15 Best iPhone Applications for Web Designers
“Once you use it, you won’t know how you ever survived without it” is a well worn cliche, applied over the years to every new technological development or advancement in gadgetry made available to the masses. The mobile phone, the electric toothbrush, ceramic hair straighteners – every important discovery of the technological era has been tarred with this overused tagline.
And the reason why? Because it’s actually true, and none more so than when talking about iPhone apps. You could probably survive without them, and you have perhaps been doing so, but they just make things so much easier, and not just for restaurant bookings and finding directions.
When it comes to web design, there are apps for nearly everything, from helping create color schemes to managing your busy schedule. Here are 15 of the best!
1. Ego
Ego is a brilliant way of checking your web statistics on a daily (or even hourly) basis. Able to support sites such as Twitter, Squarespace and Google Analytics, you can track the traffic to your website from the comfort of your iPhone without the time consuming pain of having to log in and out of each individually.
2. Palettes
Particularly useful for the graphical web design, Palettes allows you to lift colous directly from any image you see online on your iPhone and create a ‘palette’ of your own, replicating exactly the desired color scheme. Palettes can be imported from or exported to other programs such as Photoshop and Illustrator, and offer a quick and efficient way of working with colors without having to compromise on accuracy.
3. WhatTheFont
One of the best things about using iPhone apps is the mobility that they offer. For example, if you see a font or lettering that catches your eye while out and about, simply take a photo and the WhatTheFont app will identify it, meaning you can incorporate it into your own designs in a matter of seconds. WhatTheFont works on practically every image, so even if the font is on a web page and not a photo, this app will still identify it for you, which has helped this app achieve almost cult status amongst designers.
4. FTP On The Go
FTP On The Go is one of the most popular business apps available. Not only does it allow you to perform website maintenance on the move as well as edit files on your FTP server, but the built-in browser means you can check and changes on your iPhone without having to leave the app itself.
5. ZeptoPad
Sometimes, as a web designer, you may have an impromptu moment of inspiration. And since pens and paper are about as fashionable as mullets, ZeptoPad is the ideal app for channeling this artistic creativity. It allows you to create vector images, simply by drawing on the screen with your fingers. The latest version even boasts P2P access, so you can share your masterpieces with all your ZeptoPadding friends and colleagues.
6. CSS Cheatsheet
Despite what many of us may think, none of us is completely perfect, and memory blanks can happen to the best of us. Luckily, there’s an app which prevents these memory blanks from stemming our creative flow when laying out a site. CSS Cheatsheet provides an in depth look at the workings of CSS, ideal for quick references or more detailed tutorials for beginners. And what’s more, it even works offline. Look out for similar apps for Javascript and PHP.
7. ProSEO
ProSEO is possibly the best Search Engine Optimization app on the iPhone. Not only can you track the progress of your domains and those of competitors, you can also keep track of the keywords that drive traffic to your your domain from the search engines. Other handy features include a phrase counter to help determine repetitive phrases as well as the ability to analyze link anchor text and image tags within documents. This is without doubt a key app for any web designer/developer who would like to see their sites ranking highly in Google, Yahoo! or Bing.
8. WorkTimer
Working as a web designer with many clients (often spread out geographically) means a structured 9 to 5 is often too difficult to organize and equally impractical. However, you still need to keep track of how much time you spend working on each project, which is where the WorkTimer comes in. By simply pressing the screen, you can keep a log of how many hours you’ve spent working – one less thing to clutter your mind and distract your creative genius!
9. CliqCliq Colours
Possibly the primary color app for graphic and web designers alike, CliqCliq Colors allows you to find the exact color you need as well as converting it to a variety of scales and formats. Similar to the Palettes app, CliqCliq Colors allows you to take colors from images of photos seen directly on your iPhone’s screen.
10. Analytics
Analytics is the number one app for Google Analytics. Like a more detailed version of the Ego app, the free Analytics Lite allows you to check statistics and track traffic, with the Analytics Pro app allowing the user to view over 50 Google Analytics reports as well as examining traffic sources and Ecommerce statistics, meaning you can keep up with your sites’ performances wherever you are.
11. Photobucket
The Photobucket app means you can carry one of the largest photo sharing networks with you at all times, with access to your personal and friends’ albums at the touch of a screen. This is particularly useful for designers looking for photos to be used directly or even just for color schemes. And as it costs absolutely nothing, it’s an app definitely worth downloading if only as a back up source of images.
12. Ping
A useful tool for any designers or developers who are on the move a lot, but can’t afford to lose touch with their servers. Ping tests whether your servers are up and running and accessible, as well as checking that they are responding on the internet or on a private network. The Ping app is quick and easy, a role model for all other apps of its kind.
13. Dexigner
In any sort of design field, it’s vital to keep on top of design news and developments, which is where the Dexigner web app comes in. Dexigner provides the latest design news, whether be graphic design or fashion, straight to your iPhone. Excellent train journey reading material for when you aren’t taking photos of billboards and taking inspiration from their fonts and colors of course!
14. Source Viewer
An especially simple app, Source Viewer allows you, surprisingly enough, to view the HTML, CSS and Javascript source code of any website you like. Something you may take for granted when using your laptop or desktop computer, only made portable by this handy little app.
15. DatabaseViewer
As the DatabaseViewer’s description reads, quite simply ‘view any database on any iPhone anywhere’. You can view a variety of databases such as MS Access, MS Excel, FilePro and SQL, with the ability to sync any changes or developments of a certain database to stay right up to date.
About The Author
Tom Walker writes a blog about technology and gadgets for a leading supplier of ink to the print industry based in Great Britain. You can also follow him on Twitter.
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42 comments
Mahallo Media
July 1, 2009Great iPhone application. My favorite is Analytics, thanks for sharing!
Dave Parsons
July 1, 2009Thanks for the list!
It seems the Analytics app doesn’t have a free lite version – only the full paid app.
There *is* an Analytics Agent Lite app but seems to have major issues with 3.0.
Vin
July 1, 2009good list!
will definitely use ego and cliqcliq colours
Paulina
July 1, 2009Wow! Thanks for this Best of List. Somerset of them are really nice help for my work. Redards, Paulina
EthanJ
July 1, 2009I would also suggest an SSH app like iSSH (my favourite), pTerm or TouchTerm.
On the fly shell access has saved me an incredible amount of hassle when dealing with dev work, or more usually, my own sites.
Good article though Ego, WhatTheFont and Analytics are particularly great.
Paul Randall
July 1, 2009A great list. Will be looking into Ego and the Analytics Lite apps
Michael
July 1, 2009The upcoming Dropular app might be very handy for web designers as well: http://vimeo.com/5406166
arT2
July 1, 2009thanks, nice list.
Michelle
July 1, 2009These will be very helpful in my day-to-day operations! Thanks so much for doing the leg work!
nOeL
July 1, 2009I like WhatTheFont
Chris Charlton
July 1, 2009Dexigner is no longer listed in the iTunes App store.
Midas IDE does FTP, PHP, CSS, HTML. It looks promising, but I have not purchased it yet.
Kayla
July 1, 2009Awesome list. I’m assuming most of these work in the Touch as well, I’ll be looking them up right when I get back to my touch!
netslider57
July 1, 2009great selection, thanks !!!
Daniel Bryan
July 1, 2009The “WhatTheFont” app is definitely a top 15 for designers and I would put the “CliqCliq” in there as well, but the others are not something I would use or any of my designers would use. We’re still in the “we can” phase of iPhone dev, not yet to the “we should” phase. So you wind up with a lot of things that sound good, but would never be used in the real world.
steven
July 1, 2009WhatTHeFont is unusable and totally annoying. It could not recognize a clear picture of Helvetica!!! and kept timing out. Are they trying to tic off their users? Other than that great list!!
by the way i love WhatTheFont online on a full size computer… great service just a poor iPhone app.
cam
July 1, 2009damn, i guess i really SHOULD get an iphone! the matrix is closing in! lol. great list
Jake
July 1, 2009Sick! Now I just need about $199.99 to get the damn think, and I’m set.
mahalie
July 1, 2009Wow, this post sent me down quite the rabbit hole…
Nicholas Z. Cardot
July 1, 2009Ego makes me want to get an iPhone!
kyle
July 1, 2009Wow, thanks for the great comments about cliqcliq Colors everyone! I found this link via a post on twitter, and we’re flattered about all the positive feedback. Hope you’re getting plenty of use out of it, and please don’t hesitate to let us know if you have feedback, criticism, or other comments about the app.
Also, we’re working on a pretty substantial update to the app, it’s taking a little while longer for us to get it out than we’d like, but we think everyone who uses Colors will be substantially more happy with the app.
Cheers!
kyle
cofounder, cliqcliq
Antonio Max
July 1, 2009The WhatTheFont just doesnt work. Just wasted my time on all the tests ive made with it. Thanks for the article.
Jens
July 2, 2009Great list! Have you considered TimeTracker (http://www.mobileapps.de/timetracker) as an alternative to WorkTimer? It also pretty handy for keeping track of your time and offers many useful features.
Roman
July 2, 2009Wow. this blows away the small list I made, on my site for Android Apps… hey, designers don’t HAVE to like Apple.
Aneslin
July 2, 2009wow. really great app collection.
specially I like ftp. just now I knw, thx bro
arscherz
July 2, 2009Haha, any designers out there with a Blackberry, like me? I think I need to start my own blog of nifty gagets for designers that don’t like Apple products. Regardless, seems a few of these I looked up have Blackberry apps too. I need to do more research, some seem like they could be useful, or at least fun, for a phone.
Thanks for the article.
Tod
July 2, 2009Analytics and Source Viewer is the most useful applications in this list. Not only for web designers)
SEO Aware
July 2, 2009Just got 11 out of 15! Fantastic list, put it on facebook and stumbled
. Thanks!
RTIQLIT
July 3, 2009Great list! I also like TypeDraw…fantastic app for typography freaks!
Albert Pak
July 12, 2009This definitely makes me want to get iPhone even more!
And24
July 13, 2009Nice list! I’m getting these for my iPod Touch asap!!
Laurie
September 12, 2009Thanks for taking time making this list. It is great! As an Interactive Communications grad student, I think some of these apps will come in handy for my coursework and beyond. I plan on sharing it with my classmates.
Plastic Surgery Application
October 15, 2009Nice list! I’m getting these for my iPod! Analytics pro looks like a good application.
Thanks.
iPhone Development Service
October 23, 2009Stunning apps!! Love to use Ego and Analytics apps..
Dzinepress
January 23, 2010really helping applications for web designers.
Tova Meroney
February 1, 2010Glad to have checked out this site really found it useful and will return for a further look around when I have some more time.
Eileen
February 11, 2010For those app developers that don’t know Objective-C and Cocoa Touch and don’t want to outsource development, check out localbeacon (an iphone app builder) at http://www.bigforge.com. Great for those who want to build just one app or developers interested in white label.
ndopart
March 23, 2010I never imagine that web designer can do all their job by using small stuff like iphone…
Anup
April 8, 2010Nice Collection
Luke
October 25, 2010I’m thinking jQRef might be a good addition to this list.
Craig Webber
March 14, 2011You should check out HTML Writer. It has got to be the best web editing app I’ve used on the iphone. Built in FTP, syntax highlighting, lots of features and for the price ($2.99) it’s a no-brainer.
Sagar
November 11, 2011WoW ! These are some great apps, thanks for the wonderful list
Amit
January 10, 2012ProSEO is what i was loking for
thanks
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[...] Icon designers should also shy away from using transparency in designs. This is reflected poorly when apps get published to the store since iOS has a difficult time rendering areas from an icon as transparent. If you’d like some inspiration check out our best iPhone apps for web designers. [...]