App Reviews | The Verge

I used two GPS hiking apps for backpacking and I’ll do it again

2025-05-19T07:38:53-04:00

In which the phones website goes outside. | Cath Virginia / The Verge, Getty Images

For most of my life, I've relied on a paper map when I go outdoors. Then, in March, I joined my friend Rusty on the Appalachian Trail for two weeks. He told me to download FarOut.

FarOut was my introduction to the world of app-based navigation. It's focused on thru-hikers, and has useful details, including comments that tell you whether a specific water source is flowing, and if so, how well. It took me a minute to get the hang of it - I was hiking southbound, and it defaults to northbound - but once I did, I was impressed.

FarOut works like a guidebook. But the kind of backpacking I ordinarily do is on more offbeat trails in the local nat …

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This app put my Apple Home smart devices into an interactive map

2024-05-29T05:00:00-04:00

Using Apple’s RoomPlan Controller for HomeKit has added a map view for Apple Home to its app. | Image: Controller for HomeKit

Controller for HomeKit, a third-party app for controlling your Apple Home smart home, has a new Floor Plan feature that adds a map interface for interacting with connected devices like lights, locks, shades, sensors and more. I got some time with the new feature ahead of its launch this week and it's a compelling way to control your smart home. A 3D scan of your house becomes an interactive map filled with all your connected devices providing an intuitive way to control them: Just tap the lamp next to the sofa on the map and that light will turn on.

For those unfamiliar, Controller for HomeKit is a well-regarded app that can manage and cont …

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Mint is going away, but these easy budgeting apps can take its place

2024-03-22T17:12:30-04:00

If you've been using Intuit's Mint app to help you budget, automatically collect your expenses, put them in useful categories, and remind you to pay them, then you were probably a bit shocked to find out that Intuit will be folding Mint into its other financial service, Credit Karma. Originally, the final date was going to be January 1st, 2024, but now, Mint will officially disappear on March 23rd, 2024.

Credit Karma's main service is to offer advice about financial products based on your credit score, which means this may be a good fit depending on how many of Mint's features will be moved to Credit Karma. But it's too soon to tell. (Accor …

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Final Cut Pro for the iPad is slick but limited

2025-01-28T10:11:07-05:00

One of my favorite ways to edit photos is on an iPad - pinching the screen to zoom feels natural, the Apple Pencil is the perfect way to brush in adjustments, and even the apps are getting better over time. But I have not been able to replicate that setup for video editing. LumaFusion never did it for me, and despite my YouTube recommendations being filled with "I switched to DaVinci Resolve. Here's why" videos, I haven't made that switch yet.

Here at The Verge, we're all mostly Adobe users, but for my personal work, I like to play around with Final Cut Pro, so the news that it's coming to the iPad was exciting for me. Except that I own a …

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Logic Pro for the iPad is very fun with very few compromises

2023-05-23T13:00:00-04:00

Over the past few days, I've been having a lot of fun composing riffs, beats, and rhythms using the new iPad version of Apple's music production software Logic Pro. The subtly redesigned app translates the company's pro-level audio app to a touchscreen interface really well, and thankfully, it does not dumb it down for a mobile screen.

Those who have used GarageBand on an iPad will be familiar with a touch interface for virtual instruments and recording, but with Logic Pro, you have a whole lot more things to adjust - more knobs, faders, automations, plug-ins, and samples. I've been using Logic Pro on a 12.9-inch iPad Pro, so I'm using the …

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Mimestream is the Mac app every Gmail user needs

2023-05-22T12:00:00-04:00

Mimestream is what happens when you mix Gmail and Apple Mail. | Image: Mimestream

The most important thing I can tell you about Mimestream, the email app for Mac that just came out of a yearslong beta, is that it finally made me stop going to Gmail.com.

I've tried a lot of email apps over the years, and they all have at least one fatal flaw. (Some have several.) Search is the most common culprit: very few apps can search through messages as fast or as well as Gmail, which is why I've dumped everything from Spark to Edison to Apple Mail to Newton over the years. But some apps have a hard time finding contacts, others do weird stuff with inbox organization, and don't even get me started on the ones that seem somehow unabl …

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This app does only one thing: splitting meal bills

2022-07-31T11:00:00-04:00

There's a lot to be said for an app with one singular function, and that's what makes the Tab app so magical. Unlike other bill splitting apps like Splitwise, which lets you split and track any type of expense, the Tab app exists to only split meal bills among a group of people. That's it - that's all it does.

I was first introduced to the app by my friends when I lived in New York City. After many dinners and debates over who ordered an extra side of fries, who got three beers instead of two, and who just had an hors d'oeuvre in place of an entree, we were fed up with doing basic math so the five or six people at the table could each pay …

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Clipchamp is Microsoft’s new video editing app for Windows 11

2022-03-09T13:48:52-05:00

If you've been waiting for Microsoft to resurrect Windows Movie Maker, Clipchamp might be the next best thing. After acquiring Clipchamp last year, Microsoft is now bundling the app into Windows 11. It's a browser-based app that supports trimming, splitting, transitions, and even has a screen recorder feature.

Clipchamp includes a timeline, just like pro apps like Adobe Premiere Pro, and uses a combination of templates and a library of filters, transitions, stock media, and styles to let people create videos with multi-track audio support and user-friendly editing. Microsoft has integrated in an Azure-powered text-to-speech generator for cr …

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Apple Fitness Plus review: on track, but a long way to go

2025-01-28T10:39:52-05:00

Apple Fitness Plus has been out for a couple of months now, and a few of us here at The Verge have been spending that time running it (and ourselves) through its paces. The $9.99-a-month service offers a decent array of exercise videos with an added bonus: integration with the sensors on an Apple Watch. In fact, an Apple Watch is required to use the service.

Since everybody's exercise routine is a little different, we wanted to get a variety of perspectives on the service. What's become clear from all of our testing is that Apple has successfully achieved what we think it set out to do: create an exercise service that is accessible to a bro …

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Superhuman’s email app is overhyped and overpriced

2020-06-23T08:16:12-04:00

Superhuman is one of the most in-demand startups right now, with the invite-only app considered one of the most exclusive services in the tech industry. That's impressive, for an email app. It's even more impressive for an email app that merely accesses your existing Gmail account and costs $30 per month to use. The buzz - both from the company's marketing and around Silicon Valley - is off the charts. Superhuman bills itself as "not another email client," promising an inbox that's been "rebuilt from the ground up" that will make you "feel like you have superpowers." The website is peppered with accolades from startup CEOs praising how it ha …

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