6 Wellbeing Apps to Make Coping with a Second Wave Easier

Calm is essentially a mindfulness masterclass in your pocket. It has a bunch of different guided meditations tailored to common lockdown niggles, like sleep, anxiety, stress, and gratitude, that are perfect for people who have never tried the practice before.

Some of the great additional features include bedtime stories, narrated by celebrities like Stephen Fry and Harry Styles, that can help to lull you into dreamland. We also love the ‘Daily Calm’ – a morning meditation that includes an original thought or mantra to carry into your day.

When you’re stuck at home, day in and day out, it’s easy to fall into negative patterns, like being too sedentary, stress eating, or working in your pajamas.

Streaks helps you to track 12 different custom habits at the same time, whether you’re trying to get your steps in, drink more water, or avoid smoking. Every day that you complete a task (or avoid a negative habit), your streak is extended on the colorful interface, providing a satisfying overview of your healthy lifestyle choices.

When you’re going through a hard time and the future seems uncertain, a good quote can really help you stay positive. Motivation is a beautiful app that sends a daily positive reminder to your phone.

You can set up the app so your quote either arrives as a notification on your lock screen, or a widget on your home screen. Motivation includes hundreds of quotes on a wide range of topics, such as self-esteem, relationships, and dealing with stress, and you can also save and share your favorite quotes on Instagram.

Most of us can agree lockdown was a rollercoaster of emotions. This slickly-designed app lets you keep on top of your mood by tracking how you feel every day – whether you’re feeling happy and hopeful, or angry and sad.

My Possible Self encourages you to jot down activities, places, and people that possibly influence your mood, so you can better learn about yourself and focus on the things that make you feel great, and do less of the things that don’t. It also gives you access to learning modules, developed by psychologists, that will teach you coping mechanisms for dealing with high-stress situations.

Viber’s USP is simple: the messaging app helps to bring people together – whether your passion is football, gaming, or beauty blogging.

The app has different ‘communities’ on a variety of niche topics, so you can find your tribe and chat digitally about your hobbies with others around the globe. Viber could be particularly helpful if you’ve felt lonely and isolated since social-distancing measures came into place.

During the first lockdown, many of us fell into unhealthy patterns with drinking as a way to cope with stress and distinguish between day and night while working from home.

Not surprisingly, drinking over the recommended weekly allowance isn’t great for us – physically and mentally – and it’s advisable to take steps to moderate our intake. Drinkaware is a brilliantly simple app that helps you track and calculate your units, so you can make sure you know how much you’re consuming each week.

As well as showing you the units for each beverage, it also converts your drinks into calories, so you can’t turn a blind eye to the potential health implications long-term. Handily, users can also set goals to help them regain control of their drinking, and the app will provide support and motivation with regular and personalized feedback along the way.