App Map for iOS now lets you see what apps your friends use, as well as people around you

I’ve been meaning to talk about App Map for iOS for a while now. It’s a clever app that lets you see the apps that other people around you are using, as well as check them out and install them.

It’s a clever kind of app discovery that I don’t think enough people are doing. By exposing you to the apps that people around you are using, you’re getting to see stuff that is regionally popular and location centric that may never get surfaced in a search of the App Store. If a clever indy developer makes an app that details restaurants in your city specifically, for instance, it may never trend on the big charts.

But, if you pop open App Map and see that another user locally uses the app, you might be more willing to give it a try.

The app sends info anonymously about what apps you’re running (but not any data associated with it) and only if you have location services enabled. It also uses a new low-power GPS mode introduced in iOS 4 to preserve battery.

Today, the app added Facebook and Twitter logins, letting you see which apps the people that you follow (who are also using App Map) are using. This is a pretty cool way to broadcast the apps you use the most and to discover ones that your friends like as well.

The app is well built and nicely implemented. I especially like the new horizontal view for the map that gives me a wider viewpoint for checking out apps. You can see worldwide trends or zoom down to just the apps used in your neighborhood.

It’s a super clever utility that I think hits on an area of app discovery that a lot of the big services out there don’t tackle. And it’s free. Well worth a spin if you’re interested in broadening your app horizons a bit.

App Map for iOS

Image Credit: Peter Macdiarmid/Getty Images

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