Top 5 Android & iOS Apps of the Week: Dreams, Travel, Mental Health & More!

Unlike our weekly list of free app suggestions that is published twice each week, we test out each and every app in our Top 5 list before coming up with suggestions. In other words, we only curate these app and mobile game recommendations in a manner where we can sleep peacefully at night.

What are some of the important questions we answer here? Is an account required? Do you need to pay for the app? Are there pesky advertising and in-app purchases to help you progress? We share all these for each app suggestion and include screenshots and/or videos. Without further ado, here are the five app recommendations for this week.

AI Trip Planner - Orbt (Android & iOS)

Traveling can be fun for many of us, but some of us prefer to remain put at home. For those who love to explore new places and embark on adventures outside of the comfort of our homes, why not let Orbt help you out? Orbt functions as a travel planner that makes use of AI (artificial intelligence) to draw up itineraries for you. 

You no longer need another human to figure this stuff up. Save more time on packing than planning! All you need to do is key in the relevant prompts, and you are good to go!

Orbt should be able to handle itineraries of all sorts, where you include the number of persons, your general budget, and your key areas of interest. While the app is free, those who want to generate trips that are 4 days or longer will have to upgrade the account. After all, Orbt does pack quite many activities into each day’s worth of travel to maximize your time in each city.

The premium version even includes distance calculation and the amount of time required. Future updates will include public transit times considered, and letting you route maps from one destination to another so that you do not have to enter your location in the map itself! How convenient is that?

• Price: Free / Ads: None / In-app purchases: Yes ($7.99/month, $59.99/year) / Account required: Yes

• Download AI Trip Planner - Orbt from the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store

Dreams Book and Interpretation (Android & iOS)

“Sweet dreams are made of these…” or so the lyrics of a particular song go. Are you one who tends to dream a lot? If so, you might want to embark on a journey of self-exploration and personal growth through the DreamsBook app.

This app claims to provide some guidance on dream interpretation and analysis, although I am somewhat skeptical of such hocus-pocus. Still, there must be a method of sorts to the madness, right?

Dreamsbook provides you with a text area, where you describe your dream with a 250-character limit. Yes, there is not much wiggle room here to be more detailed, so you would do well to be as descriptive and brief as possible.

It takes a couple of minutes or so (no doubt an AI engine behind it, although a profile actually pops up to say who interpreted the dream with the number of reviews for the interpreter!) to generate an explanation of your dream with some insight.

• Price: Free / Ads: None / In-app purchases: None / Account required: None

• Download Dreams Book and Interpretation from the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store

Shoorah: Mental Health and Calm (Android & iOS)

Most of us live in a high-pressure environment, with so many things and people demanding our time, attention, and energy. Shoorah intends to balance things out, ironically using the very same device that is the source of much frustration for many: the smartphone. This wellbeing app intends to support your mental health and nourish you!

Setting it up is easy. First, you choose the type of sound that you like best, followed by a minimum of 5 areas of interest. These range from weight loss to meditation, finding love, sleep, calm, health, reliving past trauma, reducing stress, and spirituality, among others.

Do note that it is not an exhaustive list, you will need to install the app to see them all. Following that, there are areas of affirmation focus to choose from (a minimum of 5 as well), with the number of reminders. 

• Price: Free / Ads: No / In-app purchases: Yes ($9.99/monthly, $39.95/half-yearly, $59.90/annually) / Account required: Yes

This app offers tools for self-healing. The Restore section provides sleep sounds and meditations for relaxation. Use the Journal to record daily thoughts. Enjoy daily ‘Shoorah’ affirmations that uplift and motivate.

Express gratitude through posts, and use the ‘cleanse’ feature to rid unwanted feelings for calmness. The Rituals feature helps establish daily routines. If you're feeling stressed, this app is worth exploring for decompression.

Only those who are serious enough about making a positive change in their lives would want to unlock all the premium features. Otherwise it is good enough to try out and see what your next step is.

• Download Shoorah: Mental Health and Calm from the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store

ReciMe: Easy & Tasty Recipes (Android & iOS)

Good food and great company tend to go hand-in-hand. After all, what’s life without either? For food lovers, ReciMe comes across as highly recommended, being a social platform for you to share, discover, and save recipes from your cooking community.

With this app, you will be able to enjoy many different recipes for home-cooked food. No longer do you need to fumble around for a cookbook, as the app stores and organizes all your recipes.

You can search for recipes based on the types of ingredients used, making it easier for those who have stricter dietary requirements. Each recipe is accompanied by a mouth-watering photo, and shows off the preparation time, the cooking time, and the difficulty level.

For me, I tend to take an additional 10 to 15 minutes whenever I try out a new recipe simply because of my unfamiliarity with the preparation process. 

• Price: Free / Ads: None / In-app purchases: Yes ($4.99/month, $34.99/year) / Account required: Yes

If you think you are a fantastic cook yourself and would like to share your grandma's cherished recipe with the rest of the world, ReciMe allows you to do that as well.

List down the ingredients, put in the different steps for the method, and make sure there is an appetizing photo to go along with it. Just like how you can rate other recipes, so too, can other people rate your recipes. This app is ideal for those who love cooking and want to try something different instead of settling for the same dishes every single night.

If you have a favorite cook, you can even follow them to be notified whenever there is something new cooking.

• Download ReciMe: Easy & Tasty Recipes from the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store

Usagi Shima: Cute Little Bunnies (Android & iOS)

Do you look forward to a relaxing weekend? Is gaming on the menu at the same time? If that is the case, then I would highly recommend you pick Usagi Shima up. This is an idle game that features cute bunny rabbits. Bearing that in mind, what else is there that you need to know? Their fuzzy cuteness should already melt your stress away.

However, what kind of game is this? It is basically another variant of a collection game, where you are on this tiny island and for some strange reason or another, bunnies come a-hoppin’ onto this tiny island. Your job is to attract more bunnies, and you do so by decorating the island accordingly.

You can already tell that there is not much stress involved here, as the game's pace is really relaxed. Of course, for those who want to speed things up can always indulge themselves via the in-app purchases.

• Price: Free / Advertising: Yes / In-app purchases: Yes / Account required: No 

Overall, this game provides a really calming experience, especially with the music playing a vital role in doing so. The sepia-toned graphics make it a more muted affair, unlike the colorful presentation of many other games that were designed to attract the attention of kids.

Try as you might, there is no point in attempting to win at this game, if at all. After all, there isn’t anything that you can compete in, so to speak. Overall, a casual game that's worth chilling over the weekend with.

• Download Usagi Shima: Cute Little Bunnies from the Google Play Store and the Apple App Store

That's all we have for today. We are interested to know whether you have come across anything interesting. If you have, do share your app suggestions in the comments.