8 Essential Android Apps for Working on the Road.

Whenever I get a new device, be it a laptop, phone or tablet, I love scouring its respective app store for ways that I can work smarter while we travel. As an early adopter to smart devices, it is exciting to see how far the app world has come in only a few years. These days running our blog, as well as handling our newest business, Speakeasy Travel Goods, is now possible from an Android tablet, as I found out early this month during a road trip with my family, when I tested Acer’s newest tablet, the Iconia Tab 8, to see how it could handle a life of travel. After spending about six weeks with the 8-inch Intel Tablet, I’ve amassed several essentials apps that I thought I’d share with you guys. Each one of these is free and plays an integral part to my work flow on the road, enabling me to have my workspace with me no matter where we go.

Evernote

I’ve always been intrigued by Evernote, but never took the time to fully understand it. Like Shaft, it always felt complicated. I realize now, though, I was just overwhelmed by all of its features. After reading this story on LifeHacker—I’ve Been Using Evernote All Wrong. Here’s Why It’s Actually Amazing—I came to see the organizational app in a new light. Evernote, like many of the programs on this list, plays nicely with all operating systems, so it’s easier than ever to organize my thoughts and story ideas.

SwiftKey

One of my favorite things about SwiftKey is the ability to cloud sync custom dictionaries across all of my devices. Additionally, the keyboard supports Swype-like gestures, and has intelligent word prediction.

ES File Explorer

Strangely, Android doesn’t come with a stock file explorer like desktop operating systems. So, when you want to explore your internal storage or SD Card, download photos and music, access your files via FTP, the ES File Explorer is what you want. Another nice feature is the file explorer’s built in app manger, which gives you to power to easily install/uninstall and backup apps.

Snapseed

We’ve been using Snapseed for years now on our phone, and it is our g to photo editor on the road. In addition to a robust feature set, it’s also designed around touch. While you’re not going to get the same editing capabilities as you would with a proper version Photoshop, it is one of the best apps for editing photos on your smart device.

DocuSign

DocuSign is the easiest way to sign forms while you are traveling, even if you need multiple signatures. Once you insert your signature, then it’s just a matter of emailing yourself the .pdf, as there’s no way to save to your internal storage directly.

Google Docs

With the Microsoft Office app still in the works for Android tablets, I needed to find an alternative, so I turned to Google Docs. One of the keys for me is being able to have access to my documents on whatever device or desktop operating system I’m on, and Google’s word processing handles that task nicely.

OneDrive

These days mobile users have a lot of options when it comes to the cloud. I’ve used a couple over the years, including Google Drive and Dropbox, but I have found that Microsoft’s OneDrive is the most rounded for my needs. Through the Android app, I can easily upload and download files to my tablet, create new folders, and rename files. In the future, I’d love to see OneDrive integrated into a file explorer to make it even easier to move files around, like it is on Windows 8.

PicsArt

Placing text over photos has become sort of a thing online, so it should be no surprise that there are quite a few photo apps in the market offering this service. Of the ones I tested, PicsArt is the most complete, offering a lot of options to create your own digital posters.

Did we miss something? Let us know your fave Android apps in the comments!

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