There are quite a few iPhone apps that try to be your one stop shop for all the businesses around you that you may want to go to. While I have tried many of them, for some reason I keep coming back to iWant. iWant is a location based app that allows you to quickly find the closest restaurants, bars, cafes, grocery stores, drug stores, clothing stores, movie theaters/show times, hotels, department stores, banks, gas stations and car rental places.
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How well does it work?
The interface is quite simple. Nice big icons that cover each of the above categories. Once you tap a category it will start to display all of the businesses around your current location based on the category you tapped on. It seems to do a pretty good job of finding just about every business I could think of around me in each given category except for the banks. There are three Bank of America banks nearby and it didn’t list any of them. There is a Comerica bank about a block away and it didn’t find that one either. Not sure if there is some brand preference going on or not, but it doesn’t find every business in every category. Even with this shortfall I still like it as I’ve found the same limitation in the other apps I’ve tried as well.
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A couple of added benefits
Once you tap on a business, you get to see the address and of course the phone number which you can tap to dial. You also get to see it on the built-in Google Map app for easy directions to if from where you are. The Action menu at the bottom of the screen allows you to email your current location to anyone you like and it will automatically generate a link with your coordinates. This is cool when you are unfamiliar with the area and you’re trying to explain where you are. You also have a built-in option to email the developer. I wish more apps included this ability. You can also easily control the search radius with a slider.
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The Bottom Line
It’s hard to go wrong with this app. It’s easy to use, it’s fast and best of all it’s FREE! Download it from the App Store now.
Hey Terry! Have you tried “Around Me”? Kind of the same idea, but with a better interface, and a heading for Apple retail stores, which I remember interests you.
Joe,
Thanks for the recommendation. I’m downloading it now. I hadn’t tried that one yet. Curious though, why do you think the interface is better (looks about the same to me from the screen shots)? Yes, I’m definitely interested if it has an Apple Store category!
Just a personal taste thing, I guess. Color over b&w and I’m probably just used to it. Works great for me, and I travel quite a bit for work.
Hey Terry, Have you tried the new “Earthcomber”? They say it has a new GPS based intel, changing it from the old. Just curious.
Good App Terry. Thanks
Hey, have you found a good App for reading PDF’s that will allow you to enter the page number you want to skip to? It’s a drag on some of them to have to keep clicking next page, etc. over and over to get from page 1 to page 48, for example.
Marty