Best Useful and Creative iPad Apps You Must Have To Increase Productivity
Here are the best iPad Pro apps for creatives and students. These must have apps are useful for note taking, design work and digital journaling. Read about what’s on my iPad below, and get productive!
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Before getting into the apps, I want to share a couple of my absolute favourite iPad accessories that I highly recommend. They make the experience of using some of the apps below even more enjoyable. I can no longer use my iPad without these accessories…it’s a problem.
This is easily my favourite accessory for an Apple product EVER. This pencil sleeve from Elago that makes your 2nd generation Apple Pencil look just like a real regular wooden pencil. They have a few colour options, but my favourite is the yellow pencil skin.
Other than how it looks, it’s also quite functional. It is made of silicone so that the pencil doesn't slip in your hands while you write or draw. It also has gaps where the sensors are so you can use all your Pencil’s features easily and switch between digital tools with a double-tap.
The magnet/connector also functions well even with this sleeve on, as long as the edge of the iPad isn't covered by a case.
Ever since Apple introduced the Apple Pencil to go with the iPad Pro, I have been obsessed with matte screen protectors. Every device of mine at the moment has a matte screen protector. From my iPads, to my phone, to even my MacBook.
The reason isn’t just the texture when writing or drawing, I have it on my phone and laptop too because it’s easier on my eyes. Matte screen protectors make it so that my eyes don’t get strained as quickly. They are also anti-glare, fingerprint resistant, and of course, they are much nicer to write or draw on.
This matte screen protector is smooth, and really easy to get used to. Some people avoid matte screen protectors because they don’t like that their screens may become slightly grainy. Honestly, this is not really an issue for me. The screen is still perfectly clear and it actually helps me use the iPad more because my eyes hurt less. So I never really noticed much grain with this ESR screen protector and I illustrate as well as write frequently on my iPad. 🤷🏻♀️Highly recommend for so many reasons.
Now onto the best apps!
As an avid writer and artist, my iPad Pro is my favourite device. It allows me to create in almost all the ways I enjoy creating. It allows me to write, type, draw, paint, and I’m sure more things that I don’t even know I can do yet.
I’m always on the look-out for new apps for my iPad that can help make my creative experience with it even better. These are the best ones I’ve found so far. I hope you try them too if you haven’t already, and find that they make you enjoy your creative process even more.
Image Credit: Alexandar Todov, Unsplash
Procreate:
Anyone who likes to make digital paintings or little animations has probably either already heard of this app or even used it. In my opinion, it is the best app out there for digital art. I have used a few others, including the apps developed by Adobe, and I can honestly say that the current versions of those apps do not compare to Procreate.
Procreate has all the important features required by digital artists on-the-go. Colour pick, ability to create or buy brushes, geometrical shapes, streamlining brushes, freeform selections, insert images or text, and a lot more essential features. They also keep updating the app and adding more features quite often. So if you’re looking for a specific feature that they don’t have at the moment, they will likely introduce it in a future version.
I cannot get enough of this app. Whether you are creating intricate digital paintings, simple sketches, or handwritten/calligraphic graphics, Procreate is the right app for you. It’s also a very affordable one-time purchase for such a useful app.
Here is the download link: https://procreate.art/
Pinterest:
If you’re a creative person, Pinterest is one place that is full of inspiration for you. Whenever I’m feeling creative, but don’t know what to create, I open Pinterest. It’s my go-to app when I don’t feel like scrolling through social media.
Whether you’re a writer, artist, blogger, looking for new recipes, or just looking for outfit inspiration, (and much more) you can find it all here. There are so many creative things you could find on Pinterest. It may be a new DIY project or a new hobby you picked up. You will find inspiration for anything here. There are also tons of inspirational quotes and great wallpapers available for free on this app. I highly recommend it to everyone.
I use Pinterest not only for art inspiration, but also to help with my blogs. I also use it for journal writing prompt, recipes and fashion ideas. It’s my favorite app and I could even call it ‘my happy place.’
Here is the link to the Pinterest app: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/pinterest/
Word:
Ah, Microsoft Word. Do I really need to write about this? I’m using the Word app right now to write my first draft of this blog post. This is mainly what I use it for. I start my writing process here before it goes online as a finished article.
Of course, to use this app, you need to sign up for a Microsoft Office 365 subscription, if you haven’t already. Then you have access to all their apps on multiple devices (depending on the tier you choose to subscribe to.)
One great feature of this app is that you can save things on the cloud and then access them across all your devices. So I type up a draft on my iPad, and then I open it up on my laptop, and start pasting onto my blog. Super convenient.
Here is the link to the Word app: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/microsoft-word/
GoodNotes:
This app is essentially my on-the-go journal and notepad. You can have multiple books within the app for different uses. I have one for ideas for logueonline, one for my poetry, one as my personal journal, which I named ‘musings,’ and one simply titled ‘notes’ to use as a scratchpad.
My favorite feature of GoodNotes is how customizable everything is. From the cover of each notebook, to the kind of paper in it – you can customize it all.
A lot of people use this app to create a completely customizable planner. They make their own stickers and layouts for their planner and it serves as a digital bullet journal. You can literally custom-make your perfect digital notebook/sketchbook. GoodNotes has made my creative life much easier and more organized.
If you’re anything like me, you probably like to have multiple notebooks in use, simultaneously. I still do that, of course, but I can’t carry around so many books with me now, can I? So I feel really grateful to have this app and be able to sort out my thoughts and ideas, when all I have with me is my iPad.
Here is the download link: https://www.goodnotes.com/
Canva:
This app is great for making graphics and sharing your writing on social media. It has many options for great graphics even in the free version. It allows you to create a graphic from scratch, or use readymade templates from the app that you can build on and customize.
Canva allows you to get really creative with your designs so you can curate your social media profile however you see fit. I love the possibilities it offers when it comes to sharing information or your writing across your social media profiles. I use this app most often to create Pinterest pins for my blogs. I also use it to share poetry or my favourite quotes, sometimes.
Whenever you see infographics on Instagram that people use to spread awareness about world issues, a lot of times those graphics were made on Canva. It allows so many possibilities to create something that perfectly represents your cause and that you can feel proud of. You can add photos, text, stickers, labels and so much more to create something ideal.
Here is the link to the Canva app: https://apps.apple.com/us/app/canva
Other than these useful apps, I do also have entertainment apps on my iPad which I use to play music or put on a show in the background (using the iPad’s Picture-in-Picture feature) while i write or draw. My favourites are the usually well-loved apps, Netflix, Youtube and Spotify.
If you’d like to read about more iPad recommendations, check out this recent post on the New iPad Mini 6 2021: iPad Mini 6 2021 Purple - Review, Best Cases and Accessories
I hope you found this helpful and inspiring. If you have a tablet that you like to create with, try out these apps and let me know what you think! Most of these apps can also be used to their full potential on your phone too, if that’s what you prefer. That will allow you to have all your creative interests on one device that’s with you all the time. But, if you do have an iPad or tablet, i would recommend using these apps on a bigger device as I think they offer a nicer creative experience.