Best Consumer Apps of 2024: Lessons From the Latest Mobile Innovations

Updated December 2024

For enterprise CMOs leading digital transformation, understanding successful consumer apps provides valuable insights into user expectations and emerging technologies that can be adapted for enterprise use. Here’s what successful consumer apps of 2024 reveal about effective digital experiences:

Breaking Category Boundaries

Some of the most future-forward apps work well because they reimagine entire categories of human experience. As Brad Weber notes in Fast Company, “What looks like feature copying actually signals a fundamental shift in how digital products evolve.”

NYT Games: Beyond Traditional Gaming

Key Innovation: Ethical Gamification 

The New York Times’ games platform, an Apple Design Award winner, demonstrates how thoughtful gamification can enhance traditionally serious experiences. Their carefully calibrated difficulty curves keep users coming back without relying on addictive mechanics, showing how games can promote intellectual engagement while respecting user well-being.

• Evolution beyond classic crosswords into diverse game formats
• Social sharing features that create natural conversation starters
• Focus on intellectual engagement over addictive mechanics

Pinterest: Redefining Discovery Platforms

Key Innovation: Seamless eCommerce Integration 

Pinterest’s evolution from an inspiration platform to a comprehensive shopping destination shows how apps can transcend their original category. Through AI-assisted visual search, Pinterest has transformed casual browsing into actionable shopping experiences, a transformation that arguably led to the 2024 Apple App Store finalist list.

• AI-enhanced visual search transforming browsing into buying
• Creator tools that turn inspiration into action
• Shoppable content that maintains user experience quality
• Community-driven content that powers personalized recommendations

Hinge Health: Making Healthcare Engaging

Key Innovation: Hybrid Experience Design

Serious purposes can coexist with engaging experiences. Hinge Health maintains medical authority while using digital tools to improve adherence and outcomes. 

• Combines clinical expertise with digital engagement
• Personal coaching integrated with technology
• Educational content that drives sustained engagement

The Social Evolution

The future of apps is increasingly social, with platforms finding innovative ways to integrate community features into previously solitary experiences. 

Partiful: Reimagining Event Planning

Key Innovation: Social-First Design 

Partiful, Google Play’s Best App of 2024, has transformed event planning through social-first design. Partiful’s success comes from understanding that event planning is inherently collaborative. Their AI-assisted “Party Genie” shows how artificial intelligence can enhance rather than replace social interactions. Social features can transform utility apps when they arise naturally from user needs.

• Intuitive design that makes planning collaborative
• Simple sharing and RSVP mechanics
• Focus on community engagement

Zoom for Apple TV: Expanding Platform Reach

Key Innovation: Cross-Platform Social Connection

Zoom’s Apple TV app demonstrates how social features can adapt across platforms. Rather than simply porting their existing interface, they’ve optimized for the living room context, creating enhanced group viewing experiences that feel natural in a home environment. This thoughtful platform adaptation shows how social features can evolve to suit different contexts while maintaining core functionality.

• Seamless transition between devices
• Optimized for different social contexts
• Enhanced group viewing experiences
• Integration with existing social patterns

Sustainable Engagement Models

This year has seen a welcome shift toward more sustainable engagement models. 

Guideline: Intentional Limited Engagement

Key Innovation: “Less Is More” Design Philosophy

Not every app needs to maximize screen time. Guideline’s 10-minute monthly engagement model shows how focusing on efficiency over addiction can build user trust.

• Designed for monthly rather than daily engagement
• Clear, upfront information addressing user concerns
• Focus on building user confidence
• Efficient interaction design

Bears Gratitude: Emotional Design Done Right

Key Innovation: Emotional engagement design

Bears Gratitude is a journaling app that succeeds by understanding that building emotional habits requires both structure and flexibility. Apps can support emotional well-being while respecting the complexity of human feelings.

• Character-driven interface
• Habit-forming mechanics without pressure
• Visual progress tracking
• Emotional check-in system

Feature-Rich Platforms

Today’s successful apps are increasingly comprehensive in feature sets, but thoughtful integration is key. 

Arc Search: Rethinking Web Navigation

Key Innovation: Workspace-Centric Browsing

Arc Search rethinks how we interact with web content. Instead of treating web browsing as a series of isolated tabs, Arc created a workspace-centric approach that acknowledges how people actually use the internet.

• Command bar for quick actions
• Built-in AI search and results page
• Intuitive swipe to go forward or backward 

Claude: AI Assistant Evolution

Key Innovation: Comprehensive Tool Integration

Claude demonstrates exceptional balance in the AI assistant space, combining natural conversation with powerful capabilities while maintaining accessibility and usability.

• Writing, analysis, and creative support in one platform
• Adaptive responses based on user needs
• Focus on accessibility and usability

Realtor.com: Category Leadership Through Innovation

Key Innovation: Competitive User Value

Realtor.com has maintained category leadership by thoughtfully expanding beyond basic listings to include features not available on competitive apps like Zillow.

• Advanced risk assessment tools
• Integration of environmental data
• Neighborhood-level social features

What These Successes Tell Us

Looking across these successful apps, several key insights emerge about what makes modern applications truly exceptional. 

• Complex Technology: Behind every seamless user experience lies a complex technical foundation. When Partiful enables multiple people to plan events together without conflict, it solves intricate state management challenges. When Bears Gratitude helps users track emotional patterns over time, it balances data storage, privacy, and real-time processing demands.
• Understanding Context: Whether it’s Arc Search’s workspace-centric browsing or Zoom’s living room-optimized experience, successful apps deeply understand the context in which they’re used. They don’t just solve problems—they solve them in ways that fit naturally into users’ lives.
• Emotional Intelligence: Taking cues from Bears Gratitude’s character-driven interface, the most successful apps demonstrate emotional intelligence in their design. They understand that technical solutions must account for human feelings and behaviors.
• Community Integration: Like Partiful’s collaborative planning tools, successful apps find ways to support natural social interactions rather than forcing them. They understand that community features should enhance rather than dominate the core experience.
• Thoughtful Innovation: The newest consumer apps we want to use don’t innovate for innovation’s sake. Instead, they make bold choices based on a deep understanding of user needs and behaviors.

These insights remind us that exceptional products come from understanding what users want to do and how they want to feel while doing it. The most successful apps succeed not by maximizing features or engagement metrics but by creating experiences that genuinely enhance users’ lives in meaningful ways.