In this day and age, there’s an app for everything. From shopping to travel, there’s a handy application to help you along and mental health is no exception.

It’s estimated that one in four people will experience a mental health disorder each year, and that in

Regular exercise and a good diet are key to improving mental wellbeing, helping to reduce symptoms of depression, anxiety, and stress, and increase the endorphins responsible for happiness.

Taking direct care of your mental wellbeing can be hugely beneficial so we’ve put together information on ten apps that you can download right now and use to help improve your mental state.

 

1. Calm

Android: Free
iPhone: Free

Calm was branded as Apple’s “App of the Year” in 2017. The app is designed to reduce anxiety, improve sleep, and help you to feel happier.

Calm focuses on meditation, breathing, sleep, and relaxation, aiming to bring clarity and calm to your life.

The app delivers meditations to help you destress, as well as breathing programs, music, and sounds from nature to relax your mind and body and promote better sleep.

Calm is a great app for those who are new to mediation. Sessions are available in lengths of 3–25 minutes which means they fit right into your schedule.

 

2. Headspace

Android: Free
iPhone: Free

Headspace uses mindfulness and meditation to help you perform at your best. The app’s mission is to provide you with the essential tools to achieve a happier, healthier life.

Headspace has hundreds of mindfulness and meditation sessions to help you build happier relationships, find calm and reduce stress.

What is more, using Headspace is suggested to enhance compassionate behavior toward others in just 3 weeks.

 

3. Moodnotes

iPhone: £3.99

Moodnotes is a mood diary/journal. The app is designed to capture your feelings and help you improve your thought patterns through the implementation of CBT and positive psychology.

The app helps you recognise ‘thinking traps’ which are patterns of unhelpful thoughts for which you are provided helpful suggestions and useful perspectives to reduce stress and enhance well-being. Progress is viewable in the helpful “Insights” dashboard.

 

4. Moodpath

Android: Free
iPhone: Free

Moodpath is a mental health companion. The app’s goal is to support you through the difficult times and guide you out the other side.

Moodpath asks daily questions to assess your well-being and screen for symptoms of depression. The screening progress aims to increase your awareness of your thoughts, emotions, and feelings.

After a period of two weeks, the app generates an electronic document that you can discuss with a healthcare professional.

 

5. Pacifica

Android: Free
iPhone: Free

Pacifica is an app to help reduce stress and anxiety. It provides a toolbox to deal with daily anxiety and stress, along with a highly supportive community of like-minded individuals.

Pacifica helps you to break cycles of unhelpful thoughts, feelings, and behaviors through methods such as CBT, mindfulness meditation, mood tracking, and relaxation.

 

6. SuperBetter

Android: Free
iPhone: Free

SuperBetter is a game focusing on increasing resilience and the ability to remain strong, optimistic, and motivated when presented with challenging obstacles in life.

A study by the University of Pennsylvania in Philadelphia found that when people played SuperBetter for 30 days, their mood improved, symptoms of anxiety and depression decreased, and self-belief to achieve goals increased.

The app will help you to adopt new habits, improve your skills, strengthen relationships, complete meaningful projects, and achieve lifelong dreams. SuperBetter also has the potential to help you beat depression and anxiety, cope with chronic illness, and recover from post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD).

 

7. 7 Cups

Android: Free
iPhone: Free

If you are feeling lonely, sad, stressed, or worried, 7 Cups could be the perfect app for you. It provides online therapy and emotional support for anxiety and depression.

There are more than 160,000 trained listeners and licensed therapists who are available to anonymously speak with 24/7. Speak your mind and confide in listeners without the fear of being judged.

These listeners can be searched for based on their experience or their specialties, such as bullying, panic attacks, eating disorders, relationship breakups, and many more. Affordable therapy with an online therapist can commence one-to-one in a confidential setting.

 

8. Anxiety Relief Hypnosis

Android: Free
iPhone: Free

Anxiety Relief Hypnosis is an app suggested to help improve relaxation and reduce anxiety within just 1–3 weeks of use.

The app’s developers say that hypnosis can decrease anxious thoughts and enhance your response to relaxation, which, in turn, resets your behaviour and enables an improved response to stress.

The app provides an audio session read by a certified hypnotherapist together with calming music and sounds from nature to aid relaxation. The “awaken at end” feature can be disabled to allow you to fall into restful sleep at bedtime.

 

9. Happify

Android: Free
iPhone: Free

Happify is a space to overcome negative thoughts and stress and build resilience. Whether you are feeling stressed, anxious, or sad, Happify helps you to regain control of your thoughts and feelings.

In fact, 86 percent of the app’s users report feeling better about their lives after 2 months of using it.

Happify employs techniques and evidence-based interventions in the areas of CBT, positive psychology, and mindfulness to help you break old and unhealthful patterns and form new, healthful habits.

The app offers activities and games to improve your life satisfaction and ability to fight negativity. Your emotional well-being is calculated as a happiness score that you can improve upon each week.

 

10. Talkspace

Android: Free
iPhone: Free

Talkspace is a counseling and therapy app that connects users with a convenient, affordable, and confidential way to deal with anxiety, stress, depression, relationship issues, and chronic illness.

A free consultation is provided with a Matching Agent to identify the ideal therapist for your needs based on several factors. More than 1,000 licensed therapists are available, who specialize in anxiety, phobia, depression, domestic violence, PTSD, and more.

After upgrading and becoming a member, access is given to a secure chat room wherein you can raise and discuss your worries with your private counselor. The app’s pricing plans are described as being approximately 80 percent lower than traditional office-based appointments.