Okay, I’m going to do a best of 2023 list, but only because there were some really great new apps released this year. My criteria? I looked at my iPhone and noticed some apps that I actually use that were introduced this year. Without further ado and in no particular order, I present to you the One True Best iPhone Apps of 2023 list.
ChatGPT
ChatGPT as we know it has come full circle around the sun, but OpenAI’s iPhone app didn’t appear until May. Admittedly, I can be a New Technology™️ miser sometimes. This is what happens when you look too closely at the same thing for a decade. However, the redefinition of artificial intelligence in the sense of large language models has struck a match in which the spark has long since been extinguished.
ChatGPT is far from perfect, but this year I spent hours chasing my curiosities.
How old is the universe? How do we know? Are there competing theories about the origin of the Big Bang? What was before that? What is the largest named number? What comes after a quadrillion? What are the next 50 named numbers after that? And after that?
I’ve been really impressed with ChatGPT Voice recently. Just last night, my kid asked me some questions about our solar system that I didn’t know. I was in the middle of a movie so I wanted the fastest way to satisfy his curiosity. ChatGPT Voice has achieved this in an engaging and conversational way. Here is the transcript of our voice conversation. If you haven’t tried the voice feature yet, give it a try.
My word, I thought this was supposed to be a list, not a love letter to our robot overlords…
call sheet
Speaking of movies, I finally downloaded the Guardians Callsheet last night. I watched Maestro on Netflix and I wondered where I recognized the actor playing Felicia Montealegre. I don’t like having the IMDB app installed on my phone because it hijacks links from the web.
For whatever reason, I decided to try searching in Callsheet instead of going to the browser. The only problem is that I have a hard time remembering the Callsheet and not the “flookup” title before it was properly named. Fortunately, a search for “casey liss” in the App Store brings up good results. ATP listeners understand.
Anyway, Callsheet is good. Very well, actually. If you love watching movies and TV shows, try it for free, then drop a few bucks a year on it and choose your favorite app icon. Callsheet is simply the most attractive and easiest way to realize that “ahhh, that’s Carey Mulligan who played Daisy Buchanan in The Great Gatsby from 2013″ before returning to the movie you just paused.
neither
TL;DR Twitter is X and Threads is Twitter. Seriously, Mastodon wasn’t doing it for me as a new place to plant my social media crops. Putting aside any feelings about Meta, Facebook and Instagram… big question… Threads looks and feels good to me. I mostly use Threads on Mac as a web app built by Safari, but the iPhone version is my home base. I like it.
Ivory
If you like Mastodon, Ivory by Tapbots is a great window into the Fediverse. Seriously, it seems like Ivory has been around for ages at this point. That’s surely because Ivory is where the spirit of the X’d out Tweetbot app now lives. However, I had to look back at our coverage to confirm that both the Mac and iPhone apps were released in 2023. Way to go, Tapbots!
Bow
I can’t say I’ve replaced Safari with Arc (yet), but I appreciate the energy behind introducing a new browser in an age where everything is basically Safari or Chrome. The iPhone app launched in March and is clearly labeled as a companion to the desktop browser, not a replacement for mobile Safari. Sounds like the real deal coming in 2024. In the meantime, download Arc and admire the magnificent animation that appears around the address bar when the page loads.
Magazine
In 2023, Apple released two apps that live on my iPhone. Classical is the app that most interested Apple watchers because it missed the predicted release period of 2022. It started as an iPhone app before finally making its way to the iPad. It’s basically an Apple Music app with a nice serif font and proper handling of classical music notes and other additions that the genre requires. I had him fill it with some Leonard Bernstein now after watching it Maestro last night.
Journal, on the other hand, is much more of a new app than a review of an existing one. It’s very bare bones for now. iPhone only, no search or folders yet, and it seems like it barely made iOS 17.2. If Apple tweaks the app over the next year, I think the app shows promise.
I like how John Gruber described it as more of a social network for yourself than a traditional journaling app. As a serial eraser of old social media posts, Journal can scratch the itch of wanting to “share” a memory in a larger context than a photo alone could. Ultimately, most photos and experiences are for me to appreciate, not to advertise on Instagram or Facebook. It’s still early days for Apple’s Journal app, but it shows promise where polish is lacking.
P.S
I haven’t owned an iPad in a while, but if I did, I’m sure I’d love Orion, the HDMI monitor app from the folks behind Halide.
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