The App Store may have been hit with some problems earlier this week, but that hasn’t stopped us from curating a list of top apps of the week. Need a better way to send GIFs? Looking for additional motivation to complete your tasks? We’ve got apps to help satisfy both those questions, and more.
Giphy Keys
GIFs are a language, and so naturally, you’ll need a keyboard befitting the medium — or so that’s what the team at Giphy believes. The GIF search company is out with a keyboard that makes finding and sending GIFs much easier and faster. You don’t need to replace your preferred keyboard, as swapping between them is pretty easy on iOS. Giphy Keys has six icons sitting above the keyboard, which offer features such as GIF search, saving GIFs to your favorites, and an 8 Ball to generate a random GIF for you. An Android app is in the works.
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Quik
Quik isn’t exactly new — GoPro acquired the company behind it earlier this year. The app, formerly known as Replay, lets you quickly turn your action-packed footage into a short, snappy video. Quik automatically analyzes your footage to find the best parts — then it adds transitions, effects, and even matches the cuts to the beat of the soundtrack you choose. You can add custom text overlays, title slides, and emojis. It’s a quick way to share a video if you don’t have time or access to edit it yourself. Of course, if you do have a little more time, the second app GoPro acquired from a different company is called Splice — it features more manual control of their final cut.
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The Rock Clock
“Beep, beep, beep … I could do this all day … beep, beep, beep.” Don’t you want the sound of Dwayne ‘The Rock’ Johnson to help you kick start the day? That’s right, even the famed professional wrestler-turned actor has an app — but the Rock Clock wants to help you beat your goals. First, you’ll have to set a goal — which can range from feeding the cat, to one of the preset goals of “lose 10 pounds of non-muscle.” Then you need to pick your alarm ringtone: Choose from The Rock singing, “good morning sunshine,” to mimicking the “beep” sounds from digital alarm clocks, and more. Of course, you can also opt to set your alarm to mimic The Rock’s — though he’s an early-riser. You’ll get daily messages from The Rock each morning to help motivate you to completing your goal, whatever it is. Oh and FYI — there’s no snooze button.
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Beme
Whether you’re at a concert or at the beach in a far away land, we’ve all seen people who are more interested in sharing the experience to social media through their smartphone’s screen (and sadly their tablet) than actually taking it in through their own eyes. Beme wants to help by offering a bare bones way to share these experiences — without filters and any means of editing. Simply tap the front of your phone to your anywhere on your body to have the app start recording, and when you separate the phone from yourself, the app will stop recording and share your experience.
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Sqgl
There are a surprisingly high number of apps that help you send a physical postcard — and Sqgl is another quick way that offers a sleek interface. Simply add a picture from your Camera Roll, and type in a message for the person you’re sending the postcard to — you can choose what kind of font you want. Then you can sign your name, and add the recipient’s address. Add your billing information, and for $3 you can send a postcard to anywhere in the U.S. It also supports Apple Pay. The prices increase slightly when you send postcards to countries around the world — for example, sending one to Sweden only costs a dollar more.
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