The iPhone is the most popular cellphone in the country, and with good reason. Despite occasionally awful choices by Apple, it still has the most—and best—applications around. Here are the most popular free iPhone apps (and posts) of 2009.
As with our most popular Windows downloads and Mac downloads of 2009, this collection of applications is based solely on the popularity of the associated post here on Lifehacker. We always prefer free applications that offer a little productivity boosting, so this is by no means a complete look at the most popular apps of the 80 billion in the App Store.
First, the downloads...
GV Mobile Makes Google Voice the Default for Your iPhone
In April, an industrious iPhone developer released GV Mobile to the iTunes App Store. It was followed by other Google Voice apps, and then Apple went brain dead and removed every Google Voice application from the App Store (along with rejecting Google's official Voice app). Annoying, to be sure, but users still willing to jailbreak can still get GV Mobile for free on Cydia.
Stanza Turns Your iPhone into a Kindle, Kindle App Counters
At the beginning of the year, the beautiful Stanza (iTunes link) iPhone app came along and wowed us with how good ebook reading on the iPhone could be. Then, when Kindle for iPhone (iTunes link) was released a few months later, it gave iPhone users a pretty good reason not to buy a Kindle. In the end, Amazon liked Stanza so much they ended up buying it, so that's probably the app we'd choose.
RunKeeper is Like Nike+ for Your iPhone-Only Better
RunKeeper (available in free and pro versions) uses your iPhone's GPS to do some seriously cool tracking for your running, walking, or biking routine. Apple was extremely slow in bringing Nike+ to the iPhone (once they did, it only supported 3GS), and even then it doesn't take advantage of the fact that the iPhone has a built in GPS and excellent mapping capabilities. RunKeeper is an excellent alternative to people who don't want to pay for the Nike+ dongle, want advanced GPS and mapping capabilities, or don't have an iPhone 3GS. Still, if we could marry these two apps, we happily would.
Email 'n Walk Lets You Multitask Without Getting Hit By a Car
We get it. You are seriously busy, and you don't have time to make sure you don't walk into traffic while you're composing that email. Email n' Walk overlays an email composition window on top of the view from your iPhone's camera, so you can type out an email and watch where you're going. It was free when we first covered it; now it'll set you back a buck.
Dropbox Comes to the iPhone and iPod touch
Dropbox is far and away our favorite file syncing tool, so we were thrilled this September when Dropbox for iPhone (iTunes link) finally made its way to the iPhone. Users can access any of their synced files, view files supported by the iPhone (including documents, photos, music, and video), upload photos and video to Dropbox, and save files for offline viewing. Handy.
CardStar Creates Scanner-Friendly Bonus Cards on iPhones
Lifehacker readers hate a bulging wallet, which is presumably why CardStar (iTunes link) resonated. The free app replaces keychain tags and wallet-cluttering bonus/discount/rewards/'shopper's club' cards with scanner-friendly barcodes that live on your iPhone. Users report mixed results in the App Store, but if it does the trick in place of your rewards card, it could be worth the download.
Skype for iPhone Brings Reliable VoIP to Your Pocket
Skype is far and away the most popular VoIP service, so it's understandable that people were pretty excited when it finally made its official plunge onto the iPhone with Skype for iPhone (iTunes link).
Dragon Dictation Does Voice-to-Text Transcription on Your iPhone
You spend plenty of time typing at the computer all day, so we forgive you if you're not eager to continue pecking away at the software keyboard on your iPhone. Dragon Dictation (iTunes link) does voice-to-text transcription you can copy to your clipboard and use anywhere.
Epicurious App Puts an Entire Cookbook in the Palm of Your Hand
Epicurious for iPhone (iTunes link) puts access to over 25,000 recipes from the likes of Gourmet and Bon Appetit at your fingertips. When you find something you like (I seriously love this app and would strongly recommend the simple-yet-delicious Mario Batali Basic Tomato Sauce), you can add it to your favorites, generate a shopping list, and get cooking. The entirety of The Gourmet Cookbook is inside this killer kitchen supplement.
Put Google Calendar and Notes on Your iPhone Wallpaper
By default, the iPhone lock screen shows you the time, date, and possibly a pretty picture. With gCalWall Lite, your home screen also displays your upcoming Google calendar appointments. Handy.
And now, the popular iPhone-specific posts/how-tos:
Set Up 'Push' Alerts for Anything from Your Computer to Your Phone
When push notifications finally rolled out to iPhone 3.0 this year, lots of applications started using them—but not everything we wanted. In this guide, we demonstrate how to use Growl (for Mac and Windows) in conjunction with Prowl (iTunes link), a $3 iPhone app, to set up push notifications for virtually anything. Our guide focused on Gmail push (which wasn't available at the time, and still isn't available with message previews), but anything that sends an alert with Growl can also work with Prowl, so your options are only limited by your creativity.
Enable Tethering on Your iPhone 3G or 3GS Running 3.1.2
It's been a feature of the iPhone forever now, but AT&T is still dragging its feet on iPhone tethering—that is, allowing users to enjoy their iPhone's data connection on their laptops. We've shown you how to enable tethering on your iPhone 3G or 3GS running 3.1.2 (the latest iPhone OS), and before that we helped you pull it off with the 3.0 OS. You may not want to tempt the AT&T billing gods with flagrant use of this one (wild fees may apply if AT&T decides they do), but it's a godsend in a pinch.
Got a favorite iPhone app we covered (or didn't) in 2009 that you love? Let's hear more about it in the comments.
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