- and don't take it too seriously.

Winner: OnePlus

The biggest thing OnePlus needed to do in 2018 was avoid any high-profile screw-ups. You know, things like breaking HD content streaming in a way that required phones to be mailed-in to be fixed, or falling victim to a high-profile data breach or making a screen out of jelly. As a relatively new player in the smartphone world, OnePlus has had its share of growing pains over the years, but in 2018 the brand finally reached maturity. Aside from an embarrassing translation snafu which briefly saw it falsely laying claim to the first Snapdragon 855 release, OnePlus has simultaneously avoided any PR blunders while keeping up the pace of its growth and maintaining the level of quality that fans expect. It produced great products, made a lot of money, and ended the year on a high in partnership with veteran racing brand McLaren.

Other important OnePlus milestones included a crucial U.S. carrier deal with T-Mobile, which saw sales of the 6T really take off in the States, and an aggressive update schedule which had the OnePlus 6 getting Android Pie not long after Google's own Pixels. All of this, combined with recent setbacks for Huawei's U.S. ambitions, set OnePlus up for a great 2019.

Loser: HTC

HTC's smartphone business has been swirling in the drain for the better part of three years, but the disastrous launch of the U12+ sealed the deal. If HTC isn't already dead and buried... well, the nails are in the coffin and the casket is being lowered. The sad thing is the U12+ itself was actually a pretty decent phone, once they fixed the buttons. But the phone was such a mess out of the box that the eventual button fix, two months later, didn't matter. Even without such glaring technical problems, the U12+ demonstrated how, outside of one or two areas, HTC is now incapable of competing with Apple, Samsung and Huawei at the high end. As such, sales have continued to plummet, and the top-level brain drain at the Taiwanese firm has continued.

HTC is now left without any major Western carrier partnerships, bereft of brand value and R&D muscle (having cashed out of smartphone R&D with the late-2017 sale of assets and engineers to Google), lacking resources for basic software updates and customer support, and unable to match the scale of its Chinese rivals. The company's answer: a blockchain phone and a 5G hotspot.

It's been coming for quite some time, but 2018 truly marked the point of no return for this once-proud Android brand.

Loser: In-screen fingerprint

We've been hearing for the past couple of years how in-display fingerprint technology would revolutionize the way we used our handsets, making biometric security simpler and all-display phones a reality. Early demos, like this from Vivo early in 2018, looked promising.

Then phones with in-screen fingerprint sensors actually started to ship, and the tech turned out to be almost universally crap. Early efforts like the Huawei Porsche Design Mate RS were so bad that that phone also included a rear-mounted capacitive scanner by way of apology. Later in the year, even some of the better offerings like the OnePlus 6T and Huawei Mate 20 Pro weren't anywhere near as fast or reliable as the traditional fingerprint scanners of their predecessors. Simply put, they were a downgrade.

Qualcomm is promising next-gen ultrasonic in-screen fingerprint tech alongside its Snapdragon 855, and rumor has it Samsung will adopt it in the Galaxy S10. Maybe 2019 will be the year in-screen fingerprint finally delivers, but you'll forgive us for being skeptical.

Winner: Weird, wacky phones

This is my catch-all for things like sliders and dual-screen phones — creative designs that have appeared as phone makers have tried to engineer their way around the need for display notches. Devices like the Oppo Find X, Vivo NEX and NEX 2, and the Honor Magic 2 have emerged to dispel the idea that smartphone designs can no longer be interesting. You can even lump gaming phones like the Razer Phone 2 and ASUS ROG Phone into this mix, weird and wonderful as they are. And I'd say the same for the triumphant return of big-ass phones like the Huawei Mate 20 X. These weird and wonderful phones have added spice to the year.

Pop-up cameras, sliders and an entire second display just for taking selfies have emerged as fresh approaches to keep the fronts of our phones as uncluttered as possible. Sure, they're mostly impractical and more expensive. A second display is a significant chunk of extra cash on your bill of materials, and phones with moving parts are harder to insulate against water and dust. But they're also proof that there's plenty of innovation left in this industry.

Loser: Aluminum

Or if you prefer, aluminium. It was a bad year to be shopping for a phone that wasn't made entirely out of glass. As Apple switched to glass-backed iPhones in 2017, and more devices started to adopt wireless charging, and as more companies figured out ways to make glass feel nicer in the hand, the once proud aluminum unibody smartphone has all but disappeared.

It's bad news for those of us who prefer heft, texture and in-hand feel of metal, as well as the extra durability it provides when dropped. But with 5G phones just around the corner, along with evermore complex radio antenna requirements, it's unlikely metal will be making a comeback anytime soon.

Winner: Huawei

Geopolitics aside, Huawei had a pretty great year. The firm shipped 200 million smartphones in 2018, and at the high end, phones like the P20 Pro and Mate 20 Pro showed that it could compete on quality with the likes of Samsung, and not just rely on its enormous scale. Of particular note is Huawei's partnership with Leica, which this year produced two of the generation's best phone camera systems in both the P20 Pro and Mate 20 Pro. And Huawei has continued to dominate on battery life and charging speeds, with new 40W Super Charging tech and consistently larger battery capacities than any of its rivals.

Its own custom Kirin-branded silicon gave it an edge in areas like LTE speeds and GPS accuracy, at least for part of the year.

There's no way Huawei's going to break into the U.S. market anytime soon, but in terms of product quality and sales for the rest of the world, it's hard to fault Huawei's 2018 performance.

Loser: Sony

Sony has spent the past four years or so putting out pretty good, pretty boring, pretty expensive phones that nobody buys. Bruised by multiple failed attempts to get into the U.S. market, the company now falls back on unlocked sales outside of its traditional strongholds. Even newer, relatively decent phones like the XZ3 show signs of a company ignorant of major trends in mobile, like multiple cameras, computational photography and high-capacity batteries.

Sony's back catalog of handsets includes some truly unique, inventive designs. Yet the company has stagnated for so long that it's now left recycling old Samsung and Nokia designs. More disappointing, despite making some of the best image sensors for other brands, Sony's own phone cameras continue to underperform.

Winner: Computational photography

In 2016 and 2017, smartphone photography appeared to be at a plateau. But more than once this year I've been blown away by the quality of images I've been able to capture on a flagship phone. Computational photography — that is, using the computing power of smartphones to make up for the tiny sensors in their cameras — has unlocked new possibilities for phone cameras.

Across the board, pretty much everyone is now using multi-frame photography for improved dynamic range and color detail. Some have even introduced AI shooting modes — to varying degrees of success.

But computational night modes from Huawei and Google have been the highlight of the year in phone photography. Huawei got there first with the P20, and a handheld long exposure mode that eliminated the need for tripods when shooting in the dark. Then later in 2018, Google took this to the next level with Night Sight, using its single camera and the Pixel Visual core to capture more detail than your eye can see using only a smartphone camera behind a tiny lens. It's no surprise that Samsung is now rumored to deliver its own version of this feature with the Galaxy S10 in 2019.

Loser: Wear OS

Despite a new name, a major redesign, new(ish) chips and the launch of some genuinely impressive watches like the Skagen Falster 2 and Casio F30, Google's Wear OS (nee Android Wear) has fallen on hard times. Wear OS's current chicken-and-egg conundrum has Qualcomm apparently unwilling to engineer any truly new silicon to power it, likely due to lackluster sales. But then the fact that the bulk of Wear OS devices run silicon based on the positively ancient Snapdragon 400, from 2013, surely hasn't helped. Even the new Wear 3100 chip leans on a new low-power core designed to improve battery consumption when Wear OS isn't in use.

Which means in day-to-day performance, even some of the newer watches can be prone to lag, and the kind of lopsided battery life you'd expect from a bunch of 28nm, Cortex-A7 cores. Until there's a firmer hand on the rudder in terms of both design and tech, don't expect a breakthrough for Google's wearable platform in 2019.

But hey, at least that Galaxy Watch is pretty neat, eh?


What are your Android winners and losers for 2018? Let us know in the comments!



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Keep your new smartphone powered up with Anker's Qi Wireless Charging Pad

If you have a phone that supports wireless charging and haven't picked up a wireless charger, you're doing it wrong. Correct that today.

This Anker Qi Wireless Charger is down to just $12.99 at Amazon. This is almost half off its usual price of $24.99 and is limited to today only. If you recently got a new smartphone with wireless charging built-in, you need a wireless charging pad in your life.

The Qi-certified charging pad can power up any Qi-enabled smartphone including the newest Samsung Galaxy series, the latest iPhone models, Google Pixel 3, and many more. If you want an easy way to ensure your phone's battery remains full, add one of these charging pads to your desk or nightstand and you can simply rest the phone and get that battery to 100%. The wireless charger provides power at 5W. If your phone supports fast wireless charging, you may want to take a look at Anker's discounted Wireless Charging stand that can charge at up to 10W.

It's worth noting that your $13 does not get you a wall charger. You can use the existing one from your smartphone or pick up an extra one, such as this $10 two-port model from Aukey.

This deal is part of a larger sale on Anker accessories that is running for today only. It includes charging cables, power banks, USB-C hubs, and much more with discounts that are good until the day is out.

See at Amazon



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What's new in January 2019 on Amazon Prime Video, Netflix and Hulu

Neil Patrick Harris is Count Olaf in Netflix's "A Series of Unfortunate Events."

New year, new originals for the three major streaming libraries.

Streaming video is only projected to increase by something like a jillion percent in 2019. (That's a rough estimate.) And by all accounts Amazon Prime Video, Netflix and Hulu are coming out of the gate strong in January. Consider:

  • Gear up for the third season of The Grand Tour. Can't get enough of those guys.
  • Netflix is back with the third — and final! — season of A Series of Unfortunate Events. Maybe they'll finally find that damn sugar bowl.
  • Season 2 of Future Man finds its way to Hulu on Jan. 11. It's never too late to go back in time to save the future of humanity.

And that's just the tip of the iceberg, folks. There's something for everyone in 2019. This is just the start of it.

What's new on Amazon Prime Video
What's new on Netflix
What's new on Hulu



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5 New Year's resolutions apps you'll actually use

These apps will help you stay fit going into the new year.

2019 has arrived, and as with every new year, it means a new beginning and a fresh start for everybody. No matter what happened in 2018, now's the time to take action and make a battle plan for sticking with your New Year's resolutions.

If you're like most people, your resolutions revolve around living a healthier life and/or getting into shape. Those aren't easy for anyone, but with the help of these apps, you can ensure you have the best chance possible to stick with your resolutions and come out the end of 2019 happier and healthier than ever before.

Google Fit

Google Fit used to be a pretty throwaway app that wasn't worth using, but last year, it received a major update that brought it back into the limelight thanks to a refreshed design and all-new features.

The new Google Fit is now centered around achieving two goals each day — Move Minutes and Heart Points. It makes Google Fit feel sort of like a game, and seeing both rings close at the end of a long day is pretty rewarding and encouraging to keep pushing forward with a workout.

Google Fit can track a variety of workouts (yes, flossing is here), has excellent integration with Wear OS, personalized coaching tips, and starting January 1, 30-day challenges to push you to go as hard as you can.

The best part? Google Fit is 100% completely free to use.

Download: Google Fit (free)

MyFitnessPal

A big part of leading a healthy lifestyle is keeping tabs of what you eat, and to lend a helping hand with that, you'll want to check out MyFitnessPal.

MyFitnessPal makes it easy to track what you eat, showing a log of your various meals throughout the day, all of the macros included in your food, and a barcode scanner that automatically adds all of the nutritional info from food into the app.

Even better, MyFitnessPal connects with a variety of other fitness apps. For example, if you go for a long run with your favorite running app, MyFitnessPal will account for the calories you burned during that run and add them to the calories you've taken in so you can get an accurate view of how you're doing with your daily goal.

You can use MyFitnessPal for free or upgrade to the Premium version that gets rid of ads and adds a heap of extra features for $49.99/year.

Download: MyFitnessPal (free + optional $49.99/year upgrade

Nike Training Club

Eager to head to the gym but aren't sure what to do once you get there? Nike Training Club is for you.

Nike Training Club is entirely free to use and is filled with all sorts of workouts. You can work your way through collections designed around goals you want to reach (such as building up your abs or stepping up your running game), dive into workouts that are recommended based on your performance in past ones, or pick any of the available ones on demand that are sorted by muscle group and workout type.

I first started using Nike Training Club late last year, and it's been a great motivator for me to stop making excuses for not knowing what to do when I make myself hit up the gym. Plus, it's still pretty mind-blowing that Nike doesn't charge a dime for any of this.

Download: Nike Training Club (free)

Lifesum

If you want an all-in-one app for tracking calories, following meal plans, logging your weight, and finding healthy recipes, Lifesum is one of the best out there.

Lifesum has diet plans for keto, vegan, 5:2, and other lifestyles, an easy-to-use calorie counter, barcode scanner for adding food to the app without having to type everything in, and more.

The food planner is especially nice for people that feel overwhelmed with trying to figure out what's okay to eat while on a diet, and if you have a Wear OS watch, Lifesum's app for it allows you to see your food and water intake, exercise activity, and more right on your wrist.

While Lifesum is a free download, you'll need to pay $45 each year in order to use it.

Download: Lifesum ($45/year)

Fitbit Coach

There's a good chance you received a Fitbit for Christmas, and if so, you'll definitely want to give Fitbit Coach a look.

Similar to Nike Training Club, Fitbit Coach is filled with all sorts of workout videos. Whether you want to go on a guided run, tone those abs, or go with a quick 7-minute workout, Fitbit Coach has it all.

The app on its own is pretty great, but the real cherry on top is how it ties in with the rest of the Fitbit ecosystem. Workouts from Fitbit Coach are synced seamlessly to the main Fitbit app, and if you have a smartwatch like the Fitbit Ionic or Fitbit Versa, you can even follow Fitbit Coach workouts directly on your wrist.

Fitbit Coach is a paid service, but at just $39.99/year, it's an affordable investment and one we can't recommend enough.

Download: Fitbit Coach ($39.99/year)



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