If you’ve been leading a paper-cluttered life, it’s time to make good use of your smartphone by downloading a note-taking app. With over 10 million downloads and counting, Evernote is one of the must-have Android apps to stay organize.

The latest Evernote app, now on version 4.0, comes with a brand-spanking new look and features. The redesigned home screen shows a scrollable display of all your notes based on dates — along with a preview of the content, which would make it easier for you to look for a note and open it. The notebook list has also been updated, as it now combines user notebooks with shared notebooks. The new contextual “Action Bars”, meanwhile, give you easy access to more functionality.

Swipeable navigation is another new addition to Evernote. You can now swipe right from your note and note list to show the home screen, saving you the hassle of clicking back and forth. The swipeable navigation also works when you want to move from Notebook to Tag to Place views.

The changes are just the cherry on top for what’s already a solid note-taking app.  You can easily make a regular note, an indented or numbered list, to-dos, a task list, and many more. You can even insert photo and audio. Evernote also lets you sync your notes across desktop computers, Android and iOS devices, and other platforms – which is one of the strongest points of the app.

Check out Evernote 4.0 for Android on Google Play now if you haven’t already done so, and say goodbye to those piles of papers. If this isn’t your cup of tea, you definitely want to read our list of the best note-taking apps on Android.

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Whether you’re a high school student who wants to earn straight A’s in school or a college sophomore striving hard to live with the continuous onslaught of exams, then look no further, as there are Android apps that can help you in your woes and worries inside the campus grounds.

Here are five of the best Android applications that can help you in your studies.

Evernote

Definitely a must-have application for the everyday campus trekker, Evernote combines all the best features when it comes to note-taking. Evernote helps students keep track with almost everything–from notes, pictures, and to-do lists, just to name a few. Stay organized even if you literally have hundreds of notes and reminders with the easy-to-use search feature that pinpoints your search request accurately, saving you time and improving productivity.

Merriam Webster Dictionary

Students will never have to carry around a bulky dictionary as the compact Merriam Webster Dictionary can now be accessed right from the palm of your hands. Featuring voice input search functionality, students can easily look-up words via speech-based lookup. Boasting not only just a dictionary, the app also features synonyms and antonyms of each word entry and an example of how the word is used in a sentence. As an added bonus, the app also lets users save their favorite words and improve their vocabulary with the Word of the Day option.

WikiDroid for Wikipedia

Wikipedia has become synonymous to research with its free online encyclopedias. Almost everyone has relied upon Wikipedia for notes, information, and research options. Considered to be a favorite option for getting fast information on thousands of topics, Wikipedia has been the primary choice for many students. Opening Wikipedia on a mobile phone may take some time especially when loading fully-packed pages. However, a mobile version of the famous encyclopedia now exists to make Wikipedia more accessible to mobile users. With the WikiDroid app functioning as a pocketable Wikipedia, users are able to access the rich information on Wikipedia through a mobile phone–but minus the bloat of a desktop version of Wikipedia pages.

Adobe Reader

Students who are fond of reading books on the go will be happy to know that they can do the same task using their mobile phones. Adobe Reader can render PDF documents with ease, as the app can support PDF portfolios, password-protected PDF documents, and E-books. Adobe Reader is a perfect companion for those long boring train rides during which you might want to review your lectures or  read e-books.

WolframAlpha

If your curious mind tends to ask questions about all sorts of mind-boggling stuff you stumble upon within campus halls, let the WolframAlpha app do the fact-finding for you. Students can feed the application with unknown dates, words, or phrases that they are curious to know more about and WolframAlpha can dig up all the necessary information related to their queries. Questions can also be asked to gain quick information on a variety of topics–from the probabilities of having a full house in poker, to the person who assassinated Abraham Lincoln.

What Android apps do you use to help you with school work?

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The criteria are based on what can be most useful in terms of document creation and sharing, file management and sharing, Internet browsing, multimedia handling, and social media use. All ten apps are free to download or are offered with a free version.

1. Evernote

This app lets you note down practically anything so you wouldn’t have to forget or lose any piece of information. You can jot down ideas, make laundry lists, take photos, and even record audio reminders. However the real advantage is that you can organize, search, and sync all these notes across various devices, from the device you carry around all the time to the desktop in your home or office.

2. Skitch

If you need to scribble, annotate, or mark a photo or document quickly then this is the app to do it with. It lets you draw on your Android’s screen with your finger. It’s a suitable complement to Evernote because you can then save the file in that other application.

3. CamScanner

You will never need a scanner again with this app. Take a picture of the document with your gadget’s camera, do a little editing, and then turn the image into a PDF file. Take note that the free version will come with ads and the PDF output will be watermarked.

4. Astro File Manager

Naturally you’re also going to need an app that will let you navigate your file system just as easily as you would a PC or Mac. This app makes all the usual tasks like searching, viewing, and copying and pasting files of varied types and formats, a quick and convenient process.

5. SugarSync

There will be times where you might have to accomplish your work across several devices. In such cases you’re going to need quick and reliable file synchronization which is what this app provides. It’s especially helpful for capturing images because it automatically backs up photos in the cloud.

6. MX Video Player

You downloaded a video file and it happens to be in that uncommon format your standard media player couldn’t handle. This app solves this particular worry and hassle of file conversion by simply having the capacity to read a very broad range of video file formats.

7. Photoshop Express

It’s one of the biggest names in image editing software. This free and web-based version naturally doesn’t have the full features of the Creative Suite package but it’s useful enough for immediate and minor editing tasks such as cropping, resizing, color adjustments, and slapping on basic effects.

8. Opera Mobile

 This app is likely going to run much faster and smoother than your default browser. One of the reasons for its high usability is that it has all the functionality of a typical desktop browser but its UI and operation is geared for the specific capacities of mobile devices and their available type of Internet connectivity.

9. FriendCaster

There seems to be a scarcity of native Facebook apps for the Android tablet. Fortunately there are apps such as this one that can fill the void. Customer reviews even mention that it works better than the standard FB app for Android.

10. Plume

With a brand new Honeycomb and tablet interface, this app addresses the same scarcity issue for Twitter as FriendCaster does for Facebook. The main attraction of this Twitter client for the Android tablet is its sleek UI and the amount of customization you can do with it.

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12 Free Must-Have Apps For Your Honeycomb Tablet Top 12 Free Android Apps for Productivity

Six months after the release of Motorola Xoom, the first Honeycomb tablet, here are some recent app releases for social networking, productivity, and reading that are spicing up the platform.

Social Networking

While the Twitter for Android app works rather well on Honeycomb, third-party providers are definitely giving the official app a run for its money. Tweetcaster HD is optimized for tablets, allowing one message stream at a time, filters for posts with media, and Zip It, a cool feature that zips annoying tweeters without unfollowing.

There’s also Tweetcomb, which features a Tweetdeck-like interface for multiple streams.

A common sentiment for tablet users using the native Facebook for Android app is that the app keeps crashing, or worse, not even compatible with their Honeycomb device (take for example, Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1). The developers behind Tweetcaster then released Friendcaster Tab for Facebook, which is still in its beta stages but is definitely showing a lot of potential to dethrone the official app.

Other social networking sites like LinkedIn and Foursquare also have their official Android apps, but the focus of developers is on top 2 sites, of course.

Productivity

As mentioned earlier, most manufacturers offer devices with built-in apps like e-mail, memo, tasks, among others. However, there are a number of interesting apps in the Market that would do those and more.

Bring your corporate Exchange server or even your Outlook on your tablet with Touchdown HD, with support for e-mail, calendar, tasks, and contacts. This is a 30-day trial app, with the paid one sold at $19.99.

For free but still reliable productivity app, there’s Evernote, which arrive just a month ago bat the Android Market. Save your ideas, record audio and video, and take pictures, then access them in any of your devices, as Evernote cleverly syncs all of them.

A good alternative to Evernote would be Catch Notes, which beats the former with a reminder/alarm feature.

Reading

Kindle has established itself as the authority in e-books, and with its Honeycomb-optimized app, no doubt that it has sealed its reign in that department. The best part of it is its seamless integration with the Kindle Store, allowing access to millions of books, free or otherwise. This feature is not available in iPad, thanks to some App Store policies.

On the other hand, RSS feeds are in the realm of Google Reader. Since it updated its app to be optimized for tablets, it has featured a two-column interface similar to the Gmail app. It now allows for easier content access, without the need to flip to different pages to go back to the feed.

The Android Market practically covers apps for various basic uses, only that some are still not Honeycomb-friendly as of the moment. A sweet reminder though– iPad started with just a few apps too in the App Store.

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But there are great ways you can use the camera on your tablet, some of which aren’t what you would usually expect. So make the most out that camera (you paid for it after all) by using a few apps that take advantage of it.

1. Augmented Reality – Layar

Google maps is great but if you really want a more immersive experience, augmented reality is the way to go. The way it works is by taking the image of your surroundings through the device’s camera, processing that as well as other data, and piping through a video feed that shows points of interest on your screen. It’s like a cheat sheet for places. Layar is one of the most well-known apps in this space and since the screen of a tablet is much bigger than that of a phone, you get to drink in more info when you use Layar on a tablet such as the Samsung Galaxy Tab.

2. Note Taking – Evernote

With a tablet, taking down notes is way better because of the larger screen and Evernote is one of the best apps in this regard. With this app you can do everything: shoot pics, jot down notes and even share them online. While the Honeycomb version of the app is not yet live, they do have an Alpha version available you can try out. Some uses are snapping up your wife’s written grocery list, taking pictures of projector slides or quick copying of a friends’ notes.

3. Photo Booth – Picsay

A tablet might not be the ideal device to use for capturing photo memories but it does great for impromptu photo sessions. You can use your tablet for a photo booth during parties, birthdays and other occasions. Snap up photos of people doing wacky poses with props, add speech bubbles and graphics with Picsay and you capture some fun times right there. Top it off with its ability to share photos socially and you can quickly show people on the internet how cool your event is, all in realtime.

4. Video Chat – Built-In

One of the more obvious and best uses of the tablet’s camera is through video chatting. Almost all Android tablets have front-facing cameras, which coupled with the larger screen makes it perfect for catching up with family overseas or conferencing with business partners. This is built-in on Google Talk for tablets that run Honeycomb but if yours doesn’t have this Android version yet (shame on you, tablet maker!), you can use Fring to do video calls. Or wait a bit longer, it’s getting rolled out to Android 2.3+ devices in the near future.

5. Scanner – Google Docs

You can also use the camera of your tablet as a handy scanner. Snap a pic of that document and save it online with Google Docs. The smaller screen of cellphones really make it difficult to inspect document snapshots, but you will have no such problem with a tablet. The icing on top is that Google Docs also does OCR and can convert your picture into text (well, it’s still buggy right now but Google’s working on it).

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Evernote Android for Android

After months of development, Evernote for Android has launched and is available in the Android Market for free. Of course, there is a premium version too.

Evernote for Android allows you to create text notes, snap photos, and record audio. In addition, you can easily attached files to your notes. Free subscribers can add PDFs, text, audio, or image files. Premium subscribers can attach any file they like, as long as the total note size is under 25MB.

Evernote for Android allows you to seemlessly search through you notes and synch them with your desktop computer (and vice versa). On top of this, Evernote’s image recognition will use OCR to automatically recognizes text contained within snapshots. Useful for business cards and whiteboards. You better hope your camera is up to the job! There are loads more features too, so check out their official release page to find out more.

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[via Tech Crunch]

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