My Favorite New Apps of 2022 (Premium)

We develop habits and workflows, and behavioral change is difficult. But if you’re open to improving matters and experimenting, good things can happen. It’s exciting when you discover something that’s both new and better and can make a positive change in your life.

There are lots of areas in which we might apply this thinking, and if you are a Thurrott Premium member and read the newsletter, you know that I discuss this kind of thing a lot. (If not, no worries: one of my New Year’s resolutions this year is to get an archive of those editorials on the web.)

Today, I’d like to apply it to apps.

As a decades-long Windows user, I’ve developed some obvious habits when it comes to how I work and the tools I use to undertake that work. I have never stopped experimenting with platform alternatives—like macOS, Linux, and Chrome OS—on the desktop, but I keep coming back to Windows because I prefer it. That’s a nice bit of recurring confirmation that also speaks well of being open to change: I’ve tried the alternatives again and again but I still prefer what I was already using.

At the app level, of course, there is even more choice. And maybe less incentive to change in some cases: Windows versions come and go, but many of the apps that I use do not. As I get older, I find myself less interested in the new and shiny and more likely to stick with what works. But I try. And I am surprised to report that I adopted several new apps this year. I’m perhaps overdue for a general “What I Use” article—another item for that News Year’s resolutions list—but for now I can at least list out those app experiments that stuck this year.

Brave

This was such a big deal that I wrote an article about it, and it was a switch I had tried and failed to make several times in the past. But Brave is exactly what I’m looking for: a browser that combines all of the performance and compatibility of Chrome with built-in privacy and security controls that keep Google and other nefarious ad-dealing activity trackers at bay. It is, in other words, exactly what Microsoft promised but absolutely did not deliver with the Chromium-based Edge. It’s a lightweight and fast browser that requires far fewer extensions than the competition because it does so much to protect users out of the box. More than any other mainstream browser, in fact.

Brave
Replaces: Google Chrome, Microsoft Edge
Price: FREE

ImageGlass

Frustrated by the buggy Photos app in Windows 11—sometimes you get image-to-image navigation, sometimes you don’t—I started looking for alternatives. And an incredible alternative appeared courtesy of Kevin Llyod on Twitter: ImageGlass. It’s exactly what it says it is—a lightweight image viewer with vast format compatibility and a minimal user interface—and exactly what I wanted. Here’s how I use it: after installing it, I disable the toolbar entirely (by pressing “T”) and then put it into full-screen mode (F11). From there, I can navigate between images using the arrow keys, close it with ESC, and use it to save images in other formats (ALT + F to bring up the hidden File menu). I love it. I love it so much.

ImageGlass
Replaces: Photos (Windows 11)
Price: FREE but you can support the creator by buying the version in the Microsoft Store ($9.49)

Notion

Mary Jo and I struggled with OneNote for 12 long years, and of course I had used this note-taking solution since its inception 20 years ago regardless. But it had major failings that made it untenable: its real-time collaboration functionality was so buggy and unreliable that Mary Jo and I would alert each other when we were making show note edits so there wouldn’t be conflicts, it never made sense as a general writing tool, it was too big and unwieldy compared to the newer, lighter note-taking solutions, and its output wasn’t identical to that of Microsoft Word, which I always found odd. I started looking around for something, preferably something Markdown-related.

And I found most of that in Notion, which I’ve been using for the Windows Weekly notes—and for other notes related to the gym, the book, and other things—since about March. It’s not based on Markdown, but it’s everything that OneNote isn’t: lightweight, fast, and reliable, and real-time collaboration actually works without a hitch. It can be used as a general-purpose writing tool, and I may go I that direction. But for now, I’ve found the note-taking tool I needed.

Notion
Replaces: Microsoft OneNote
Price: FREE, Notion Plus is $92 per year

Adobe Premiere Elements

Video editing is difficult and time-consuming, and I’ve tried and failed over the years since the demise of Windows Movie Maker to find something simple enough that I could use to expand into video. This came to a head in early 2022 when I experimented with several video editors so I could add video clips to the Windows 11 Field Guide and was discussing starting a YouTube channel with my wife. I was saved from having to make videos for the book by TWiT, which resurrected a pre-pandemic plan for a new podcast about Windows how-to topics, Hands-On Windows. But my wife and I did start our channel—it’s called Eternal Spring—and the few skills I had learned while experimenting really helped out.

There are other excellent video editors out there—the Clipchamp app built into Windows 11 now is actually quite good, though it won’t export to 4K—but Premiere Elements is a nice balance between the simpler and often more basic editors you see everywhere and more professional tools. And I like that I can buy it once and use it for years before even considering an upgrade, without needing to pay a monthly fee.

Adobe Premiere Elements
Replaces: n/a
Price: $99.99 but it’s often on sale

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II

This one is notable because I’d been stuck playing Call of Duty: Black Ops 4 for the past several years because the previous three COD titles, Call of Duty: Vanguard, Call of Duty: Black Ops Cold War, and Call of Duty: Modern Warfare, all had serious issues with multiplayer. Modern Warfare II does not have any of those problems, most notably the lag/latency problems that killed Modern Warfare and Black Ops Cold War for me, and most of the initial maps are great. It does have other issues—it’s brutally hard, has an inscrutable interface, and has the most ridiculous weapon upgrade system ever invented—but it’s still better. And I’m finally back on the latest version of the game. It’s been a while.

Call of Duty: Modern Warfare II Cross-Gen Bundle
Replaces: Call of Duty: Black Ops 4
Price: $69.99