Best smartphone apps for business travellers: New York City

Heading to New York City on business? We've narrowed down the wide field of apps for your iPhone, iPad or Android device, and we've got recommendations for the most useful to keep about your person when in New York.

We've split things up into "getting in and around" and "restaurants, bars and things to do" sections, which should help you make the most of your business trip -- during and after hours.

And we have direct links to the iTunes and Google Play app stores so you can pick the most useful apps up with minimum hassle.

Getting in and around

None of NYC's main airports -- JFK, Newark or LaGuardia -- have apps of their own, so you're probably best to check what's what in the back of your airline's inflight magazine for terminal information.

Making sense of New York's subway system is vital if you're travelling around the city much -- or can't expense every cab fare. Our favourite is the excellent KickMap family of apps.

You can snag KickMap Lite (iTunes AU | iTunes US) for free, but if you're likely to be travelling around during the subway's reduced 11pm-6am night service we'd drop the $2.99 for 24-hour KickMap (iTunes AU | iTunes US), which automatically changes the map to the overnight version.

Of course, if you can expense those cab fares, CabSense NYC (iTunes AU | iTunes US | Android) is dead useful to actually find one of New York's yellow taxis. It checks GPS data and suggests the best corner to flag down a cab.

Restaurants, bars and things to do

It's hard to beat the Time Out New York app (iTunes AU | iTunes US | Android) for events and curated reviews.

If you're keen to know what the New York Times' reviewers think, check out The Scoop (iTunes AU | iTunes US) , a curated list of restaurants, bars, coffee shops, stores and more by the city's best paper. You should hit at least one of the Sifty Fifty restaurants (from restaurant critic Sam Sifton) during your trip.

But if user reviews, pictures and opinions are your thing, it's Yelp (iTunes AU | iTunes US | Android) all the way.

And because finding great coffee in New York City is harder than you might think, we recommend New York's Best Coffee (iTunes AU | iTunes US) to discover those coffee shops the locals know and love, from lazy cafés to holes in the wall serving a great fresh roast.

The app covers many of our favourite NYC coffee stops, including Oslo, Grumpy, 49th Parallel and Bluebird.

And almost all of NYC's museums and galleries have their own app -- search the iTunes store or Google Play for the one you're interested in.

Your favourite apps for New York..?

Got a favourite app for the Big Apple that's not listed above? Tell us about it the comments section below!

John Walton

Aviation journalist and travel columnist John took his first long-haul flight when he was eight weeks old and hasn't looked back since. Well, except when facing rearwards in business class.