Apple has announced its picks for this year’s App Store Awards, and the winners include some of the most talked-about apps, games, and productivity tools of the current moment. The annual awards showcase developers whose apps have left a standout impression on Apple users. The selection isn’t limited to just iPhone or Mac, but also includes apps and experiences for iPad, Apple Watch, and even Apple TV.
Mobile gaming has been a mainstay on Apple’s handheld devices going back to the early days of the iPod, and the presence of games across its entire ecosystem has only grown since the 2019 launch of Apple Arcade. To that end, games tend to dominate its yearly “best of” lists. Plenty of other categories get a nod, too, though. Past awards have celebrated apps for artistic creation, wellness, photography, task management, and dating, among countless other things. In 2020, video-conferencing app Zoom was named iPad App of the Year, surprising no one.
This year, Apple selected 16 winners for its 2022 App Store Awards. The company has named BeReal the iPhone App of the Year, marking yet another big win for the social platform that skyrocketed to global popularity this summer. The widely loved productivity app GoodNotes 5, a digital notebook that allows for handwritten notes, claimed the title of iPad App of the Year. Apple also added a “Cultural Impact” category this time around, awarding five apps — including ARTE Experience’s Inua - A Story in Ice and Time and the Rise-Home Stories Project’s Dot’s Home — for their efforts toward the greater good.
The Winning Apps of 2022
Inua, a point-and-click adventure, takes players through Inuit history and folklore, supported by a cast of Inuit voice actors and artists. Dot’s Home explores issues of race, gentrification, and injustice. Also among the Cultural Impact winners were the How We Feel Project’s How We Feel app, which aims to promote emotional wellness, Locket Labs’ Locket Widget for sending live photos to an iPhone user’s Home Screen, and Vitalii Mogylevets’s Water Tracker Waterllama, which visualizes personal hydration goals with cute animal characters.
Outside of Cultural Impact, several games for iPhone and other devices were named winners in their respective categories, including EA’s battle royale shooter Apex Legends Mobile (iPhone Game of the Year), which is one of the most-downloaded games in the world, Devolver’s Inscryption (Mac Game of the Year), Studio Drydock’s Wylde Flowers (Apple Arcade Game of the Year), HandyGames’ El Hijo (Apple TV Game of the Year), X.D. Network’s Moncage (iPad Game of the Year), and Tencent’s League of Legends Esports Manager (China Game of the Year).
Apple also gave nods to MacFamilyTree 10, the Mac App of the Year, ViX: Cine y TV en Español, its Apple TV App of the Year, and Gentler Stories’ exercise app Gentler Streak, the 2022 Apple Watch App of the Year. “From self-taught solo creators to international teams spanning the globe, these developers are making a meaningful impact that represents the ways in which apps and games continue to drive culture, leaving a seismic influence on our communities and lives,” said Apple CEO Tim Cook in a statement about 2022’s winning apps. Some of them may even be your favorite.
Source: Apple