While iPad and iPhone apps are usually pretty inexpensive individually, it'll soon add up if you're buying an app or two a week. There are ways to get paid apps for free, though, and here, we're going to tell you how.
Find out when apps are free or on offer in iTunes
With millions of apps in the App Store, developers are constantly trying to find ways to up their visibility, and one of those ways is through price-drop promotions. There are several apps that let you find out what paid apps are currently on offer or cheaper than usual.
Apps Gone Free [1] is updated daily with hand-picked apps that are currently available for free. What's good about Apps Gone Free is that the apps are chosen based on the ratings they've received on iTunes, so you know the app you're downloading is actually going to be worthwhile.
You can check back over apps that were featured on previous days to see whether they're still on offer. If they're not, they'll have an "Expired" stamp on them to save disappointment when you arrive in the App Store.
Be warned though, this app can be addictive. I once ended up with almost 200 apps on my iPhone, all of which I had downloaded for free and many of which I never actually made use of.
App Shopper is another good place to find apps that have been reduced in price. If you head over to AppShopper.com [2] , you can see what's new in the iTunes Store in a frequently updated list, as well as the top 200 and, best of all, price drops [3] .
If you go to the What's New tab and then click Popular, Free and Price Drops in the filter menu, you'll see all of the popular apps that have recently been made free.
There are other apps out there, including FreeAppMagic Daily [4] , that offer similar services but the quality is significantly less impressive.
One thing to note about all of these free app offers is that it's still possible that there will be in-app purchases available within the apps.
Apple's Free App of the Week
Every week, Apple chooses an app as its App of the Week. They're usually pretty impressive apps that will cost you a pound or two when they're not in the promotion so it's well-worth keeping an eye out on the iOS App Store each week to see what's on offer.
You'll spot Apple's free App of the Week on the iTunes Store home page, as circled here.
Apple's 12 Days of Christmas 2013
Look out for Apple's 12 Days of Christmas coming up in December, too. Each year, Apple updates its 12 Days of Christmas app and offers something free each day from 26 December until 6 January. This could be an app, a song, a video or a book.
Last year, free app highlights from Apple's 12 Days of Christmas included Sonic & Sega All Stars Racing [5] , Snapseed [6] and Shift 2 Unleashed [7] .
Starbucks Pick of the Week codes
Starbucks has a Pick of the Week promotion that offers a free download on iTunes each week.
All you need to do is visit a Starbucks each week (the promotion changes every Tuesday) and pick up a Pick of the Week card. They can usually be found on the counter where you pick up your coffee order.
On the back of the card you'll find a code that you can type into iTunes to start downloading your free Pick of the Week. You'll find that they include books, music, apps and games.
Alternatively, you can use the Starbucks iOS app [8] while connected to Starbucks WiFi to get the current Pick of the Week.
See also:
Freemium is the worst thing in the history of gaming: a rant
How to remove your Apple ID completely: shut down your iTunes Store, iCloud and other accounts
The best free Mac OS X games: Free Apple Mac games you should play
Links
- ^ Apps Gone Free (itunes.apple.com)
- ^ AppShopper.com (appshopper.com)
- ^ price drops (appshopper.com)
- ^ FreeAppMagic Daily (itunes.apple.com)
- ^ Sonic & Sega All Stars Racing (itunes.apple.com)
- ^ Snapseed (itunes.apple.com)
- ^ Shift 2 Unleashed (itunes.apple.com)
- ^ Starbucks iOS app (itunes.apple.com)
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