Powerful Blogging Tools for Android Lovers

This is a guest post by Ashlee on some useful Blogging Tools For Android. You can read the guidelines for guest posting at our guest posting guidelines page.

Theoretically, it has been possible to “blog” from a smartphone for many years now. You could awkwardly tap posts, perhaps, and maybe upload a terrible quality phone photo, if you were lucky.

Today, however, smartphones offer ubiquitous Internet, modern browsers, excellent screens and cameras, and a robust selection of apps. With all these factors together, you can indeed perform advanced blogging functions, and go beyond words to create and upload photos and videos.

For this blog post, I will focus on a handful of high quality Android apps that allow you create content and manage your blog on the go.

Blogging Services

WordPress: This excellent, free app may just offer all the tools you need to manage your WordPress blog. Creating new posts, managing comments, uploading multimedia, and viewing visitor statistics can all be done through the app. (Free)

Text Editors

QuickOffice: If you like writing content in Microsoft Word before converting it to HTML (or simply pasting it), I recommend QuickOffice. Built with connections to both Dropbox, Google Docs, and other popular online document services, you’ll find an excellent option for accessing and editing your rich documents. ($14.99)

Writer: For those that may find an “office” app too unwieldy, I can recommend the simple, free plain text editor Writer. Unlike many other mobile text editors, this one is stripped of formatting features and all distracting buttons and options. Just sit down and let your thoughts flow with this. (Free)

DroidEdit Pro: I know I’m going heavy on the text editors, but I promise this one’s worth it. DroidEdit Pro offers about as good an environment for writing and editing HTML as you’ll find on a smartphone. Power users will love features like syntax-based color-coding, keyboard shortcuts, HTML previews, and connections to Dropbox. ($1.69)

Image Editing

FX  Photo Editor: Image editing has never been an ideal task for smartphones. I find, however, that FX Photo Editor does an admirable job on my Samsung Galaxy from T-Mobile. You’ll find options for simple commands like resizing images to more complex operations such as color corrections and adding powerful filters. ($3.99)

Photoshop Touch: If you have an Android tablet, you can’t go wrong with Photoshop Touch. Take advantage of your screen size and capabilities to use incorporate features like layers and blending. ($9.99)

Analytics and Social Media

gAnalytics: Both free and powerful, gAnalytics offers a user-friendly atmosphere for viewing your Google Analytics website statistics. (Free)

Hootsuite: For sharing your blog posts and following social media, I recommend Hootsuite. Made with professionals in mind, this social media management dashboard offers the ability to add multiple accounts for Twitter, Facebook and LinkedIn. The app includes a URL shorter and tracks clicks to your links, which is vital data for understanding what works and what doesn’t in social media. (Free)

File Management

Explorer + File Manager Pro: For accessing files directly on your Android phone, I recommend this robust file explorer. ($3.99)

FTP Café: Most of you won’t need an FTP manager, but if you do, FTP Café offers a good blend of features and convenience. ($3.99)

Dropbox: You may have already seen this file storage service mentioned several times already. I recommend Dropbox because it plugs into so many other apps, and its dead-simple to use. (Free)

Notes and Reading

gReader Pro: Keep up with your favorite blogs with this excellent Google Reader client. Stories look great and are easy-to-access on this popular app. ($5.99)

Evernote: For researching my blog posts, I love cloud-based notes service Evernote. On this web, Windows, and phone app, I can keep lists of links I might refer to, outlines of possible posts, and even just brainstorm ideas. (Free)

About the Author:

Ashlee McCullen is a staff writer for ApronAddicts.com, a website about kitchen fashion and home style. She also writes about mobile technology and self-improvement.