On my list of apps I wouldn't want to go anywhere without, Yelp is pretty high. I use it on a weekly basis to find reviews of restaurants, stores, and businesses.
Searching for a great Thai restaurant, dive bar, or retail store close to you? Turn to Yelp. When you open the app, you get a clean and easy-to-navigate home screen. You can then look for nearby businesses, browse the main categories, or pull up bookmarked places you've saved.
You can either browse for businesses or use the search feature. Results display as a list or on a map with Yelp's familiar numbered triangles; you can filter the results by the price range, the distance from you, or the operating hours. Select a business, and you'll see the same details that Yelp.com offers, including user reviews and tips. You can draft your own review of a business on the app and then save it to Yelp.com for later posting; you can even add photos and tips to spice up your review. I have to say that the photo feature works great; it allows you to take a new picture or upload one from your gallery, too.
An interesting and handy feature is Monocle, which uses your phone's camera and GPS function to display nearby businesses via augmented reality. Say you are standing on a street corner, and you want to know about the establishments in the neighborhood. With Monocle, you can simply point your phone's camera in a general direction to discover what's good.
The Yelp app is clearly geared toward finding restaurants. If you are browsing for businesses in the Nearby section, however, you have copious amounts of categories to choose from. In some portions, the results can be limited or miscategorized, but I blame that on whoever submitted the business information to Yelp, not on Yelp itself.
Yelp's popular Check-In feature is included on the home page, allowing you to tell all of your friends--through Yelp, Facebook, or Twitter--about the delicious meal you're enjoying, or the awesome bar you're visiting.
Looking for a cheap meal, or a discount at a business? Check out the Deals section, which lists check-in offers and bargains that businesses close to you are offering.
All of the features from Yelp.com are well represented in the Yelp app. The mobile interface is visually pleasing and easy to use. And I've never encountered any major issues or glitches--it works great every time.
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