If you’re looking for apps to use on your Chromebook, you’ve come to the right place!
Chromebooks are great for students because they’re easy to use and they don’t require a lot of storage space. But if you want to make the most out of your Chromebook, you need the right apps.
In this article, we’ll cover some of our favorite apps for Chromebooks. We’ll also give you some tips on how to get started with these apps so that you can be productive in no time!
Best Apps For The Chromebook
Chrome OS gets bigger every year. The platform has tons of devices both cheap and expensive, with varying degrees of performance. However, Google made a smart move with Chrome OS by letting people use Google Play. It opened up the platform to millions of apps and games. The Play Store is also way better than the Chrome app store. It immediately made the platform a good option for most people.
There are tons of apps that work with Chrome OS. However, we focused primarily on ones that take advantage of a Chromebook’s larger screen and keyboard.
We’d also like to give an honorable mention to Taskbar (Google Play link). It’s a launcher app that lets you run other apps in resizable windows and use a different start menu. It’s also one of the only ways to get Chromebook widgets. More interested in games than apps? We have a separate list of the best Chromebook games on the Google Play Store too.
Without further ado, here are the best Chromebook apps available in the Play Store.
The best Chromebook apps
Adobe Lightroom
Google Drive
Gmail
KineMaster
LastPass Password Manager
MediaMonkey
Podcast Addict
Pulse SMS
Reddit
Solid Explorer
TickTick
VLC
Almost any messenger, chat, or video call app
Basically all music streaming apps
Basically all video streaming apps
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Adobe Lightroom
Price: Free / Up to $52.99 per month
Adobe Lightroom is probably your best bet for photo editing on Chromebooks. It has a lot of the same features as the desktop variant, including presets for quick editing, the Healing Brush feature, advanced color grading, support for RAW images, and more. It’s not quite pro-level, but it’s definitely close enough — a lot closer than you’d get with many other photo editors. Still, you do have options. Pixlr and Snapseed are both excellent photo editing apps.
See also: The best photo editor apps for Android
Google Drive
Price: Free / Varies
Google Drive screenshot 2020
Google Drive is an excellent option for Chromebook applications. It comes preinstalled on most Chromebooks anyway and provides a rock-solid suite of office apps. You get Google Docs (word processor), Google Sheets (spreadsheets), and Google Slides (presentations). All of them provide collaborative features and easy sharing. Drive also comes with 15GB of free cloud storage. Plus, there is Google Keep for taking notes. Microsoft Office is another viable solution with Microsoft OneDrive. We have a list of office apps here and most of them work for Chrome OS too.
See also: How to use Google Drive: Everything you need to know
Gmail
Price: Free
Gmail – best email apps
Gmail comes installed on most Chromebooks already, but it competes with the best of the best. The app manages your Gmail account as usual. However, it also supports multiple accounts, including Outlook, Yahoo, and others. The UI is clean and easy to use. You can also sync email and view them offline if needed — a valuable tool for the portable Chromebook platform. Blue Mail is another great free option.
See also: The best email apps for Android to manage your inbox
KineMaster
Price: Free / $5.49 per month / $39.99 per year
KineMaster is an excellent choice for video editing on a Chromebook. It has a lot of desirable features, including a timeline-style editor like most of its desktop competitors. The app also includes an asset store for music, clip graphics, fonts, stickers, transitions, and more. It supports 4K video export at 30FPS. The free version lets you edit some stuff with a watermark. The premium subscription removes the watermark and gives you access to the assets store. KineMaster is one of the great Android apps on Chromebook. PowerDirector and Adobe Premiere Rush are also great options in this space.
See also: The best video editor apps for Android
LastPass Password Manager
Price: Free / $36-$48 per year
LastPass is one of the most popular password managers. It has a great free version that should service single accounts without the need for a premium version. The app lets you store passwords, secure notes, bank details, debit card info, and other sensitive information behind its encrypted vault. It also has multi-factor authentication support, fingerprint scanner support, and supports the latest Android auto-fill APIs. You can see a great breakdown of the free versus premium version here, and most password managers work with Chrome OS so you have plenty of options.
See also: The best password manager apps for Android
MediaMonkey
Price: Free / $2.49
MediaMonkey is one of the best music player apps
MediaMonkey is a local audio player. It supports music files as well as podcasts. After some updates a few years ago, MediaMonkey can read music from external hard drives, internal hard drives, and SD cards. Thus, you can keep your music in a portable storage medium and listen to it whenever you want. Plus, those with MediaMonkey on their desktop computers can stream their local music over MediaMonkey’s server. It’s a good all-around option with a cheap price tag. Poweramp is another great option for local music playback as well. Of course, most music players work. Here is our best list if you want to find more. They’re all basically really good Android apps for Chromebook.
See also: Buyer’s guide: What is a Chromebook, what can and can’t it do?
Podcast Addict
Price: Free / $3.99 / $0.99 per month
Podcast Addict is one of the best android apps
Podcasts are great background noise for most activities on a Chromebook. Podcast Addict is arguably the best of the bunch. It has an excellent free version, a cheap ad-free premium version, and an entirely optional subscription model in case you want to support the developer and get a few extra features. All versions of the app find and download podcasts available on Apple Podcasts. There are also various playback options, download options, and other settings. Pocket Casts is another decent option, as are Doggcatcher and CastBox. All podcast apps should work with Chrome OS.
See also: The best podcast apps for Android
Pulse SMS
Price: Free / $59.99 once / $1.99 per month / $19.99 per year
Pulse SMS is an excellent app for Chromebook owners. It lets you send and receive SMS text messages from your real number. The app syncs your phone with any device connected to your account. Any text you send is mirrored on those other platforms. The app is open-source and encrypted in such a way that no one can see your texts but you. It works perfectly fine on Chromebooks so you can text via SMS without any complicated setup. Maple Media purchased this from its original developer in early 2020 and the prices have gone up since then. Still, it’s one of the few apps that gives you this level of functionality cross-platform. The lifetime subscription is still the best option, but you may want to use the free trial and subscribe for a month or two to make sure it works for you.
See also: The best texting apps and SMS apps for Android
Reddit
Price: Free / $3.99 per month / $29.99 per year
Reddit screenshot 2020 2
Reddit is a good resource for Chrome OS owners. There are various subreddits for Chromebook users, including Chrome OS and Chromebook. Both have resources, tips, advice, and stories from other Chromebook owners. Additionally, you can find help with various apps and games, troubleshoot issues, find wallpapers, and other great stuff. Chrome OS has a very different feel than Mac or Windows, and some good support makes the transition less annoying. Most Reddit apps work on Chrome OS.
See also: The best Reddit apps for Android
Solid Explorer
Price: Free trial / $2.99
Solid Explorer is a great file explorer app with tons of useful features. It includes the basics like copying and pasting files, browsing your documents, and it supports all the various storage options on a Chromebook. Some other features include support for NAS storage, cloud storage services, and FTP servers. That should work fine for the vast majority of people unless they need something really special. Like most apps, file explorers should universally work on Chrome OS.
See also: The best Android file explorer apps, file browsers, and file managers
TickTick
Price: Free / $27.99 per month
TickTick screenshot 2021
TickTick is a to-do list app and one of the best ones on Android. You can create tasks, organize them in lists, and collaborate with other people in your household. It’s a lightweight app that syncs with all of your devices for free. The free version also comes with two reminders per task, recurring tasks, and a calendar. It should serve its purpose without the need for yearly subscription fees. TickTick is powerful enough to use both at home and for work. Of course, you can find more to-do list apps here if you want to try something else.
See also: The best Chromebooks to get — Google, Asus, Lenovo, and more
VLC
Price: Free
VLC for Android screenshot 2021
VLC is a multi-purpose media player and an excellent addition to a Chromebook’s app drawer. It supports most video and audio codecs, along with subtitle and network stream support. It can even see network drives like NAS. The UI is fairly basic and the controls are easy enough to find and use. VLC should play any video file on a flash drive or SD card so you can watch movies on the go. The app is free, open-source, and has no ads. Of course, there are other great video player apps here in case you need more options.
Basically any messenger app
Price: Free / Varies
Fortunately, very nearly all messenger apps work on Chromebooks. You have your usual suspects like Facebook Messenger, WhatsApp, WeChat, Viber, and others. Then you have your work ones like Slack, Microsoft Teams, and others. Finally, we found that even apps like Zoom, Skype, and Google Duo work on Chromebooks with a webcam. We could recommend one or two, but you and your friends and family probably have yours picked out already. You can definitely use them on Chromebooks. However, if you want to see some great ones, we have lists for the best messenger apps, best chat room apps, best video chat apps, and best video conferencing apps for Android at the respective links.
best chromebook apps for business
Chromebooks have been around for quite some time now. These devices are incredibly popular and cost effective, putting them in the hands of several users across the world. It’s a viable alternatives to full blown notebooks sometimes with devices like the Chromebook Pixel packed with high-end specs. However, for the most part, one concern that customers have with Chromebooks is the lack of apps. But that’s changing, and fast, given the ability to run Play Store apps on Chromebooks. However, if you’re looking for specific Chromebook applications, there are quite a few of them out there as well.
We’re going to talk about five such apps today in the hope of helping you find the best of the lot. Not all of these are free however, and might require a subscription. But these are certainly apps that you need to have on your Chromebook.
So let’s check them out.
Best Chromebook Apps
best chromebook apps
- Calmly Writer
My one complaint with traditional text editor apps are that there are a lot of tools and options visible at all times, although fullscreen mode does help sometimes, almost every text editor offers a cluttered experience, sometimes taking the focus away from what you’re writing. Calmly Writer is an app for Chromebooks that helps greatly with such distractions. The app is designed to make life easier for writers who just want to write on a blank page.
With the ability to add typewriter sounds to your keystrokes, writers can also experiment with a style that older writers were used to. If you’re typing in the night or simply want to switch up the experience, the app also offers a dark mode which changes the background to black and the font to white. The app also has a font meant to help with dyslexia, something that affects a lot of people around the world. You can even get an estimated reading time for the articles you write, making this an excellent app to have. Calmly Writer will set you back by $3.99 on the Chrome Web Store.
Download it now: here
best chromebook apps
- Evernote
This is yet another necessary app for those seeking an app that can help you sync up your notes or files on the cloud instantly. Evernote has been around for quite some time, and has been the mainstay among utility and productivity apps. The Chromebook version is tailored perfectly for the platform and allows you to access all your files and documents simply by signing in using your credentials. One of my favorite features of Evernote is the ability to search through text as well as PDFs and images that you have stored on your account. This feature makes it easy to search for something even if you have a lot of files saved.
Evernote is a free app, but getting a premium subscription has some benefits. With Evernote Premium, you can even set a custom lock for the app to keep your notes secure and away from people who handle your phone. The app is free to download on the Chrome Web Store.
Download it now: here
best chromebook apps
- Spotify
This app needs no introduction as it is one of the most popular music streaming services in the world. It comes with a fairly decent collection of artists, and undoubtedly has the most users among streaming providers, although Apple Music is quickly catching up. Spotify’s user interface on this Chrome app has been designed with a lot of care and thought, which we admire greatly. All the artists, albums and playlists are easy to access.
Unlike other streaming services, Spotify has a free version as well. This is not a free trial, but a somewhat limited version of Spotify Premium with ads and the inability to skip tracks. Spotify Connect allows you to play music on your TV or other connected device using your Spotify app as the remote. The app also has an excellent music discovery feature that is carefully adjusted to your music tastes. The free version of Spotify can be tried out for sure, but for continued usage, we highly recommend getting the Premium subscription valued at $9.99 per month. The best chromebook apps itself is free to download from the Chrome Web Store.
Download it now: here
best chromebook apps
- Polarr Photo Editor
Rated as one of the best and highly powerful photo editing tool for Chrome OS, Polarr is an excellent app that can help you make edits and photo modifications even when you’re offline. The app is available in Express and Pro versions, giving you the choice between a free offering and a paid service. Among the slew of features that the app offers, Polarr allows you to superimpose and add layers to existing photographs, letting you convert your standard pictures into a modern day marvel.
You can also add photorealistic effects like clouds, water, rain etc to add a bit more spice to your pictures. The app also supports an auto enhance mode which allows you to make quick adjustments to the white balance and contrast of your photographs. Polarr is a free download on the Chrome Web Store. Be sure to check it out.
Download it now: here
- Word Online
This is an official app by Microsoft, and brings you all the features of Microsoft Word with online editing and commenting abilities included. It’s basically the standard Microsoft Word, but with real-time editing and collaboration features included. The app works in tandem with Office Online, which consists of several Microsoft productivity apps, although the presence of Office Online is not a prerequisite for this app to work. All things considered, Word Online is a fairly decent text editing app for Chrome OS, and we appreciate the fact that it brings online editing which can be instrumental in the completion of group documents or projects.
Naturally, you can also choose to save the file natively on your desktop, which is ideal if you have no internet connection. But at its best, Word Online works as an online word documen5.t opener, specially tailored to work with multiple users at the same time. This best chromebook apps is a free download for Chrome OS.
Download it now: here
Conclusion
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