Mobile Apps for accessibility

By: Ben Watson
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There are a variety of mobile apps available for helping disabled users with specific tasks. This guide lists a variety of mobile apps for accessibility you might find useful.

We have split the lists of apps into broad categories such as those for blind assistance, etc. Each application has links to where they can be downloaded on the relevant app stores.

Default accessibility tools

Both Apple and Android mobile devices contain a variety of accessibility features by default, including text size adjustments, screen readers, high contrast modes, magnifiers, mon-audio and much more.

A great place to find more information about accessibility features of your device is My Computer My Way hosted by AbilityNet which can give you device specific guidance broadly split into the following categories:

For platform specific guidance, most big suppliers also have accessibility advice pages:

Cognitive

Todoist

Task manager and to-do list app.

Download Todoist on the Apple app store

Download Todoist on the Google Play store

Noisli

High-quality soothing background noises, like rain, ocean, brown noise and white

noise sounds, to help mask loud noises, reduce stress, improve focus and productivity.

Download Noisli on the Apple app store

Download Noisli on the Google Play store

Hearing

Google Live Transcribe

A speech-to-text mobile app that helps you engage with spoken words and surrounding sounds in real time.

Download Google Live Transcribe on the Google Play store

Google Translate

Translate between up to 133 languages. Tap to translate in any app, or use your camera for instant text translation.

Download Google Translate on the Apple app store

Download Google Translate on the Google Play store

Rogervoice

Rogervoice is the first software for the deaf and hard of hearing that can live subtitle all of your calls at home and abroad in over 80 languages.

Download Rogervoice on the Apple app store

Download Rogervoice on the Google Play store

Otter AI

Otter transcribes all your meetings, interviews, lectures, and everyday voice conversations in real time, so you can focus on the discussion. Get automated notes for: in-person, Zoom, Google Meet, and Microsoft Teams. All notes are searchable, and shareable. Otter.ai is also available on the web. English only.

Download Otter on the Apple app store

Download Otter on the Google Play store

Apple Live Captions

With Live Captions (beta), spoken dialogue is turned into text and displayed in real time on your iPhone screen. You can more easily follow the audio in any app, such as FaceTime or Podcasts, and in live conversations around you. Live Captions is available on iPhone 11 and later when the primary language is set to English (U.S.) or English (Canada).

Motor

Assistive Touch

There are two different apps called Assistive Touch, one for Apple and one for Android that do the same thing though are not the same company.

For Android

With a floating panel on the screen, you can easily use your Android smart phone. More conveniently, you can quickly access to all your favorite apps, games, settings and quick toggle. Assistive Touch is also an ideal app to protect the physical buttons (home button and volume button). It is very useful for big screen smart phone.

Download Assistive Touch on the Google Play store

For Apple

When you turn on AssistiveTouch, a button will appear on the screen. You can use AssistiveTouch to adjust volume, lock your screen, use multi-finger gestures, restart your device or replace pressing buttons with just a tap.

Download Assistive Touch on the Apple app store

Changing Places Toilet app

This is not an app to find standard accessible (RADAR or disabled) toilets. Changing Places are different to standard accessible (disabled) toilets. There are over 1800 changing places toilets in the UK - and others worldwide. This App allows you to find your nearest facility by searching a specific location, find how to get there, how to get in, and what facilities are there.
Download Changing Places Toilet Finder on the Apple App store

Download Changing Places Toilet Finder on the Google Play store

Vision

Be My Eyes

Be my eyes is a service that connects blind people with sighted volunteers to get visual description when they need it.

Download Be My Eyes on the Apple App store

Download Be My Eyes on the Google Play store

Seeing AI

Seeing AI is a free app that narrates the world around you. Designed with and for the blind and low vision community, this ongoing research project harnesses the power of AI to open up the visual world by describing nearby people, text and objects.

Download Seeing AI on the Apple App store

Download Seeing AI on the Google Play store

NaviLens

NaviLens is a high-density artificial markers system for long distance reading.

The tags generated by this system are designed in order to be read from a long distance, without the need of focussing and even in motion. This makes them useful for blind and low vision people. All you need to do is to point the camera of the device to a tag in order to quickly read its contents.

There are two versions of the NaviLens application.

Download NaviLens on the Apple App store

Download NaviLens Go on the Apple App store

Download NaviLens on the Google Play store

Download NaviLens Go on the Google Play store

Microsoft Application suite

A large amount of the Microsoft Office 365 suite is also available as mobile applications. Some of the applications offer a reduced selection of accessibility customisation tools while others still offer the same list of accessibility features such as live captioning on MS Teams mobile.

For further information about Microsoft apps accessibility check the following:

Other great lists

Disclaimer

We suggest these apps in good faith and the expectation that they comply with the rules of the app stores they have been published on, including any data protection requirements. We are not responsible for websites we link to and we do not endorse or accept liability for the apps used as examples on this community source recommendation list.

We have included apps to support people with different access needs, but some apps might not be inclusive of all access needs. If an app is not accessible to you, contact the app provider to tell them about your access needs.

We will regularly check this page but if an app is no longer available, please contact us and we'll update the information.

Some apps are paid. Check the costs of using the app you are interest in. Some are; Free, Free to download with in-app purchases, including subscriptions, Paid to download, Paid to download with in-app purchases.
Some apps will use up data quickly. Some apps will use a lot of data if you’re using the app when you are out. If you are using an app without Wi-Fi, check your settings to find out how much data each app is using.
Some apps will require location and camera access too.

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