Here is the list of list of alternate Android apps that you can use instead of using the popular Android apps which provide restricted features in free versions and paid version of them is not practical. Some of these apps are only available on the open app market so you won’t find them on Google Play Store. Most of these apps won’t need your smartphone or tablet to be rooted unless stated otherwise. Let us have a look at my own favourite alternate Android apps list:
69 Top Alternatives Apps To Popular Android Apps Available On Google Play and F-Droid Market
| App | Description | Tags |
|---|---|---|
| AdAway | Blocks ads system-wide. | tools, FOSS, root, basic |
| ADM | Video Downloader. Can download literally any video on the web. A (better) alternative is Xposed One Tap Video Download (see below), but it requires root. | basic |
| Advanced Power Menu [ROOT] | A neat looking app that replaces the power menu when you long hold the power button. It adds the option to reboot your phone and to enter recovery. | tools, root, basic |
| AnkiDroid | Amazing flashcard app to go along with the pc program. Stuff you forget will be presented more, while stuff you remember will be presented later. | FOSS, basic |
| August | It’s free, but the lock is not. I need this app to unlock my door. | tools, paid, daily, basic |
| Awesome Pop-up Video | So I accidentally bought this one, but it’s great! You can have a floating window for any video, very useful on Reddit apps to browse Reddit comments while watching the video. Also great on tablets! | tools, paid, basic |
| AwSMS | My favourite texting app. It’s probably the best competitor of Textra, with similar features and options but also lets you quick reply in the iOS fashion: straight from the heads up display. Like how Hangouts is now doing it. | paid, daily, basic |
| BusyBox Free | No idea what this app is for, but Titanium needs it. | root, basic |
| CALCU | Very nice looking calculator. It can do more than just add if you swipe up to reveal functions like log, etc. | basic |
| CF.lumen | Pretty much flux for Android, works amazing. You do need root for this one to work perfectly, as in if you need to approve permissions or something you don’t need to disable CF first. Nonroot works great as well. Another non-root alternative is Twilight | tools, root, paid, basic |
| ClearFocus | This is a great pomodoro app. Simple to use, keeps track of your record, unobtrusive, and has a widget. | paid, basic |
| CPU-Z | App that gives the hardware and OS info of your phone. Handy when looking for ROMs or trying to compare newer phones to your current one. | tools, basic |
| Dropbox | I use Dropbox to backup photos, but mainly to sync files between pc and laptop. The app makes it easy to access those files and documents on my phone or tablet. | basic |
| Etar | A free calendar, it’s simple with no ads or anything. Has a good looking widget, and the all itself is not crowded with features. Plus you can actually read the events in the month view without clicking each day. | FOSS, daily, basic |
| Event Flow Widget | A very cool calendar widget app that you can customize to be in a variety of ways. Agenda, week, month views. | paid, basic, daily |
| Forest | My wallpaper. It’s a live wallpaper of a forest. The trick is, the conditions that the forest is under is the same as the weather currently in your area. It shows when it’s raining, windy, sunny, snowing, etc. | paid, basic, daily |
| F-Droid | Required for AdAway, it’s an app store that lists only free open source apps. Root not needed, but you do need to enable this setting | tools, FOSS, basic |
| Firefox | My browser. I sync it to Firefox on PC to access open tabs, history, etc everywhere. | FOSS, daily, basic |
| Fleksy | Simply the best keyboard. It’s a tap keyboard, no silly cursive swiping. | tools, basic, daily |
| Hangouts | I use AwSMS for texting, but hangouts for group texting. Hangout is convenient for my family who has different types of phone. My dad can participate even though he has a dumb phone, just goes either on Gmail where the chatbox opens or to hangouts.google.com | basic |
| Insight Timer | My meditation timer. A simple app without ads, a nice gong sound. No distractions. | basic, health |
| LastPass | My password manager. Syncs between pc and tablet and phone and laptop. | paid, daily, basic |
| LeafPic | My QuickPix replacement. Free, open source, a basic gallery with all the features an average user would want. | FOSS, basic |
| List My Apps | The app that helped me format and create this table! | tools, FOSS, basic |
| Moon+ Reader Pro | Ebook and pdf reader. Great on my tablet to read textbooks on. | paid, basic |
| Moonshine | My default icon set. Looks neat. | paid, basic |
| Music Boss | Use to control music from my pebble watch. | paid, daily, basic |
| MX Player | Video app I use instead of VLC. Nice looking, handles almost all file formats, and you can swipe on the screen while the video plays to adjust volume or brightness. The only disadvantage is the ads if you are using the free version. | basic |
| My Effectiveness Pro | To-do app that implements the ideas from “7 habits of highly effective people” book. You can check out the basic philosophy, which you need to know to figure out how the app works, at this image. It’s also further detailed on the app page, and especially in the help button inside the app. | basic, daily |
| Nav Me | Use to get Google maps directions on my pebble watch. | paid, basic |
| News Digest | Probably my favourite news app for a quick glance on today’s top headlines. Provides a brief summary, and if you’re interested it gives more information at the end. | daily, news, basic |
| NFC Tasks | Needed for NFC Tools app to work perfectly. Root needed for advanced features only. | tools, basic |
| NFC Tools | I set up Sleep as Android to only let me mute the alarm when I swipe at the NFC tag in my bathroom. I also set up the tag with this app to remove Airplane Mode. Plus another tag by my bed to put the phone in Airplane Mode, turn NFC and Bluetooth back on, and open Sleep as Android. | tools, basic |
| Nova Launcher | Most customizable launcher. I try out all kinds of launchers but always end up back with Nova. Swipe on the app to open a different app, rename apps, change grid sizes, swipe up on the Home screen to open the drawer and swipe down to open notifications, these are some of my customizations. You don’t need root except to get around some Android bugs, like the agonizingly slow opening of the notification drawer when using the swipe down Nova gesture. | root, daily, basic |
| Nova Launcher Prime | Probably the number 1 recommended launcher on /r/android and /r/androidapps, I bought it to support the developer. It also unlocks gestures and stuff. | paid, basic |
| NPR News | The least biased news station in the US. | FOSS, basic, news |
| OneNote | I use OneNote to sync my notes from pc to other devices. Sometimes I just want to look something up real quick, this way my class notes are with me even while doing groceries. | basic |
| Opengur | Open source app to upload images to Imgur. Good for quick sharing of screenshots. | basic |
| Outlook | Since mailbox app is discontinued, I migrated to outlook. Swipe left to archive, right to delete functionality that is a mist for me. You can customize what swipes do. | daily, basic |
| Pebble | App is required to get benefits of my pebble watch. It’s free but obviously, need the smartwatch. | paid, basic |
| Pocket Casts | Probably the best looking, most feature-packed podcast player out there. You can subscribe to podcasts, have it download them, or you can just stream them. Syncs with Google so your devices should work similarly. | paid, basic |
| Popup Widget | This app is beyond useful. It basically lets you create widgets inside folders. I set up Nova so that when I swipe up on my to-do app (My Effectiveness) it brings up the to-do widgets. | tools, paid, basic, daily |
| Portal | Most reliable app to transfer files directly to my phone from pc via WiFi. No size limit. | tools, basic |
| Prey | App to track where my phone is, to shut it down, send a message to it, reformat it remotely. I use this over googles device manager since I can track non-android devices as well. | tools, basic |
| Pushbullet | App to mirror to and send texts from a pc or tablet. Also to send links and files and messages between devices. | tools, basic |
| Relay | Simply the cleanest, smoothest, most beautiful Reddit client out there. I bought the pro version in the app to get rid of apps and support the dev. | paid, daily, basic |
| seNotes Plus | Simplest sticky note widget around, use it in lieu of a to-do app since there are no simple to-do apps that mimic this widget. You just type, back out, and it’s on your home screen | daily, basic |
| Sleep | Tracks my sleep so I can check sleeping pattern, wakes me up when I’m not groggy. I set it up to track sleep through my pebble and to wake me up by causing my pebble to vibrate. No more annoying alarms. | daily, basic |
| Sleep Unlock | This is the prime version of Sleep as Android, my sleep tracker. I turn off the alarm via the NFC tag in my bathroom, track my sleep via my pebble watch. Worth every penny. | paid, basic |
| SleepCloud | Used by Sleep as Android to backup my sleep data to Google Fit, Google Documents, Google Calendar, Dropbox, or their own cloud depending on my choice. | basic |
| Slide for Reddit | Has completely replaced Relay for me, it is a wonderful app. Looks clean, has a ton of options, very smooth, and the dev is absolutely amazing. Worth the pro version ($4.00) | basic |
| Snapchat | Send temporary pic updates on what you’re doing at the moment. I rarely use it, but keep it because my friends and siblings use it extensively. | basic |
| Solid Explorer | A great file explorer. Easier to switch between windows than in fxExplorer. Can browse cloud drives and samba too. | tools, paid, basic |
| Spotify | Music streaming and saving. $4.99/month with a student discount. | paid, daily, basic |
| Stack | Pretty fun game, simple and beautiful. The goal is to stack the blocks, but each time you don’t stack it perfectly a bit gets chipped off. Nice waiting game. | games, paid, daily, basic |
| StrongLifts | Workout app for the StrongLifts routine that is highly recommended in /r/fitness and by me. Use it 3x each week. | paid, daily, basic |
| SuperSU Pro | Required for root. | paid, tools, basic, root |
| Tasker | I didn’t use Tasker for a long time, but /u/takkuso gave me some neat ideas. Now I have many annoyances fixed: I can start Sleep as Android tracking my sleep by pressing a button on my watch; Once the Sleep as Android app opens, Airplane Mode is automatically turned on, and Bluetooth and NFC turned back on; if my battery gets below 10%, Pushbullet sends a notification to all my devices and browser. Same thing once my phone is charged; if my phone connects to my car Bluetooth then it automatically turns off WiFi, and presents me with 4 huge buttons I can press to open Spotify, pocket casts, audible, or Google Maps; I can then on my computer by bumping my phone against and NFC tag by my bed; with a nova gesture, I can shrink my screen area to be more convenient for one-handed use. Other ideas still in progress! | tools, paid, basic |
| Timely | Most beautiful time app. Great for impromptu quick alarms, countdowns, or timers. | basic |
| Titanium Backup | The only worthwhile backup app as far as I’m concerned. I have it set up to back up new apps and data twice a week. You can also batch uninstall, freeze apps, delete backups and so on. Really the ultimate app manager for root. It’s free, but the features most people want (multiple backups) is not. | tools, root, basic |
| Titanium Backup PRO | I think this was the first app I bought, not sure why. But Titanium Backup is the most useful app I ever bought. Backs up all my apps and data to my SD card, including contacts and texts. Definitely saved my butt more than a few times. | paid, root, basic, tools |
| Torchie | Does not require root, it lets you turn on the flashlight just by pressing both volume buttons at the same time. You can set it to work when the screen is only on, only unlocked, or at any time even if the screen is off. | basic, tools |
| wallsplash | The only wallpaper app I found that looks good, doesn’t lag, doesn’t nag, and has great photos and drawings. | basic |
| Weather Timeline | Prettiest looking weather app with the prettiest clock and weather widgets. | paid, daily, basic |
| Wikipedia Beta | Wikipedia app. Beta version because I once read if you highlight a word anywhere on your phone, the wiki bets adds an option next to copy/paste to search that word in Wiki. I do not see this happening. It’s a ton better than the mobile website, I have it set as a default for all Wikipedia links. | basic |
| XDA Premium 5 | To check up on the latest mods, ROMs, and news of my phone and tablet. | basic |
| Xposed Installer | Required for gravity box and YouTube AdAway below. Root needed. Android Pay does not work if this is installed. | basic, root |
| Xposed One Tap Video Download | An easy way to download any video you are streaming. It shows a notification in the notification drawer when it detects a video being played, tapping it will let you download. A non-root alternative is ADM (see above). | basic, root |
| YNAB Classic | Syncs with the YNAB pc program. Every time I purchase something it gets recorded in YNAB. It’s a budget program, great for getting a grasp on your actual money situation and for keeping yourself accountable. The basic principle is that you assign every dollar you have to some thing, no lazy dollars allowed. Relieves anxiety on whether you have enough money for bills. The app is free, the pc software is $60 with a free 34-day trial. For students, it’s free completely. The new cloud-based version was just released, that is $5/month. | daily |
I hope you like my list of alternatives apps to Popular Android Apps that you can try! If you have your own favourite apps that you would like to share with other readers then do it in the comment section.
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