Periodically while browsing a third party app, I sometimes wonder what is my alternatives if this service goes away tomorrow. The likely event of that happening is low but it’s a great thought exercise. I have recently listed all my Default apps 2024 which has tons of default services that comes with all Apple devices. I am going to list all services that I rely on weekly and if not daily.
1. RSS and Readlater
I extensively use Readkit as my primary source of RSS reading. However I use Feedly as a backend service that plugs in Readkit. I also recently purchased Lire and NetNewsWire is great starting point. So this category is healthy and have iCloud as a sync engine if things go catastrophe.
I use Goodlinks as a read later service. There is always an option of using Safari Reader.
2. Movie and TV Show Tracking
I extensively use Letterboxd and Trakt for Movies and TV Shows respectively. While I will be extremely annoyed with losing any of the both services there are some alternatives. With Letterboxd launching support for TV Shows later in 2024, it will give us more options.
3. Sports
I watch a lot of sports mainly Football, F1 and Cricket. For Football I use Fotmob which is one of the most complete apps in the sports category. It supports Live activities, Dynamic Island and has great widgets. I use Cricinfo for Cricket which is decent app but has no ways to remove ads. I use the official F1 app for Formula One and also pay for the live data but then again there is lot to be desired in this app. This category has always been underserved for me and I will certainly have issues looking for alternatives.
4. Finances
I use Outgoings app for tracking recurring subscriptions and generally prefer this app. There are alternatives but this is the app I love. I also use Expenses app for major one time expenses coming up. I believe this category has tons of apps and everyone has options.
5. Books
I mostly consumer Books via Audible. I like Audible the service but I am too deep in the ecosystem. I have started backing up my Audible library where I have invested thousands of dollars. I also use Goodreads but I am always looking for alternatives. I also tried using Storygraph but their app is also not very good.
6. Photo Editing
I use Pixelmator Photo in conjunction with Apple Photos. I believe there are many programs including Lightroom and it’s more about losing time that you have spent learning the tools. There are lots of apps and I hope Photomator stays around a while.
To conclude there are some apps and services that are easier to replace and some harder to replace for me.
iVikrant 