We all know there are thousands upon thousands of apps, most of which provide writers with distraction rather than help. However, I’ve found a few apps that can actually lead you to being more productive, so I thought I’d share.
First, let me start off with the one love most: Dragon Dictation. It’s free in the app store and is useful when you’re on the go. Don’t have pen and paper or hands free for a keyboard? No problem. This app will turn your voice recordings into text (albeit sometimes error-riddled, but you can edit those out later).
Another helpful app is the Hemingway Editor. It analyzes your text, and highlights hard-to-read and very-hard-to-read sentences. Adverbs are called out, and in general it helps you increase readability.
Write or Die is a frustratingly helpful app that allows you to set word count goals and punishes you when you don’t meet them. It makes you want to set your computer on fire, but you do get quite a bit of writing done. Try out Kamikaze mode at least once. ;)
If you don’t like Write or Die then try out Self Control. This app allows you to block certain sites, such as Twitter or Facebook, for an amount of time of your choosing. That way you won’t be tempted to get distracted by social media and can actually get work done.
And last but not least, all writers can benefit from the Spotify app. It’s free (with ads) and provides a ton of music for inspiration. It even has soundscapes and nature sounds if you would rather have ambient noise instead of music.
Also on a side note, this is not an app, but try out www.grammarly.com. It helps with proofreading and simple typos.
So get to writing! Now you have no excuses!