14 Best Baby Apps for New Parents to Download

Huckleberry helps you track all babycare — but especially sleep — then evaluates trends and presents summaries. "I used Huckleberry for both kids for the first few months," says Stefani Sassos, M.S., R.D., director of the Good Housekeeping Institute Nutrition Lab and a mom of a baby and preschooler. "It was helpful in the newborn days to keep track of feedings, nursing sessions, medications, and even poops and pee. It’s user-friendly and you can easily share the data with your pediatrician."

Another user praised how both parents can track, saying, "More than one person can use the app to update the baby's schedule, and it's an all-in-one place to log sleep, feeding, solids, diapers, pumping and even activities like baths, story time and tummy time."

If you have twins, you can track multiple kids. A tester said, "I loved the timed notifications. We needed to wake our daughters for feeds and it was stressful while sleep deprived. But as long as we logged feeds, Huckleberry calculated the wake-ups for us and set automatic alarms which was amazing!" Free; premium versions for $5/month to $10/month include the brand's SweetSpot suggestions for naps and nighttime, and the more expensive one presents a week-by-week sleep plan

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Many parents told us that The Wonder Weeks helped them figure out their baby's moods during the crucial infant months when it's hard to know what a newborn is so upset about. It's a long slog through the first month or two until you get that first smile!

Researchers behind the app identified mental leaps that every baby makes. Infants are more prone to crying, clinging and being cranky during those changes. This app helps you identify the waves and ride them. "There are Wonder Weeks Facebook groups for each month, too, if that's your thing," a user told us.

"The Wonder Weeks gave us an idea of what to expect in an easy format," a tester told us. "I think some people are literal about it and expect X to happen on Y day, but I just took the explanations as a guideline. It helped us get an idea of what might be going on and helped us feel like we weren't alone in the trenches." Free for one week, $5/month, $10/three months, $35/two years

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Information relevant to your pregnancy arrives every day on The Bump's app. Users love to laugh at popular features like "how big is baby" food size comparisons, but it's a genuinely great tool for everything from baby name inspiration to reading health advice.

While The Bump rose to the top of the the list for free pregnancy trackers, our testers also gave high marks to the What to Expect and BabyCenter apps, if you're looking for close runners-up. All offer communities you can join, for instance being in with a group of people due the same month. Experiences differ; some users say a community is a lifeline and some say comments give them anxiety, with a lot of in-between, but it's all free to try. Free

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RELATED: The Best Pregnancy Apps for Expecting Parents

A winner of one of our most recent Parenting Awards, Pregnancy+ is a little more medical in feel, full of information and detailed, interactive 3D models of what's going on inside. If you like videos, our testers found the ones in this app to be helpful.

“I liked that it gave me a timeline so I was able to see what my body and baby were going through and things I should be looking out for,” said Senior Reviews Writer & Analyst Olivia Lipski, a mom of an infant. She also liked the health and nutrition articles targeted to a user’s pregnancy stage. Free; premium version to access the 3D models for $4/month or $30/year

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This also won our Parenting Award, where we praised it for being a free way to track key milestones, new abilities and more. "Since it's free, it's worth downloading and checking it out," a tester told us. "The same content might also be on the Pathways.org site but the app is searchable and has a nice checklist."

“It’s a fantastic resource for activities to do with your baby and incredibly helpful any time you’re just sitting there wondering, OK, well what should we do?” another tester said. Pathway’s YouTube channel is also integrated into the app. Free

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RELATED: 20 Best Infant Toys, According to Child Development Experts

In the first weeks, you want to capture all the data: feedings, diaper changes, sleep and more. The Glow family of apps includes a period tracker and pregnancy tracker, but we like the Baby app for quickly logging babycare details, and for the helpful interactive growth charts.

You can also connect to the rest of the Glow community to ask all those "is this normal?" questions. You have to pay a premium to unlock extra features like the ability to sync data across multiple caregivers. Testers also gave high marks to Sprout Baby, Baby Connect and Baby Tracker, though Glow Baby was the favorite. Free; premium versions for $16 to $60

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Okay, so what do you do with your baby all day? BabySparks offers tips for parent-child playtime activities tailored to your baby's age and stage, for babies from birth to age 3.

You'll get information on what's going on in baby's brain during these activities, and how the playtime is working gross-motor skills, fine-motor skills or other areas, like memory. You can also keep track of developmental milestones in this app. Free for two activities a day; premium versions for $4 to $24 for more activities or parenting classes

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RELATED: Best Toys for 6-Month-Old Babies Who Are Always Learning

"I really love Tinybeans as a way to share photos with family that's not public," a user told us. Since many parents have privacy concerns around posting photos of their babies on social media, this offers a secure place to store and share photos with only the friends and family you invite, who also download the app.

You can add cute things like stickers and filters and you can print photo books for all the proud relatives. Free; premium version for unlimited storage and an ad-free experience from $8 to $75

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You're going to have health questions about your baby, and issues aren't always going to present themselves when your doctor's in the office. While you still need an in-person pediatrician, Blueberry Pediatrics offers live, 24/7 virtual access to doctors, and they'll give you a medical kit so you can take vitals at home.

Their experts can make diagnoses, send in prescriptions and recommend next steps while you and your baby are still in pajamas. With the pandemic rise of virtual visits through many doctors and insurance companies, Blueberry is no longer unique, but it's still a great service for anyone who doesn't have access through those other channels. Free apps; membership to use the service is $18/month or $216/year

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Both Sittercity and Urbansitter let you either browse profiles of babysitters and nannies for hire, or post a job listing and let caregivers respond to it (which is great if you're in a last-minute bind). The services do background checks, and you can read reviews from other parents before you book. Sittercity is iOS-only for its app. Free apps; both require a membership fee to use their services, $9 to $200 depending on your location and membership duration

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Finding other parents who are on the same page as you can be difficult, so Peanut seeks to make the whole process less socially awkward. You can meet and chat with other local moms through the app, join subject groups to cast a wider net or just read comments to see what everyone else is going through — no pressure! It's a way to check in with others without having to gather up the courage to start conversations with strangers on the playground. Free; premium versions for $9 to $15

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The KidPass app is iPhone-only. On it, you can discover local baby classes, mommy and me yoga and more, including classes for older kids ready for soccer, acting and the like. It's a boon to parents looking to get out and meet other families with kids the same age. The larger the city you live in, the more possibilities this app will serve up; on the Instagram page the brand makes it clear this is currently best for parents in New York City, Los Angeles, Washington, D.C. and San Francisco.

The app is free, but if you buy a KidPass membership, you'll get a certain amount of credits each month that you can put toward the cost of a class. Free; membership starts at $49/month

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Access hundreds of thousands of baby songs, lullabies and playlists — not to mention parenting podcasts — on Spotify with one hand while you soothe your baby with the other.

You can also make your own playlists of baby favorites, and find your own music and playlists, too, for when you have some adult time. Free; premium versions for an ad-free experience or family sharing for $12 to $20/month
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Download Sound Sleeper to your phone and you'll always have a white-noise helper when you're on-the-go or traveling, or even to just use in the living room if you don't want to move to the nursery where you might keep a larger sound machine.

This app includes shushing sounds and noises like "vacuum cleaner" which help some newborns calm right down. The womb was a noisy place! Free; premium versions from $4 to $6/month

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RELATED: Best Baby Sound Machines

We considered ease of use, quality of information and cost when evaluating apps that help new parents track a pregnancy or their baby's first year. Several Good Housekeeping Institute researchers have used tracking apps in the last five years for their own babies, and we gathered insight from a wider group of parent testers as well.