Download This App If You Want to See What’s Trending in 2017
We are a society always in search of the next great product, whether that’s an app to help you finally get organized or find your next favorite song, or a new battery pack to keep your MacBook going on the run. New products often give us a much needed boost in our personal and professional lives, because let’s face it — we can’t do everything by hand. We got better things to do. Word of mouth helps you find new stuff, and friends can (sometimes) recommend good things to try, but there’s an even better way. There’s an app called Product Hunt that delivers a curation of the best new products daily. It’s a way to discover new apps, websites and more. We’re gonna break it down for you so you can get the best use out of it.
Home screen. Product Hunt’s home screen is essentially a newsfeed of products that people just like you have found around the internet and submitted to PH for you to discover. Oftentimes there will be books and podcasts, in addition to apps and physical gadgets. PH is also a good place to find announcements from products you already use, like Netflix — in the photo above you can see the announcement for Netflix offline (FINALLY!!!). If you look closely, you’ll also see that there are topics across the top. These are the topics that you are following.
There are tons of different topics, but some of our favorites include iPhone, where you can find awesome iOS apps, and Mac Menu Bar Apps, where you can find apps that will put your productivity on steroids. Woo! Some other great ones include iMessage Apps, Games, Pranking (one of the best pranks is sending Christmas carol text bombs to your friends and spying on their reactions), and a section for cool Kickstarter campaigns. There’s even an RIP category, for when you’re feeling nostalgic about great products that have bitten the dust (looking at you, Sunrise Calendar).
To see more topics, just tap the three dots at the top right when you’re on the Home tab. This is where you can follow topics — you’ll then see them across the top of the Home tab. So aside from the (awesome) ones we mentioned, what topics can you choose from? Basically, if you can think of a category of products, PH has it. Seriously.
Chats and activity. If you head over to the Chats tab, you’ll see a list of people who are holding (or have held) discussions with the PH community. These people include makers, CEOs, authors and more. You can even request to be reminded when they go online and start the conversation. The Activity tab is essentially a notifications tab, where you go to see what’s new in topics you’re following and what people you’re following have upvoted or posted (called “hunting”). Some good people to follow when you start out are Ryan Hoover, Product Hunt Founder, Ben Tossell, Product Hunt Community Lead, and Jack Dweck, Product Manager at Unroll.me. There’s also a list of the top 500 people you should follow on PH, but of course, you’re welcome to follow whomever you please. You can keep track of who you’re following, who’s following you, everything you’ve upvoted, submitted and more on your Profile tab.
PS: Check out the Golden Kitty Awards, where you’ll find the top products of 2016. These are the best of the best, people!
PPS: Email notifications. You can opt in to have a daily digest of new products sent to your inbox.
What would you use Product Hunt for? Have you hunted products in the past? Tell us @BritandCo!
(Photos via Product Hunt for iOS)