FoursCrowd shows you crowded foursquare locations to flock to or stay away from

Depending on what type of person you are, you might want to head to a coffee shop that is bustling with people, or one where there’s nobody to be found. If you require activity or quietness, this app for foursquare will help you decide on your next stop.

FoursCrowd uses foursquare’s API to show you which locations in your area are the most popular, and uses data from previous days to predict whether that spot will be popular at any given time.

The app will get your location through your browser and doesn’t require you to log-in to show trending locations. If you’re bored or want to stay away from a crowd, this is worth a play.

What’s hot?

The app updates itself in real-time as more foursquare check-ins occur. When you start using the app, your location will yield the top five hotspots:

Based on the information above, you might choose to stay away from Philz Coffee since it’s extremely crowded and probably doesn’t have a place for you to sit down and work. While you can’t judge a location based on foursquare check-in data alone, it’s definitely a decent gauge if you’re in a major city where foursquare adoption is high.

If you click on hot close-by venue, you’re shown how many people are checked in and how likely the location is crowded based on historical check-in data. This is a feature I’d love to see on the official foursquare app. Since it makes all of this historical data available in its API, it would be a great move to tell me what times the venues are the most crowded.

This is just a further illustration of how important third-party developers can be for the ecosystem of a popular service. Since foursquare can’t build every feature, it can rely on developers like this to create services that peak our curiosity.

For a major metropolitan area like San Francisco, it’s nice to get a glimpse into what restaurants might be full before venturing out and getting frustrated later.

➤ FoursCrowd