Software & Apps Apps The 17 Best Android Tablet Apps of 2021 Get the most out of your new device by Julia Borgini Writer Julia Borgini is a former Lifewire writer and a technical copywriter. She's written for B2B News Network, Kissmetrics, Social Media Examiner, and more. our editorial process Twitter LinkedIn Julia Borgini Updated on January 04, 2021 Tweet Share Email Apps Best Apps Payment Services With over 2.5 million apps in Google Play, it can be a challenge to find the best ones for your Android tablet. A tablet is great for watching movies and TV shows, editing photos, reading books, discovering new recipes, and more. Sure, we could've just rounded up the usual tablet apps, but this time we thought we'd gather some of the more interesting and creative ones for you. 01 of 17 Feedly What We Like Offers suggestions of feeds based on topics you're interested in. Easy to add the RSS feed from external sites. Syncs between desktop and mobile versions. What We Don't Like No way to search feeds for Feedly Free users (only Pro and Team plans can do this). Not as aesthetically pleasing as other reader apps. Our review of Feedly Feedly is an RSS reader app that automatically downloads the latest articles and posts from sites with an RSS feed. The interface is easy to use, it syncs between devices, and you can follow as many topics and feeds as you want. Follow a few topics or RSS feeds and then when you log in, your news feed automatically refreshes. Download Feedly 02 of 17 Pocket What We Like App is free. Offers suggestions of feeds based on topics you're interested in. Syncs between desktop and mobile versions. What We Don't Like Searching in the free version of the app only looks at titles and URLs. Bulk tagging of articles must be done manually (you cannot select all articles at once). Pocket is a free save-for-later online reading app that lets you curate your own news feed. Save stories, articles, news, videos, and more, from any publisher or app on your tablet. Use the tablet app to read all the articles you didn't have time to read previously. Download Pocket 03 of 17 Zinio What We Like The individual magazine subscriptions, rather than an all-in-one subscription. Access to Marvel comics, which is normally not part of these kinds of services. What We Don't Like The individual magazine subscriptions, as it can get pricey if you want to read from a lot of magazines. Not many interactive elements while reading. ZINIO is a digital newsstand app, giving you access to magazines from around the world. Use your tablet's larger screen to enjoy a traditional magazine layout experience or use the innovative text mode for a more modern reading experience. Selected articles are free, while others require a subscription to the magazine. Download Zinio 04 of 17 PressReader What We Like Good search functionality to find relevant magazines or topics. HotSpots give free users instant complimentary access to the entire catalog. What We Don't Like More expensive subscription than other options (starting at $29.99/month) Can only share/sync content with five devices. PressReader is an online magazine and newspaper reader. For a monthly subscription, readers get access to over 7,000 magazines and newspapers from around the world. Even without a subscription, PressReader gives complimentary access to their entire catalog when you're at one of their HotSpots; you can search for them easily from their site or through the app. Download PressReader 05 of 17 Libby by Overdrive What We Like Content is free with a library card. Can read previews of books without downloading the whole thing. What We Don't Like Need a library card to use it. No way to control the lighting setting of the app. Our review of Libby Libby by Overdrive is an ebook and audiobook platform tied to libraries around the world. Simply open the app, connect it to your local library, and you can borrow eBooks and audiobooks with your library card for free. Download books to read offline, send books to your Kindle app, and keep track of your reading history in the Activity tab of the app. Download Libby by Overdrive 06 of 17 Moon+ Reader What We Like Many different themes for the app, allowing users to customize it as they like. Supports gesture controls while reading. Read in landscape mode with dual-page functionality. What We Don't Like Need a Dropbox account to sync content between devices. No built-in store to download content from. Only supports local content files. Moon+ Reader is another eReader app for those looking for a no-frills, basic reader for their tablets. It supports a wide range of eBook formats, has 10+ themes, gesture controls, auto-scrolling, and multiple device syncing via Dropbox. Get access to even more settings and ditch the ads by going pro for $4.99. Download Moon+ 07 of 17 Flipboard What We Like Smooth, modern interface makes reading a breeze. Content partnerships with major publishers. Offline reading modes. Mute publications, topics, and hashtags from appearing in your feedd. What We Don't Like Articles behind a paywall trigger the paywall option only after clicking the article to read it. Coverage of trending stories may be repetitive. Ads appear between stories and is hard to discern. Our review of Flipboard Flipboard is a news reader app where you can create your own virtual magazine. Simply choose interests to have it find related articles for you or add in your favorite site RSS and social media feeds to it. Flipboard displays everything in an easy to read manner while making it easy to share the stories back on your social media feeds too. While it's great on a smartphone, it's even better on a tablet as you can take advantage of the larger screen size. Download Flipboard 08 of 17 Amazon Kindle What We Like Many free books to download. Upload your own documents and books to read through the app. Many font size options. What We Don't Like Requires an Amazon account to use the app, even if you're not buying any books through it. Requires a credit card to download anything, including free books. Our review of the Amazon Kindle app The Amazon Kindle is a free app you can use buy and download books. Tablets make good ebook readers because of their larger screens. The Kindle app has a variety of reading options and settings, including downloading books for offline reading. The app is flexible enough to let you import non-Amazon books or documents too, including PDF and TXT files. Download Amazon Kindle app 09 of 17 Google Play Books What We Like App is free. Has a good selection of available books. Syncs across all apps to keep track of where you are in a book. What We Don't Like No bookmarking feature. Taking notes or highlighting depends on the book having the Flowing Text option available. The Google Play Books app is another good free ebook reader. Like the Kindle app, you can purchase books from the Google Play store or upload your own PDF or EPUB files to read. It also has a good free books list that you can download to your app. Download Google Play Books app 10 of 17 Netflix What We Like Wide variety of content available. Easy to use on any tablet. What We Don't Like Netflix increases their prices frequently. Categories can be hard to find through the app. Our review of Netflix The granddaddy of all the streaming services, Netflix is great to use on your tablet to take advantage of the larger screen. It has a huge selection of shows, movies, and documentaries and streams videos in HDR10 and Dolby Vision videos. Use the app to enjoy your shows on the larger tablet screen instead of your smartphone. Download Netflix 11 of 17 Autodesk Sketchbook What We Like UI is clean and easy to use. Works well with both touch input or stylus. Offers good discounts for longer subscription lengths. What We Don't Like Free version has a limited amount of tools available. Free trial isn't long enough to understand how to use the app fully. Autodesk Sketchbook app is a digital drawing and painting app for tablets. Whether you're a casual drawer or a professional artist, you can use Sketchbook to capture any idea you may have. Snap a picture of a drawing and import it into the app to finish it off with colors and effects. Draw with pencils, inks, markers, or one of the 190 customizable brushes available in the app to help you incorporate textures and shapes into your drawings. Download Sketchbook 12 of 17 SnapSeed What We Like Full edit history. Portrait and Head Pose options to make people pictures stand out. What We Don't Like No auto-save. Some touch gestures needed to use features are not obvious to casual users. Snapseed is a free photo editing app and offers serious tools usually only found in higher priced apps. Use the edit brushes or film-related filters to give your pictures a professional touch. The Portrait and Head Pose modes give you the ultimate control on selfies and other pictures with people in them, so you can highlight eyes, smooth skin, change the background focus, and more. The Undo and Redo options make it easy to try out changes to your photos without committing to them, and with a full edit history, you can remove or re-apply earlier effects easily. Download SnapSeed 13 of 17 Pixlr What We Like Easy-to-use collage tool. Editing controls are easy to understand and use. What We Don't Like UI is cluttered. No help feature in the app. Our review of Pixlr Pixlr is a free photo editing app with a wide selection of tools and filters you can add to any picture. Edit your pictures with traditional photography tools like contrast, crop, and brightness, or adjust it with fun tools like color splash (turning all but one color to grayscale) or doodle (freestyle drawing on top of the picture). Pixlr lets you share your edited pictures directly to Instagram, Facebook, and Twitter, or you can simply save it locally on your tablet. Download Pixlr 14 of 17 Guides by Lonely Planet What We Like Over 200+ cities available in the app. Travellers suggest new cities to add, so it's not just the usual cities on there. Need to Know section is perfect for trip planning or daydreaming. What We Don't Like No Home button in the app, so it's not obvious how to get back to the start after downloading a guide. City names are only searchable in English, not in the local language. For those of you who like to travel, Lonely Planet's Guide app is for you. It bundles maps, recommendations, and budget guides for over 100 cities around the world. Discover where to stay and eat, what attractions to see, and uncover the hidden gems of these cities from Lonely Planet's expert writers. You can even start learning some key phrases in different languages, so you'll be prepared for your trip. Download Guides from Lonely Planet 15 of 17 TripAdvisor What We Like Has a ton of great info on cities to plan your trip. Uncover new ways to explore cities. What We Don't Like Can't always trust the info in the app. Advanced booking isn't always available on the app. A veteran of the travel app market, TripAdvisor is good for finding reviews about places to go and stay. On a tablet, it's great to explore the photos and videos of cities, attractions, restaurants, and hotels. Customer feedback and ratings are one of the top features of the app, letting you sort through cities, attractions, hotels, and more based on the ratings. Bookmark your favorites and come back to them to plan your next trip (or to simply view the pictures again). When you sign up for a profile on the app, you can see all of your favorite places, ratings, and more. You can also follow people through the app, which is especially handy if you find someone with similar tastes as you, making it easier to find new places to go and see. Download TripAdvisor 16 of 17 All Recipes Dinner Spinner What We Like Features over 50,000 recipes. Great pictures and videos. What We Don't Like Spinner feature isn't included on the tablet version. Need to sign in to save recipes. Discover new recipes to try with All Recipes' Dinner Spinner app. Featuring nice pictures, reviews, and clear instructions, using this app on your tablet makes meal time a breeze. Bookmark recipes to try them out later or share them via email, Pinterest, or Facebook. You can even check out videos of the recipes, to learn new techniques or just see how others make them. Sadly, the Dinner Spinner feature isn't included on the tablet version of the app, which lets you randomize a recipe based on an ingredient or meal type, but it's still a great app for browsing recipes. Download All Recipes Dinner Spinner 17 of 17 Kitchen Stories What We Like High-quality videos are posted on the site. Simple explanations for complex cooking techniques. What We Don't Like How-To section isn't organized into categories. Comments are repetitive and not always helpful. Kitchen Stories is another free recipe app, but it features videos of executive chefs creating the recipes instead of just the text for it. Every day there's a featured video recipe, along with an inspiration video to expand your cooking repertoire. It's perfect for home chefs who want a little more instruction on new recipes than just reading a recipe. Download Kitchen Stories Was this page helpful? Thanks for letting us know! 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