Apps every parent absolutely must have? We’ve got a list of 15 for you! Are your favourite apps on this list? Let us know.
Being a parent is busy work. Diapers to buy, news to read, podcasts to listen to, kids to ferry to classes, food to cook, whew! That list feels endless!
Which do we do first? How do we prioritise our tasks based on the multiple things staring us in the face everyday? Technology can actually help us if we use it as a tool instead of a distraction.
Make use of these fantastic apps for parents to save time and get more things done!
1. Dunzo
What it’s about: Want the groceries picked up? Need a sudden supply of diapers? Is there a package that has to be delivered to someone’s house or office? Get everything done through Dunzo, a one stop shop for pretty much everything you need done. They even helped someone update their bank pass book! Dunzo is not available in all areas of Bangalore but we hope they expand soon. They are a boon to hassled people everywhere and you can be rest assured that parents fall in that category! Their web site lists details on how much they charge for a specific task.
*Available only in Bangalore
What BB loves:
- The app is well designed and user friendly
- Service is good and quick.
- Their delivery people are efficient and excellent.
Available on: Android and iOS
2. Swiggy
What it’s about: As food apps go, Swiggy has the widest range of restaurants and cafes on offer, big or small. It is also available till 11 pm, in case you have a few late night hunger pangs! Food apps are dime a dozen these days but Swiggy is designed beautifully and is easy to filter.
What BB loves:
- You can also add multiple locations like home and work.
- Delivery is prompt and it is easy to place your order.
- Swiggy also shows you the eat-outs that are trending and new restaurants in town.
Available on: Android and iOS
3. Licious
What it’s about: Licious delivers world-class and fresh meat and sea food right at your doorstep. Apart from their standard meat products, they have also introduced some yummy chicken spreads and pickles. Their prawn pickle is superb! Their marinades are perfect for cooking meat and payment modes are easy too. Our co-founder, Priyanka Sehgal, is a regular customer and received the chicken spreads as a gift. She loved it, of course!
What BB loves:
- Their meat is fresh, soft and delicious.
- The packaging, in airtight plastic boxes, is also perfectly done and is so sleekly designed that you can easily stock them in the freezer, especially if you have a smaller fridge.
- Licious also color codes their meat — chicken is red, fish is yellow and mutton is blue, so it is easy to recognize what you want without having to thaw the entire pack.
Available on: Android and iOS
4. Flipboard
What it’s about: A news aggregator that gets all your reading material in one place, Flipboard has a beautiful interface. Are you a busy parent who wants to stay up to date? Then this is an elegant app that jumps right up to the task!
What BB loves:
- You can actually sync it with your social media networks, so if you like or want to save a post that you read on Twitter or Facebook for later, it gets added to your Flipboard repository.
Available on: Android and iOS
5. Practo
What it’s about: Apart from being a one stop place for information on medical care in the city, you can also order medicines through Practo The ordering process is simple. You will then get your medicines in an hour or so.
* Practo currently offers this facility only in Karnataka.
What BB loves:
- The orders are serviced by qualified pharmacists.
- They offer a 20% discount.
Available on: Android and iOS
6. Pencil Play
What it’s about: We have many parents ask us what to do with the drawings, paintings, sketches and art work that their children make. We don’t want to throw them away because they chart a tremendous journey that we don’t want to forget but they take up so much space. Enter Pencil Play, an app that allows you to maintain a digital portfolio of the child’s drawings.
What BB loves:
- You can maintain copies of your child’s drawings and mark it by age, date and context.
- It is a beautiful way to keep those memories alive and to also document your child’s journey.
Available on: Android
7. Walnut
What it’s about: When the demonitization was in full swing, we used this app to check out which ATMs were working in a specific area.
What BB loves:
- It doubles as an expense tracker.
- You can locate ATMs that are working in your vicinity.
- You can split expenses with friends and pay your bills online.
Available on: Android and iOS
8. Kids Place Parental Control app
What it’s about: We may monitor our children’s screen time like bosses but do we have the adequate parental controls in place? After word got out about the disastrous fake Peppa pig videos afoot online, we want to make sure our children are watching appropriate content. The Kids Place Parental Control app is perfect for Android. Net nanny is also a great parental control application for iOS users.
What BB loves:
- Prevents kids from downloading or buying new apps.
- Supports multiple profiles.
- Appropriate for toddlers, kids and teenagers.
- Extensive web site content and video filtering.
- Converts any device into kids mode.
Available on: Android
Also check out our list of 8 Fun Learning Apps for Kids
9. Sky View
What it’s about: Always wanted to find out the name of the star or the constellation in the sky but couldn’t identify it? Play astronomer with this stupendous app that identifies celestial objects when you point your phone at the sky.
What BB loves:
- You don’t need a Wifi, data signal or even a GPS, so you can take it boating, camping, trekking or any place that doesn’t have a signal!
- Has an inbuilt Augmented Reality (AR) technology that can identify objects in the sky, day or night.
- You can time travel to the past or future to see how the sky looked like on different dates and times.
Available on: Android and iOS
10. Youtube Kids
What it’s about: You must have heard of the notorious Peppa pig fake spin offs that are doing the round. Youtube for Kids allows very specific parental controls that ensure that children are watching appropriate video content. As parents, you can set the boundaries as per what you believe is right for your child.
What BB loves:
- Our favorite part about YouTube Kids is that you can limit your child’s screen time by using the timer. When a child exceeds his or her time on the app, the ‘it’s time’ notification will come up and the app will be locked until the once time limit is reached.
- YouTube uses algorithms to filter inappropriate content but if you find a video that has not been filtered appropriately, you can flag it.
Available on: Android and iOS
11. Shazam
What it’s about: One of the most popular music apps out there, Shazam does many things – helps you identify songs, sing along, have an offline feature, follow your favorite artists and more.
What BB loves:
- Can hear music on demand.
- Their audio fingerprint analysis can identify songs you can’t place.
- Get the latest songs from the latest artists and create multiple playlists.
Available on: Android and iOS
12. Netflix and Amazon Prime
What it’s about: The new age of entertainment is here. Not only can you see movies and shows on Netflix and Amazon Prime but both these companies have got into film and television production in a major way. Remember Amy Poehler’s quip about Snapchat winning Best Picture in the near future? That day is not far away!
What BB loves:
- The number of documentaries on Netflix is just wonderful.
- Amazon has a huge range of cartoons and shows.
- You can get recommendations and alerts about new shows and movies
- You can think outside the genre and embrace stand up comedy shows, indie shows, classics and more.
Available on: Android and iOS
13. Stitcher
What it’s about: Stitcher is an app that gets you the best podcasts from around the world. For the mums and dads among us, pod casts like Serial and the Moth are great draws. For the kids, there are tons and tons of pod casts to choose from, including the Book Club for Kids and
What BB loves:
- It notifies you when a new episode of your favorite show has come up or if a new show has been added.
- Tons and tons of shows are on access here.
- You can create your own custom stations and playlists.
- You can share episodes with friends, download them and listen to them when offline.
Available on: Android and iOS
Also check out our list of 6 Fascinating Podcasts for Kids
14. Pocket
What it’s about: Pocket is an app that lets you discover, save, recommend and explore the best stories on the Internet and you can come back to these stories even when you are offline. You can also save a page to Pocket from anywhere, including Twitter, Flipboard, Facebook and more.
What BB loves:
- Seamless reading interface
- Ability to bookmark and sync across all devices
- Easy retrieval of information
Available on: Android and iOS
15. Mandala Coloring Book
What it’s about: For both adults and kids, this app is a great stress buster and is good for hyperactive kids.
What BB loves:
- You can save and share your work.
- Lots of design and add-on features.
- Beautiful themes and art work.
- You can create your own designs with the blank page feature.
Available on: Android and iOS
*Disclaimer: BuzzingBubs does not help with connecting users to the above apps or in placing orders through the same. The above list is based on experiences the team has had with the service providers. We are not commercially associated with any of the above listed apps.
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