Top Apps in Spain for Expats

So want to leave your hometown and start a new journey in a foreign country. Or maybe you're already living in Spain (this post will be useful for you, too!) As a newcomer to Spain, you will be looking for resources like guides, maps, and local apps in Spain to help you settle into your new home. These days, the main device that's going to help you move around your Spanish city will be your smartphone, so this blog post offers a list of essential local apps in Spain. 

Best Apps in Spain for Any Region

El Tenedor 

Let’s start with the basics, where are you going to eat? For us that’s the first question we ask ourselves, food first to grab energy so you can start looking for a place to live.

El Tenedor (The Fork) is the perfect app to find more than 30,000 restaurants in Madrid, Cataluña, País Vasco, North and South of Spain. You’re going to find recommended spots with the best gastronomy of each city. In this app you’re going to be able to book a table and find the best promotions of town.

Idealista 

After having a blast eating one of the best gastronomies in Europe, it's time to look for a piso or even a house to live, it all depends if you haven’t look for a place before you came to Spain and depending also on your needs. Check out our top house-hunting tips for Spain. 

Idealista is as clear as water when it comes to looking for a an apartment or a room or a house, is trustworthy, is the favorite app and website for Spaniards that are looking for a new place to live. Is easy and gives an idea of each and every part of the city you decide to move in.

MyTaxi 

There’s different places in Europe where they use this amazing app, makes your life easier when it comes to moving from one part of town to the other. The passenger and the taxi are connected. In Spain is one of the apps that has revolutionized the market. It is easy to use and we believe that this app is inside of a great percentage of mobiles in the country.

Duolingo 

After settling in your new town, it is important that you start learning the local language, as most of the the Spanish websites for getting a NIE, Empadronamiento, European Certificate and more are all in Spanish. Duolingo is very basic and powerful at the same time, is so easy to learn Spanish or any other language thanks to the platform.

Wallapop 

If you brought a lot of things from back home or maybe you need new things but a little bit cheaper than what’s out there in the market, Wallapop is the app where you will find secondhand things and where you might find the deal of your life. It helps you find things based on your location so you have to move as far away from home to look for the things you or your house need.

Spain is culture app

This is an app created by the Ministry of Education, Culture and Sport, to help those who are looking to get in touch with the most important museums of Spain and to get to know the most important artwork of the country. You can find information for more than 1.000 artwork, 69 museums and 76 biographies of Spanish artists and authors, it's in available in english and french.

These are the 6 top apps we recommend to you to help you feel like a local in Spain, but the next section will discuss the top apps of Madrid and Barcelona.

Best Madrid Apps

Metro de Madrid Official

You just arrived and you want to get to know the city, but you don’t understand the Spanish signs or the map? This app is perfect to help you move around the capital of Spain, after a month or maybe three weeks you’re going to feel like a local, moving a around without looking to any sign. 

This app lets you know what would be the best and the fastest way to go from one place to another and also how much time is going to take to get there. It also has a little map where you can see and find the most touristic places of Madrid.

EMT

A lot of locals use the metro because it can be the fastest way to move around, but there’s a great percentage of citizens that prefer the buses, so EMT is an app that helps you know when and where is the bus coming and which are the best routes to take. It gives you the opportunity to personalize your profile so you can be updated every time. Buses can give you a better look of this beautiful city in a short period of time, is fast and very comfortable.

BiciMAD

What better way to get to know your new town than driving and getting lost with two wheels? BiciMad is an app where lets you know where are the nearest bikes around you and also lets you know how you can get the card that lets you the possibility of enjoying the city bicycles. It also helps you know through the GPS of your mobile, the route, the distance, the speed and all the calories you burned.

Madrid 5D

Let’s get to know the most important touristic zones of the heart of Spain thanks to this app, that helps you see the city through a visual and interactive way. Makes travel before you even move out of your house thanks to auto guided routes, geolocalization and 360 images.

Best Barcelona Apps

TMB

This is the official app for transportation in the city of Barcelona, it helps you know which are the best and fastest routes for the subway and for the bus lines. You will have to create profile that will keep you updated with different types of alerts.

Bicing

Barcelona is a bicycle friendly city, this app is necessary if you’re going to use the bike-sharing service. It is easy to use and it helps you find the availability of the bikes near or the stations.

BCN Visual

It gives you historical images and all the information you need to know about the city. It's an amazing app that can also gives you the possibility of looking at different parts of Barcelona as they were before. It will show you what places have changed and which haven’t changed.

Mercats BCN

Finally you will find the locations of the best markets of the city, the opening hours and what you might find in each market.

We hope you enjoyed this article. If you haven't made your move or are still deciding where to live, check out our Cost of Living in Spain Guide to help you make a decision that you can actually afford: