Who doesn’t have trouble getting up in the morning? Just persuading yourself to get out of that toasty warm bed can be the toughest thing you have to do all day. Most of us these days use our mobiles as alarms, but if you’re getting stuck in the snooze cycle, then you might want to rethink your alarm app. And you also might want to think about how late at night you’re using your phone too, blue light can impact your sleep making you feel terrible in the morning. But for now, we’re here with the best alarm apps on the market. If you’ve got a problem dragging yourself out of your cocoon, then try downloading one of these…
Walk Me Up
Available for both iOS and Android, Walk Me Up is a very, very simple concept. You set your alarm, and once it rings, the only way to get it to switch off is by getting up and walking around. The app uses the inbuilt step calculator on your phone to make sure that you’re up and about before it stops ringing. You can set up how many times you want to be able to hit snooze (or disable it altogether), as well as setting how many steps are required before the alarm switches off. Simple and elegant, Walk Me Up is sure to get you out of bed.
SpinMe
Walking not good enough for you? Then check out SpinMe. Its alarm sounds are loud and could wake the dead, and as if that weren’t enough, if you want the racket to stop, you’re going to have to get up and spin around. That’s right. Once your alarm goes off, you’ll need to stand up, hold your phone flat and then spin around twice in order to disable it. SpinMe is pretty sensitive too (in tests we ended up spinning around at least three times to get it to turn off, and that was in the middle of the afternoon), so you’re sure to be up and about in no time, albeit slightly dizzy…
Alarmy
Alarmy is a big seller in app stores, and it’s a pretty detailed alarm app. It lets you do things like setting up puzzles to solve to switch off your alarm, which is pretty neat. But the unique selling point of Alarmy is its “photo from location” setting. In this mode, you’ll need to get up and go to a location of your choosing and take a photo before the alarm will switch off. And we have to say that this works pretty well, especially if your chosen location is the coffee maker in your kitchen. Just remember to choose a location inside your house, otherwise, you’ll be giving the neighbors a surprise…
Wake N Shake
Wake N Shake is iOS only at the moment, but it’s free, and an Android version is being planned. It’s very simple. Your alarm goes off and then you need to shake your phone to get it to stop. And we’re not talking a little shake. No. You’re going to have to go into full Hulk mode to get the ringing to stop. We found it impossible to do this in bed and therefore spent a solid thirty seconds in the middle of the floor shaking our phones before the noise stopped. It definitely works, whether or not you want to explain what you’re doing to whoever you’ve persuaded to share your bed for the night is another issue.
Shake It Alarm
This one’s similar to Wake N Shake, except it’s also available for Android. Your alarm goes off, you shake your phone. Easy. But that’s only the first step. In order to stop the ringing, you’ll need to complete the second step, which means you have to literally scream into your phone. You’ll then get the peace and quiet you need. It does work, but again, you’re going to end up with some explaining to do if you share a bed. One cool feature of Shake It Alarm is that if your alarm goes and you don’t switch it off, the app will randomly send a message to someone in your contacts list. So if you don’t wake up to your alarm, you can wake up to angry calls from your friends instead.
Puzzle Alarm Clock
Puzzle Alarm Clock does pretty much what it says on the tin. In order to switch off your alarm, you’ll need to complete a puzzle. There are several types to choose from, including memory games, picture completion, and math equations. And trust us, getting your head around algebra when you’ve just woken up and your phone is screaming at you isn’t easy. To make it harder, every puzzle has a time limit and resets at random intervals. Puzzle Alarm Clock is for the hardcore oversleeper…
I Can’t Wake Up!
Similar to Puzzle Alarm Clock, I Can’t Wake Up also forces you to complete puzzles to stop that annoying buzzing. But I Can’t Wake Up features eight different kinds of puzzles, with everything from maths to color recognition, and can be randomized, meaning you never know what you might wake up to. You can also set I Can’t Wake Up to require scanning a barcode to stop ringing. This means you have to go and find the barcode that you set up, maybe the one on your shampoo bottle in the shower, and scan it before you get quiet. With so many different options there’s no way you’re going to get used to I Can’t Wake Up enough that you’ll be able to ignore it…
And the Rest…
There are some awesome alarm apps on the market, even if you’re not a chronic oversleeper. And even if you are, it might be enough just to swap out your overused alarm app with a new one. If you’re looking for something cool that’s a little less extreme than some of the above options, then check out Go Clock, or Alarm Clock Xtreme, both great alarm programmes. You might also want to give Winder a go. A fairly new app, Winder doesn’t let you set alarms. Instead, you input your schedule, commute method, and route, and Winder plots everything to wake you up at the perfect time every time. Neat, right?
