There are dozens of apps on the Play Store dedicated to following the Sochi Winter Olympics that have been underway for about a week now. After trying several of them, I settled on a non-official app, 2014 Sochi Winter Games. Here’s why you should also make it your one-stop for all things Sochi. First of all, the app adopts a very Holo and clean look that fits quite at home among other Android apps. It also uses cards and a sliding side-menu to remain in line with the Android design guidelines. The second reason is the speed and responsiveness of the app, along with its free price point (however, in-app purchases are available to remove ads). 2014 Sochi Winter Games excels at presenting you with relevant information first. The Overview section for example is a quick way to see current, past and future events. Results, timings and essential details are displayed there so you don’t have to switch panels to see them. Visual icons are also useful to easily recognize each competition type at a glance. You can also browse by events or by schedule, the first presenting you with schedules for each event separately, the second offering a daily-based view of all the competitions. Individual events can be favorited to provide a quick way to see the ones that are interesting to you, and a medal table sums up the current tally for every country. This table isn’t limited to the current Olympics, instead offering results that go as far back as 1998. It’s quite fun to look at how countries’ performances have evolved across the years. With the competition not even halfway done, the Netherlands have already gotten more medals than in the past 3 olympics! Add the fact that 2014 Sochi Winter Games is also optimized for tablets, and you have a simple, efficient, and well-executed app that you can install on your Android device and use to follow the olympics.
