6 of the Best... Festival Apps

Abbas Ali checks out some of the best smartphone applications to enhance your festival experience. 

Whether your smartphone of choice is a Blackberry, an iPhone, or runs on Google’s Android operating system, Nokia’s Symbian, or Windows Mobile, there are hundreds of thousands of “apps” on the market for you to try out. These applications do everything from train timetables to paying your gas bill, so it’s no surprise that there are a wide and growing variety of phone apps perfect for the Summer music festival season.

The array of apps for these events is huge, providing help with everything from finding your tent, to finding out the stage time for your favourite band. A growing number of music festivals are even releasing their own apps, packed with exclusive content including youtube videos and photos. Then there are other apps that it’s just useful to have - from apps to save your phone battery to ones that will recognise a song you’ve just fallen in love with. Here is our guide to some of the best festival apps around...

1. Google Maps Navigation (Beta)

Operating System: Android, Blackberry, iPhone, Nokia

The original, and still the best! The free app from one of the internet’s biggest players includes navigation software, so you can find your way to your Summer party in a field without having to invest in a Sat Nav or fumbling about with motorway maps. Includes the facility to search by voice (which is not that great, but it is free, and a Beta after all!), and satellite/traffic views.

2. Shazam

Operating System: iphone, blackberry, Windows, Android, Nokia

This famous piece of software, launched back in 2002, allows music lovers to identify the artist and title of a song anywhere, using just their mobile phone. The programme runs tunes through its database of 8 million songs. With over 50 million users in over 150 countries, it's proved a popular piece of kit, and in July two versions of the app were released – a free and premium version. The “Freemium” version will be able to access editorial content including lyrics, artist biographies, discographies and track reviews. The paid “Shazam Encore” version introduces song recommendations to go with existing functionality, and Facebook/Twitter compatibility. Overall, a great toy for people who like to play with their phone...

www.shazam.com

3. V Festival

OS: Nokia

Like many of the major Summer festivals including Glastonbury, V has its own official app, which is surprisingly free. Along with weather forecasts and travel information, the app features Twitter updates from your favourite bands, along with regular images and youtube videos uploaded during the event. Add to that a stage guide and interactive festival map, and you have the essential ingredients of what to expect from a festival-specific mobile app.

4. Tent Finder

OS: iPhone

Most memories of going to a festival used to involve staggering around at 4am for an hour, trying to find your own tent after several shandies and a wrong turn. Thankfully, such dilemmas are a thing of the past, thanks to Tent Finder, which you can use to create GPS tag of your tent, and later use that to guide you home to the warmth your sleeping bag, campfire and Pot Noodles. Note that some festival apps, such as the Reading Festival, and iFest (below) now integrate this feature, so it may be possible to save yourself a few quid by shopping around.

www.tentfinderapp.com

5. iFest

As well as official festival apps, there are a few generic festival apps that aim to cover a variety of events over the Summer including Festival (free on iPhone), Festival Star and iFest. The latter is the brainchild of 22 year old recent graduate Chris Blackmore, who launched his app at Glastonbury this year, combining Met Office weather info, a tent finder, and social networking functionality. It’s still worth getting at this stage of the Summer, as the app will cover this year's Reading and Leeds, as well as V and Bestival.

6. Torch for iPhone 4

OS: iPhone

OK, so you can’t use it as a phone without dropping calls, but at least your shiny new iPhone 4 can make the grade as a Torch, for only £0.59. It may seem like a rip-off when you can get versions of this kind of software for free, but with high customer praise for the extremely bright LED light emitted, this app could shed some light on where your toothbrush has disappeared to, when you finally crawl indoors.

See our festivals guide here.