Apps

With the release of its newest iOS app, Starbucks now supports tipping in its mobile payments service. It also introduced a new shake-to-pay feature and a new interface design.

The Starbucks mobile app with digital tipping options, previewed last week, has arrived in the App Store. iPhone users can grab it now, and get the new digital tipping option if they’re based in the U.S., plus a feature where you just shake your phone to bring up the barcode baristas need to scan to accept your mobile payment. Other new features include a visual redesign, as well as a new…

Fast food giant Burger King will roll out a mobile app in April that will let users pay for food at more than 7,000 locations in the U.S., expanding on the company's BK Crown Card program already available on Apple's iOS.

Recipe search engine Yummly wants to be more than just a research tool. With its new iPad app it hopes to become a digital kitchen assistant.

Dash, the mobile payments service for bars and restaurants, has today secured a $1.2 million seed-2 round from Mike Germano, CEO of Carrot Creative, as well as existing investors like New York Angels, Caerus Ventures, and founder and CEO of the One Group, Jonathan Segal. Along with the funding, Dash is also announcing a revamped iOS 7 app which will offer a few extra features for forward-thinking…

Dining out with friends gets complicated when it's time to split the bill. Everyone crams a combination of cash and plastic into the leather bill folder, and the unlucky waitperson has to deal with a tangle of dollars, cards and instructions. The creators of restaurant app Cover want to make sure you never have to deal with that kind of scenario again. The app splits the bill for you, and you can pay directly from your smartphone without waiting for the check.

SIt's the end of a long week and the beginning of Winter Olympic madness. Don't let your smartphone or tablet get left behind—turn it into a gold-medal productivity star, or the olympic village of time-wasting games, with our favorite new apps. AndroidBeats MusicSBeats Music is a promising new take on streaming music—it's curated by real human beings, not emotionless algorithms. Try the sentence mix option, where you type in your mood and what you're doing and get a mix in return. Now out on Android,...

While drinking a lot of whisky can leave you dazed a confused, a similar state may also be attained simply by shopping for the stuff. And this is where Distiller hopes to help, with an iOS app that serves as your companion for all things, well, ‘whisky’. Here’s how it works....

OpenTable is taking its restaurant reservations service into a new vertical today, the company says: mobile payments. According to a post on the OpenTable blog, a pilot program is currently underway in San Francisco which allows diners to not just book a table, but also pay for their meal right in the OpenTable iPhone app. “Select restaurants” are testing partners for the new service…

Mobile wait listing service for restaurants, NoWait, is now expanding the rollout of its consumer-facing mobile app to reach diners nationwide, the company says. The app shows you a list of nearby restaurants, wait times, and distances, and lets you join wait lists from your phone. It first arrived on the market last September in NoWait's hometown of Pittsburgh, where in three months' time it…

Starbucks on Friday quickly responded to criticism after it was discovered that its iOS payment app does not encrypt users' login information, with a new update that promises additional "safeguards" for customers.

When you type a password into a mobile payment app, you'd probably expect it to protect that password somehow. But it seems that the Starbucks app for iOS doesn't actually lock its usernames and passwords down. According to a Computerworld report, company executives admitted today that the mobile app stores passwords in clear text, with no encryption of any sort. By connecting your phone to a computer, the report claims, someone could easily retrieve your password from a crash log....

Yummly, a veteran of the recipe discovery space -- founded back in 2009, and backed by Physic Ventures, Unilever Ventures and others to the tune of $7.85 million -- is kicking off its first international expansion by launching into the U.K.

These days, your tablet and smartphone are two of the most versatile tools you can have in your kitchen. With so many food-centric apps available for iOS and Android platforms, your tech can be especially useful if you're trying to eat healthy. See also: 10 Best iPhone Armbands Whether you're working around a food allergy or looking for delicious low-calorie recipes, these nine apps are a must for health-conscious eaters.

Black Friday's not just for real-world goods; it's also arguably the biggest day of the year for sales on great apps. We've listed a ton of the best deals below, and we'll add more as we see them. If you know of any we missed, let us know in the comments! iOS Android Mac Windows Welcome to our coverage of all the best Black Friday deals. Deals are continuing to pour in, and this post will be constantly updated right up to the … Read…

Black Friday has brought an assortment of software deals from Apple's AppStore and third parties, and AppleInsider is also offering an exclusive, lowest-price ever on the No. 1 selling speech-to-text software, Dragon Dictate for Mac 3.0, as well as the R/C Micro Drone 2.0 + Aerial Camera.

Mogl today launched version 2.0 of its restaurant rewards app with a renewed focus on ending hunger in the US....

Restaurant recommendations service Ness has been steadily improving upon on its technology which helps you find the best place to eat based on your unique likes and dislikes, a place's popularity, time of day and other factors. Earlier this year, it rolled out an update which allowed for instant recommendations, and today it's launching recommendations for groups - that is, it's able to combine…

Dash, a mobile payment platform for restaurants, bars and clubs, has launched an iOS app today that lets you pay your bill with your smartphone — without even having to ask for the check....

Microsoft's former chief technology officer Nathan Myhrvold loves both science and food, a combination that resulted in Modernist Cuisine, a six volume foodie encyclopedia that's now available in a digital form exclusively as an iPad app.

Yelp is pretty extensive, but there's one area it hasn't penetrated yet: stadium food. As any sports fan will tell you, finding good food at sports stadiums is a crapshoot. As sports blogger Daina Falk explains, snack envy is endemic. When you see someone walk by with a Shake Shack burger you will look on your lowly hot dog with regret, especially if you didn't know that there was a Shake Shack nearby.

Munchery today announced a grab-bag of updates to its platform, including a redesign of its menus, new iOS apps, support for kids' meals, booze delivery (including gluten-free options), and carbon offsetting of deliveries. The list is diverse, but the thrust of the updates is that Munchery is tightening its core dinner experience. Munchery brings together chefs to prepare meals then delivers…

The Spring lets you save the world without doing anything. You connect your credit card to The Spring, pay with it at local restaurants, and automatically trigger donations to needy neighborhood causes while also earning yourself cash back. There's no checkins or pay-up-front coupons. Just eat at great local restaurants like you normally would, and you make a positive impact in your community.

The Living Wallet looks like a regular wallet -- except for the small wheels on its sides. According to its official website, the wallet pairs with a bookkeeping app called Zaim, which works on the iPhone, Android, iPad and on the web. The wallet, created by a Japanese company, looks ordinary on the outside -- but inside, it's anything but. See also: 10 Weird Japanese Products That Are Actually Kind of Useful The wallet can apparently be set to two different modes, Save Mode and Consumption Mode.

It's one thing to sketch out an idea for an app, but turning it into a working digital design is another story. AppSeed makes that entire process much more seamless. Take a photo of your drawing -- making sure to capture the image within the app's specific markers -- and let computer vision do the rest. The app turns your sketched-out features into user interface (UI) elements such as a map or street view and even input text.