Meebo IM

If you like to pass the time exchanging smiley faces and abbreviations with your friends through instant messaging apps, you ought to get a copy ofMeebo IM. It's an instant messaging aggregator, incorporating AIM, MSN, Yahoo, MySpace, Facebook, good old ICQ and more, serving everything up in one convenient interface. Typing in all your logins and passwords for everything is the only, very temporary, inconvenience.

beebPlayer

This does one thing - it lets you access the BBC's famed iPlayer on your Android phone. You need to be connected via Wi-Fi for the best performance, as our mobile networks can't really handle live streaming the new Doctor Who through the ether, but for in-bed TV it's a great solution.

UPDATE: The developer of beebPlayer has recently removed the app from Android Market and ceased further development. There's now an official BBC iPlayer app, which we take a look at on the next page.

RAC Traffic

An official production of the motoring organisation, RAC Traffic is dead simple - it guesstimates your location via the mobile signal, then pops up the current traffic alerts for your area. It's much better than having to listen to the radio for the odd update about arterial blockages.

AppSaver

The Android 2.2 update known as 'FroYo' will let users save their Android Market purchases to their phone's SD card, freeing up valuable in-phone memory. But if you're using an older, less fancy version of the OS, an app likeAppSaver does at least let you save your app install files to the SD card.

AppMonster

The act of monitoring and uninstalling apps on Android is a bit of a clumsy process, to be honest, with numerous sub-screens to navigate - and yet more yes/no/are-you-sure dialogue boxes to get through once you've found the 'bin it' page. So get a decent app manager such as AppMonster, which also offers one-click backup of all your apps to an SD card, if you're the type of person who worries about having copies of everything.