10 smartphone and tablet apps that make life easier

Fill your yuppie treasure box with these best apps for smartphones

The current chatter about best smartphone apps brings to mind the term "yuppie." In times of lore and days long gone, Tom Paxton captured the essence of the yuppie lifestyle in a hit tune titled "Yuppies in the Sky." The song's lyrics talked about shuttered sushi bars, maxed-out credit cards, empty salad bars and condos to sell. In a modern version, the best apps for smartphones would surely command a major lyric.

So what do you look for when you need an app to make life easier? According to mainstreet.com, here are the 10 best smartphone apps of 2011:

1) Hipmunk

It's a travel app with a focus on simplistic navigational commands. The core app addresses individual user concerns such as flight cost, flight departure times and flight length.

2) Slice

Slice searches your email receipts and then organizes order shipment details. It also includes a map that tracks the exact location of every order.

3) Manilla

Manilla tracks and manages billing accounts. It handles over 1,200 businesses, including the details on reward cards, deal vouchers and daily deal sites.

4) FastCustomer

FastCustomer works with over 1,000 select businesses partners to ensure that recorded messages do not hinder your efforts to contact a human representative of a given company.

5) Stamped

This app tags reviews by friends, celebrities or people you tend to follow at a later date.

6) Orchestra

Orchestra helps users establish a shared to-do list. It even includes chat functions, email forwarding and automatic reminders.

7) Savvy

Savvy keeps up with your purchases and then flags you if a product price drop opens your doorway to a purchase refund.

8) Spotify

The Spotify app combines streaming music with the sound bytes of four major record labels. Access over 15 million songs for a mere $10 per month membership fee.

9) Flow

This Amazon-released product app scans barcodes and then returns price data and other product details. The focus is on Amazon purchasing based upon instant price comparisons.

10) Lemon

Organizing your budget is now easier than ever. The Lemon app scans, catalogues and charts your purchase receipts. Most of these best smartphone apps are available for free on Android phones and the iPhone. Pick the ones that suit your needs. Upload a copy of "Yuppies in the Sky." Live for today.

Content Provided by Spot55.com