15 iPad Business Management Apps


The iPad is proving to be a smart way of managing all aspects of business, whatever the scale of the operation, from solo freelancers to big companies. The device’s large screen and extensive capabilities enable users to access and control every part of their business on the move, and there is a wide range of excellent apps on offer to cover all work requirements.

This post brings together 15 of the finest iPad business management tools available from iTunes, a mixture of premium products and apps that may be used free of charge.

Pages

 

Price: $9.99

What it does: Word processing

Pages is one of the trio of iPad apps in Apple’s immensely popular iWork office suite along with Numbers and Keynote, which are available individually but together form a powerful set of business tools. Pages clearly shows the care that has gone into completely redesigning this app for the iPad to create one of the most powerful word processors for a mobile device. Users can write, layout, edit and share documents of all kinds using multi-touch gestures and Apple’s brilliantly designed templates. Finished documents can be viewed full-size on the iPad’s crisp display, delivered in various formats to colleagues, clients and customers, or sent to print.

Numbers

 

Price: $9.99

What it does: Spreadsheets

Numbers, Apple’s spreadsheet management app, has also seen a complete refit to take advantage of the iPad’s capabilities. The app features more than 250 functions to allow users to quickly and easily produce attractive spreadsheets. The tools available cover all your needs for organising data, calculating information and managing lists using Apple templates. You can also import your own tables and the app’s compatibility means you can use Numbers ’09, Microsoft Excel or CSV files.

Keynote

 

Price: $9.99

What it does: Presentations

Keynote is the third part of the iWork office suite, a superb app for making and delivering powerful presentations. Users have their audience captivated with slick graphics, animations, slideshows and video clips. The app makes the most of iPad’s potential with beautiful Apple-designed templates, and users can import their own themes. Completed presentations can be viewed on the iPad’s vivid display at meetings, or for larger conferences the device can be linked directly to a projector.

Evernote

 

Price: Free

What it does: Note Taking

Evernote is a neat app for note taking on the move, allowing you to take text, photo, audio and video notes of any kind, from memos and meeting minutes to visual snapshots and moments of inspiration. You can view all your previous notes at the tap of a finger, and Evernote instantly synchronises with your iPhone, Mac or Windows desktop.

Dropbox

 

Price: Free

What it does: File Sharing

Dropbox is the simple and easy way of synching and sharing files of any kind to and from your iPad. Essential business documents can be viewed and shared remotely across multiple computers, and the app doubles up as a PDF and document reader.

WebEx for iPad

 

Price: Free

What it does: Online Meetings

WebEx offers a variety of powerful features for online video conferences allowing multiple webcams to join meetings with smooth data and audio streaming. The app features voice recognition that automatically switches the spotlight to the current speaker, and the high quality video recreates the full meeting experience. With a host account users can schedule meetings and invite participants, meaning you can stay connected with your team and clients wherever you are.

Market Scan

 

Price: $29.99

What it does: Stock Analysis

It’s one of the more expensive iPad apps available on iTunes, but Market Scan is actually a shrewd investment for users wanting to keep up-to-date with the latest market developments. The fast-loading interface offers a variety of powerful stock analysis tools, quickly identifying the best profit opportunities based on personalised technical criteria. The app features ready-to-run predefined scans that may be customised using thousands of combinations to meet your precise trading requirements. As business apps go, this is one of the very best.

Bloomberg for iPad

 

Price: Free

What it does: Financial Information

An essential and highly trusted source of financial data and news, Bloomberg presents this app that allows you to follow current market information on your iPad. You can confidently depend on Bloomberg to bring you all the news, stock quotes, market trends, company details, prices, market analysis and much more.

Expense Tablet for iPad

 

Price: $0.99

What it does: Budgeting

Expense Tablet for iPad is a great choice for all your personal expense tracking and budget management requirements. The simple, easy-to-use interface allows you to keep tabs on all daily outgoings and get a monthly overview of where all your expenses are going. The app doesn’t cover all aspects of financial management, but has some very useful features including category and account tracking; monthly budget reports; graphs representing your recent expenses history; PIN protection and live search updates; everything you needed for easy expense tracking.

e-Task Project for iPad

 

Price: Free

What it does: Project Management

e-Task Project for iPad is a simple yet highly effective app to manage business projects online and on the go. The app has some excellent features for both solo operations and team projects, in which project managers and co-workers can synchronise their collaborations. Specifically designed to aid business management, e-Task Project helps you track leads; collate client and colleague information; organise projects; track time and tasks and maintain timesheets.

Bento for iPad

 

Price: $4.99

What it does: Databases

Bento for iPad is Filemaker’s popular personal database app, based on Bento for the iPhone but expanded and improved to make use of the iPad’s bigger screen and wider capabilities. The app comes with 25 ready-to-use templates that can be personalised to suit virtually any type of information, manage contacts, plan and tracking projects. The app allows you to watch videos, view photos, send emails and browse the Internet, and is easy to synchronise with Bento 3 Mac.

Things for iPad

 

Price: $19.99

What it does: Task Management

Things from Cultured Code is a brilliantly intuitive task management app, which achieves the delicate balance of accessibility and strength of features. Things may be used as a stand-alone tool or in conjunction with related apps for iPhones and Macs, and the iPad version has been specifically designed to make use of the device’s potential. Users can quickly and easily create to-do lists, make notes, set dates and follow projects, with handy daily reminders to keep your schedule organised.

TweetDeck for iPad

 

Price: Free

What it does: Twitter Interface

For businesses that use Twitter for social networking, TwitterDeck is a great app for keeping in touch with clients, colleagues and following all the latest trends and developments. The interface makes full use of the iPad’s screen size, allowing you to watch everything in multiple columns and multiple accounts. Social networking is becoming ever more important in business management, and TwitterDeck is the perfect way to organise this aspect of your work.

KAYAK HD

 

Price: Free

What it does: Travel Shopping

KAYAK HD is an essential app for travel shopping, offering fast and reliable searches to discover the perfect flights and accommodation for business trips. The app provides reviews, compares prices and offers information, photos and recommendations of the locality you are visiting, all viewed within an attractive map-style interface.

Omni Invoice

 

Price: $4.99

What it does: Invoicing

Omni Invoice allows you to create professional invoices and quotes anywhere and email them in seconds from your iPad. Quotes can be drawn up on site or during meetings so you can secure contracts straight away, and it’s simple to produce and send invoices to help the payment process, a basic essential of any type of business operation.

What iPad apps do you use for business management? Share them in the comments.

 


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David is founder of CreditCardCompare, one of the top credit card comparison websites in Australia.

Discussion

  1. Matthias on the 1st February

    Nice list except of Tweedeck. Which is unusable for German user. It displays the tweets in random order and Tweetdeck don’t like or is unable to fix this bug, since August 2010.

  2. Taylor on the 11th August

    If your an agile web developer looking for a simple project management app check these guys out:

    New player here.

    http://itunes.apple.com/us/app/pivotal-tracker/id444623375

    http://www.pivotaltracker.com

    You can read about some others here on RWW

    http://www.readwriteweb.com/enterprise/2011/04/best-project-management-apps-f.php

    FYI while its designed for web development projects really anyone could use it for task management and prioritization.

  3. PM Hut on the 20th September

    The one about project management is a client app, so it synchronizes with a server, which means you’ll be in trouble if you don’t have an internet connection.

  4. Data Capture Solutions User on the 23rd September

    Great list. I am always away from the office so Data Capture is the main use for my iPad (as you can tell from my name). I will definitely be adding some of these though!

  5. Andrew on the 23rd November

    mpengo Project and Quotes should be added to the list. Great apps to bid and manage any project.

    http://www.mpengo.com/mpengoproject.html

    http://www.mpengo.com/mpengoquotesipad.html

  6. darm on the 3rd December

    I use Evernote before, but nothing beats the Ghostwriter Notes app! I can maximize my iPad whenever I attend to business meetings. It is is very comfortable to use.

  7. Peter on the 12th January

    for remote access to your home/office PC, check out TEAMVIEWER. It lets you control your PC/MAC from your ipad, any other PC/MAC,…. I don’t travel that much, and therefore have all my info on my desktop. I can simply go there and find the info, even transfer files, etc… Basically same as GoToMyPC or other similar software choices. I just like Teamviewer.

  8. Dave on the 5th March

    On my side I have an Ipad since day 1, have been using a lot Evernote for its syncing capabilities but it lacks meetings oriented feature such as actions, to-do and follow-up.
    I’m always looking for a replacement App as I think we could gain a lot of time if it was done correctly.
    I’ve tested nearly every notes / todo app on the Appstore in 2 years, I have to admit I’m still amazed how difficult they are to use in a work environment.
    I just discovered http://www.beesapps.com/beesy-ipad-to-do, an iPad To-Do app , that seems to have understand note taking from a business perspective. I tried it for a few days and for the moment I’m quite thrilled, even a bit too powerful at the beginning.
    I particularly love the fast and nice Icons to add different kind of notes / actions and the instant meeting minutes you can send.
    Another great thing I’ve been appreciating: it reuses my notes / tasks from the meeting in the To-Do manager, yes you read correctly ! Huge time saver.
    Only drawback so far: a few glitches here and there, but nothing compromising the use of the App and the lack of iPhone sync at the moment but the devs at http://www.beesapps.com said they’re on it for a future release.

    • Bobby on the 23rd July

      I have been using Gantt Pro to carry my Microsoft Project Plans. Its a decent tool and full fills my requirement. It allows you to view your Microsoft plans in offline mode. You can share the plans as pdf with your colleagues. Its worth trying. http://itunes.apple.com/app/id438874552

  9. Samia Lee on the 18th May

    Hello

    I often use my iPad at work especially for meetings. I used as note taking application EverNote and then Awesome Note for a long time and their ability to sync but both had a disadvantage ; the lack of features to accommodate tasks, to-do and make monitoring.

    So I was seeking an alternative application to save time for my meeting. I have almost tested all the apps on Notes/ ToDo on the Appstore and I must admit I am still surprised they do not fit with a pro use. I have discovered Beesy, an note taking and management app ToDo which include taking notes with a business way. I have tried for a month and until now i’m really satisfied by Beesy. It’s really efficient and maybe the only disadavantage is you need a bit time to use it efficiently.

    I love shortcuts of Beesy’s icons in order to use it quicky and easily add notes. Also, the advantage is to submit easily by email minutes about my different meeting
    If you are interested you can google “Beesy” of go to the application’s website http://www.beesapps.com/beesy-ipad-to-do/

    I really recommend you this app which allows to save a lot of time at work and start appreciating meeting again 😉

    All the best

    Samia

  10. Sean on the 14th June

    I found NeedToConnect, which is a business networking application. It is a newer app but I picked up some business! I don’t know if it is populated everywhere but it is on the east coast.

  11. John on the 10th July

    Another iPad app to help you manage your business that you might want to try is AnywherePad. Basically it is a meeting app from which you can meet anywhere and collaborate with anyone. You can also access your documents from anywhere and share your ideas.

    Thanks,
    John, AnywherePad Marketing Team

  12. sandeep on the 16th July

    Try Project Planning Pro for iPad.

    Simple app to create project plans with gantt charts and all 4 task relationships. Also import existing ms project plans. Multiple import and export options.

    The app is free to download and create one plan and import 2 plans. Upgrade for $8.99 currently for unlimited access.

  13. emma on the 3rd December

    Thanks for sharing

  14. Sharon on the 30th January

    Thanks for the thorough review. I would mention that with the Current WebEx app that you cannot Present at meetings from your iPad. You can only view While others present what’s on their desktop. I can’t wait to try some of the apps that you mentioned.

    • Carla on the 21st February

      Wondering if you found a meeting app that suited you. I too have been looking. Thanks

  15. Manisha Singh on the 8th February

    great apps you have listed here ,surly i would use some of these apps .
    Thanks.

  16. Najeev on the 6th March

    Great list! I would definitely add Bitrix24 to the list – you can’t beat free. Their iPad app is supercool

  17. Nour on the 27th May

    Hi guys,

    Thank you for sharing Beesy, I discover this app on the Evernote Trunk and it’s true, since it’s become my best iPad project management app. I must admit that I can not live without Beesy, quick note-taking & sharing files is really impressive, I love discovering new tools thanks to the Trunk.

    I advice people to keep an eye on this app if you are interesting. 🙂

  18. paul on the 27th August

    I switched from Things to SmartTM and for me as an enterpreneur it was one of the best choices about my productivity. Using SmartTM made getting things done much easier and effective and I have overview of my tasks on Evernote so I can get back to any task any time. I recommend this app for all enetpreneurs who’re looking for a super effective task manager!

  19. Andrew on the 5th December

    Great list David! I can’t believe I haven’t tried Evernote. A similar app to WebEx is TurboMeeting. Note that to use Turbomeeting you’ll need to have a GoMeetNow account or your company will need to have a server from RHUB.

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