The best mobile apps of 2011's first half

How do you spend your day? Department of Labor data published earlier this month reports that the average American devoted 4 hours and 40 minutes of each day to leisure activities in 2010, with two hours and 31 minutes of that time dedicated to watching television. Work--a.k.a. leisure's evil twin--takes up 4 hours and 24 minutes of our daily lives, and sleep accounts for 8 hours and 23 minutes. The rest of our hours are spent on eating (1 hour, 12 minutes), household chores (1 hour, 41 minutes), education (36 minutes), purchasing goods and services (43 minutes) and other staples of modern life. It's a packed schedule.

But that was 2010. Here in 2011, an increasing chunk of daily life is dedicated to mobile applications that give us greater flexibility over where, when and how we tackle the tasks that make up everyday existence--and how we maximize the leisure time that's left over. Daily time spent using mobile apps now exceeds time spent surfing the web across both the desktop and mobile devices according to data published earlier this month by app analytics firm Flurry. Subscribers across the iOS, Android, BlackBerry, Windows Phone and J2ME platforms spend 81 minutes a day immersed in mobile applications. By comparison, users across the open web, Facebook and the mobile web spend 74 minutes a day on the Internet. As recently as December 2010, web consumption topped mobile app usage by a difference of 70 minutes daily to 66 minutes daily; a year ago, web time exceeded mobile app time by a difference of 64 minutes to 43 minutes.

The growing amount of time and energy spent on mobile applications makes it clear that consumers are identifying mobile games, news apps, social networking services, enterprise solutions and productivity tools they enjoy accessing time and again. Apple's (NASDAQ:AAPL) App Store alone now tops 14 billion downloads, with developer revenues surpassing $2.5 billion. But with hundreds of thousands of applications already available and thousands more entering the market each week, it's becoming more and more challenging for consumers to separate the good, the bad and the ugly. FierceMobileContent is here to help: Our weekly feature Appealing/Appalling spotlights the very best and the very worst apps available for download. With the first half of 2011 now in the books, let's take a look back at the absolute best of the best--the cream of the crop. Life is hectic enough, after all; you don't have time--or money--to waste on apps that don't make it a little more manageable, or at least a little more fun.--Jason 

 Number 5: Super 8    

To read more about Super 8 and the rest of the list, click here to get started.