7 Indian Mobile First Apps That Kicked Ass In 2014

2014, was arguably, the year which marked the coming of age of mobile apps in India. Numerous biggies like Flipkart and Amazon launched and heavily promoted their apps and investors poured in enormous amounts into mobile.

Here we highlight those mobile first startups (or companies whose primary usage happens via mobile) that generated a lot of buzz and built up a large user base in the year of 2014.

Gaana

Gaana is a music streaming app which uses internet to stream music on phone. The app has a neat, clutter-free user interface which is soothing to the eye. It has options of New Releases, Playlist of the hour, top charts etc. It plays music smoothly without any ads. It works well for all english music lovers as well. It has monthly as well as annual plans which are INR99 and INR 1020 respectively.

Platforms Live on: Android, iOS, Windows, Blackberry & Java

Android Downloads: 5,000,000 – 10,000,000

Paytm

Paytm is India’s largest mobile commerce platform. It started by offering mobile recharge and utility bill payments and today it offers a full marketplace to consumers on its mobile apps. It has over 20 Mn registered users. The app has a clean design and ease of accessing options. At Paytm, you have the option of recharging and shopping from wherever, anywhere and are equipped with a secure online wallet called Paytm Cash.

Platforms Live on: Android, iOS, Blackberry, Windows

Android Downloads: 10,000,000 – 50,000,000

OlaCabs

Transport has taken a shift from calling people to websites and now to mobile. With a touch of a button you can book a cab or plan your trip ahead. The user interface of app is facile to use, even a first-time app user can explore around without any hiccups. The app gives you basic steps to follow. All you have to do is set your pickup location, scroll within the list of available cabs close by and Voila, you will have taxi at your doorstep.

Platforms Live on: Android, iOS, Windows

Android Downloads: 1,000,000 – 5,000,000

Wynk Music

Wynk is the music app for every mood! From Rahman to Rihanna, the app boasts over 1.8 million songs across Indian and International music. The app has a rich UI and has an option of changing language from english to hindi. Also, the app has an advantage over its rivals as it offers unlimited ad-free streaming and streams songs at a higher quality. The app has playlists as per moods, artists and genres.

Platforms Live on: Android & iOS

Android Downloads: 1,000,000 – 5,000,000

Hike

Hike is an indigenous which competed with the likes of Whatsapp, Viber and other messaging apps. With its recent funding it has focused on providing more features to its users. The app has a security which lets you hide your conversations with a password and lets you share any kind of file from within the app. Hike uses a 128-bit SSL encrypted, firewalled server for the exchange of media and text messages only on wifi. Messages are stored locally in the user’s device and the data is not backed-up to Hike’s server.

Platforms Live on: Android, iOS, Windows, Blackberry, Nokia Store

Android Downloads: 10,000,000 – 50,000,000

NewsHunt

NewsHunt bring all the news in your pocket. The apps focuses on National as well as Regional news and provides support for 11 Indian Languages including Hindi, Malayalam, Tamil etc. It provides an option to change text size and background color to suit reader’s readability.  Apart from providing news, the app hosts a huge collection of regional language eBooks and provides an option to buy them via their mobile phone in addition to their credit/debit cards.

Platforms Live on: Android, iOS, GetJar Nokia Store, Windows, Blackberry

Android Downloads: 10,000,000 – 50,000,000

IRCTC Connect

With more than 170 Mn mobile internet users in India, a number which is increasing exponentially, Indian Railways has done the most sensible thing to connect users with IRCTC seamlessly.  The official IRCTC Connect app allows users to book railway tickets, apart from checking reservation status, train schedules, train routes, availability of tickets, cancellation, booking history, recent history, favourites, and more. Users can easily navigate this app, as the designers have followed the best practices of UX while designing this app; meanwhile complete care has been take to choose the right color combination to come up with nicely designed interface.

Platforms Live on: Android

Android Downloads: 1,000,000 – 5,000,000

This is part of our special series, In Focus: 2014 In Review, in which we showcase the highlights of 2014 and what’s to come next year in the Indian Tech Ecosystem. Stay tuned for more.

Note: We at Inc42 take our ethics very seriously. More information about it can be found here.