The Best Progressive Web Apps (PWAs) of February 2024

I've been seeing web apps and PWAs mentioned in social media threads all over the place this past month after the recent groundbreaking news surrounding the state of native iOS apps in the EU. With every big news story in this area, more and more people learn about and incorporate PWAs into their daily lives. I'm going to do my part to spotlight the apps (and developers) that are pushing this movement forward. Here are my favorite apps I've used this past month:

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Timezones

This is one of those apps that I don’t really have a day-to-day use for, but I want to use it every day because of how good it looks. It’s one of those PWAs that truly feels like a native app. If you've ever tried planning a meeting or event across multiple timezones, I'm sure you've had to do some mental gymnastics to make sure the scheduling makes sense for everyone. This has a great interface that playfully helps you contextualize one time across many timezones so you can make sure you're not scheduling a 3 AM meeting for your coworker in Germany. Love the color scheme and the UI, kudos to the devs! Next time I need to figure out a timezone difference I know exactly what app I'm opening.

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Duolingo

Everyone knows what Duolingo is and most people have the native app. So why get the PWA version? First of all, I'm not here to talk about native apps, I'm here to showcase my favorite web apps. But also in my experience, it has almost all the same features as the native app (albeit without some of the Duolingo Max stuff) and takes up almost no storage (like every other PWA). I just wish they wouldn't prompt you to download the mobile app every time you open the PWA. A couple months ago my old phone was on its last legs and was basically out of storage. I did however want to jump back into learning a language so I picked this one up and the devs have done a phenomenal job. Every button click feels exactly like the native app! (And it still gives you those iconic push notifications).

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New York Times Games

This is another PWA that arguably has a better native app counterpart. Just like Duolingo, I started using this one when I was low on storage and I found that it has all the features of the native crossword app, it's performant, and it looks good. My only qualm is iOS doesn’t expose the vibration api so trying to do the Mini or the Wordle quickly doesn’t feel right without the haptic feedback. Also the in-app ads feel a little wonky. All stuff I can live with. Even now, I have a new phone with tons more storage but I'm still rocking the PWA.

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Player One

If you ever need to randomly pick one person out of a group, this app will do it for you and with great visuals too. Just have everyone put their finger on the screen and after 3 seconds it’ll randomly pick someone for you. A great example of the benefits of building on the web. Why go through the hassle of building this simple (but useful) idea in a native app when you can just do it on the web?

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Monkeytype

Is typing speed a niche hobby? The semi-recent rise in popularity of custom mechanical keyboards seemed to get people interested in increasing their typing speedm, and I have friends that somehow hit 150+ WPM. Meanwhile I'm barely breaking 100 WPM. Anyways, Monkeytype is a fantastic PWA for testing your digits. It's got a super slick UI and smooth animations. You can choose to be given random words, famous quotes, excerpts from books etc, and after the test it presents you with a slick dashboard of where you did well and where you screwed up.