9 apps to help you keep your New Year’s resolutions
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New year, new you, right? There’s something about turning the page on a calendar and putting a close on a chapter of your life that is oh so alluring, especially if it’s been a bad year. You think, you swear, you hope and pray, this year is going to be different. So you do the thing nearly half of Americans usually do: you make a New Year’s resolution.
With the best intentions, you say goodbye to 2015. You vow to stay fit and healthy, lose weight, spend less and save more, get organized, travel, fall in love, do something for charity, enjoy life to the fullest.
Only 8 percent of people are successful in achieving their goal. Over half abandon their resolutions after six months.
If you’re serious about making a change in 2016, get some help from your smartphone. We’ve collected an assortment of apps that should make keeping your New Year’s resolutions a little easier.
Eat better with Fooducate
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When you’re grocery shopping, you can scan the barcode of packaged products to get a breakdown of nutritional facts and grading. From there, you can choose healthier alternatives. Fooducate throws up a red flag on foods containing an excess of sugar, trans fats, controversial food colorings and other questionable ingredients. For example, Nutella gets a D+, largely because it contains 21 grams of sugar per serving. Fooducate recommends Welch’s reduced sugar concord grape jelly or Earth’s Pride organic creamy peanut butter instead. The app also has a health tracker, which counts calories according to foods eaten and exercise. While the app is available for free, a premium account, costing $74.99 for a lifetime subscription, unlocks additional features.
Lose weight with Lose It!
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The personal app-based weight loss program allows users to track their eating and exercise habits, set reminders and alerts to prompt action and engage with others users to take part in challenges or share their weight loss journey socially. Lose It! calculates a daily calorie intake according to your weight, height and target weight. It’s also made to sync with popular health and fitness devices like pedometers and workout apps. It is free. A premium account, which is $39.99 a year, unlocks additional features related to fitness, body measurements and nutrition.
Stay fit with The Johnson & Johnson Official 7 Minute Workout
- Ally Karsyn
Don’t have time to hit the gym? This puts the gym in your pocket. You can work out anywhere there’s a floor, wall and chair. In addition to the original 7-minute workout which integrates full-body resistance and cardio exercises, there are others ranging in difficulty from easy to hard. You can also create a custom workout and pick from different exercises that include planks, lunges, push-ups and squats. You’re also able to select the workout difficulty and time, ranging from 7 to 27 minutes. Once you’re ready, let the audio-visual instruction begin.
Enjoy life with Headspace
- Updated
Headspace is "gym membership for the mind." And yes, like gym memberships, it isn’t free. This one is $12.95 per month. The app was set up by Andy Puddicombe, a former Buddhist monk and registered clinical mindfulness consultant. He guides users through meditations in a calm, soothing voice, distinguished by a British accent. You can pick from different themed “packs” that focus on depression, self-esteem, stress, anxiety, sleep, pregnancy, generosity, relationships, change, appreciation, acceptance, creativity, focus, happiness and balance. And you change choose the session length -- 10, 15 or 20 minutes.
Manage money with Wally
- Updated
Finding ways to spend less and save more often top the list of most popular New Year’s resolutions. Get some help from Wally, a personal finance app that tracks and charts your expenses to provide a complete picture of where your money goes to help you set and achieve your financial goals. The InstaScan feature is supposed to eliminate tedious data entry. It’s designed to collect and store information from your purchases simply by taking a picture of the receipt. Unlike some other personal finance apps, like Mint, this one does not require access to bank accounts or credit cards to aggregate information. What you put in is what you get out.
Get organized with Evernote
- Updated
Never lose another sticky note again. This free app allows you to take pictures of documents and Post-Its, making it easy to search and access difference pieces of paperwork from anywhere without physically toting them around. With a premium account, you can turn business cards into contacts and connect on LinkedIn. Evernote Basic, which is free, also has an option to record audio, a useful feature for keeping track of everything from business meetings to class lectures. The best part about Evernote is that you can download the app onto your computer and it syncs with your phone.
Travel more with Airbnb
- Updated
Just ponder this for a moment, there are more than 1,400 castles listed on Airbnb, an online marketplace where hosts and travelers can list their space and discover unique accommodations around the world. Some hosts may be renting out an extra room while others list entire homes and other types of lodging that you would have to see to believe. Whether you’re looking to stay in a loft apartment for a night in New York, a Welsh castle for a week or a houseboat in Amsterdam for a month, Airbnb connects people to unique travel experiences, at any price point, in more than 34,000 cities across more than 190 countries. Where will you go next?
Find a date with Hinge
- Updated
The dating app claims to "Cut the clutter, the creeps and the games" by meeting someone the old-fashioned way: through your friends ... on Facebook. Hinge "hinges" on your online friends to find the love of your life. Matches could be your friends or friends of friends. The app only gives you a certain number of matches a day and they expire within 24 hours if you do not message them. In short, you better like (and trust) the company you keep -- or you may need to find some new friends. There’s probably an app for that.
More like this...
Eat better with Fooducate
When you’re grocery shopping, you can scan the barcode of packaged products to get a breakdown of nutritional facts and grading. From there, you can choose healthier alternatives. Fooducate throws up a red flag on foods containing an excess of sugar, trans fats, controversial food colorings and other questionable ingredients. For example, Nutella gets a D+, largely because it contains 21 grams of sugar per serving. Fooducate recommends Welch’s reduced sugar concord grape jelly or Earth’s Pride organic creamy peanut butter instead. The app also has a health tracker, which counts calories according to foods eaten and exercise. While the app is available for free, a premium account, costing $74.99 for a lifetime subscription, unlocks additional features.
Lose weight with Lose It!
The personal app-based weight loss program allows users to track their eating and exercise habits, set reminders and alerts to prompt action and engage with others users to take part in challenges or share their weight loss journey socially. Lose It! calculates a daily calorie intake according to your weight, height and target weight. It’s also made to sync with popular health and fitness devices like pedometers and workout apps. It is free. A premium account, which is $39.99 a year, unlocks additional features related to fitness, body measurements and nutrition.
Stay fit with The Johnson & Johnson Official 7 Minute Workout
- Ally Karsyn
Don’t have time to hit the gym? This puts the gym in your pocket. You can work out anywhere there’s a floor, wall and chair. In addition to the original 7-minute workout which integrates full-body resistance and cardio exercises, there are others ranging in difficulty from easy to hard. You can also create a custom workout and pick from different exercises that include planks, lunges, push-ups and squats. You’re also able to select the workout difficulty and time, ranging from 7 to 27 minutes. Once you’re ready, let the audio-visual instruction begin.
Enjoy life with Headspace
Headspace is "gym membership for the mind." And yes, like gym memberships, it isn’t free. This one is $12.95 per month. The app was set up by Andy Puddicombe, a former Buddhist monk and registered clinical mindfulness consultant. He guides users through meditations in a calm, soothing voice, distinguished by a British accent. You can pick from different themed “packs” that focus on depression, self-esteem, stress, anxiety, sleep, pregnancy, generosity, relationships, change, appreciation, acceptance, creativity, focus, happiness and balance. And you change choose the session length -- 10, 15 or 20 minutes.
Manage money with Wally
Finding ways to spend less and save more often top the list of most popular New Year’s resolutions. Get some help from Wally, a personal finance app that tracks and charts your expenses to provide a complete picture of where your money goes to help you set and achieve your financial goals. The InstaScan feature is supposed to eliminate tedious data entry. It’s designed to collect and store information from your purchases simply by taking a picture of the receipt. Unlike some other personal finance apps, like Mint, this one does not require access to bank accounts or credit cards to aggregate information. What you put in is what you get out.
Get organized with Evernote
Never lose another sticky note again. This free app allows you to take pictures of documents and Post-Its, making it easy to search and access difference pieces of paperwork from anywhere without physically toting them around. With a premium account, you can turn business cards into contacts and connect on LinkedIn. Evernote Basic, which is free, also has an option to record audio, a useful feature for keeping track of everything from business meetings to class lectures. The best part about Evernote is that you can download the app onto your computer and it syncs with your phone.
Travel more with Airbnb
Just ponder this for a moment, there are more than 1,400 castles listed on Airbnb, an online marketplace where hosts and travelers can list their space and discover unique accommodations around the world. Some hosts may be renting out an extra room while others list entire homes and other types of lodging that you would have to see to believe. Whether you’re looking to stay in a loft apartment for a night in New York, a Welsh castle for a week or a houseboat in Amsterdam for a month, Airbnb connects people to unique travel experiences, at any price point, in more than 34,000 cities across more than 190 countries. Where will you go next?
Find a date with Hinge
The dating app claims to "Cut the clutter, the creeps and the games" by meeting someone the old-fashioned way: through your friends ... on Facebook. Hinge "hinges" on your online friends to find the love of your life. Matches could be your friends or friends of friends. The app only gives you a certain number of matches a day and they expire within 24 hours if you do not message them. In short, you better like (and trust) the company you keep -- or you may need to find some new friends. There’s probably an app for that.
More like this...
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- Evernote
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- Hinge
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- Eat Better
- Lose Weight
- Manage Money
- Get Organized
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