UPDATED 13:15 EDT / MARCH 26 2012

Waiting for Instagram for Android? Try These Apps First

Instagram is coming to Android soon. After reaching over 20 million iOS users, CEO and co-founder Kevin Systrom showed off the beta version of the app for Android at the recently concluded SXSW Interactive festival. Truly, this app that makes anyone an instant photographer, and it’s come a long way since its initial launch in 2010. But while the exact release date for Android is still undetermined, here are some Android apps you can play with as alternative for Instagram to bide your time.

Streamzoo

One of the closest clones of Instagram is Streamzoo. This app helps you share, organize, and discover #streams of mobile photos and videos. Quick photo enhancements include pecial filters, borders and tilt shift effects. Streamzoo has recently bagged the “2011 Best App Ever” for the Android division, beating big names like Google+ and Photobucket. It’s a photo social game that will let you share and compete with your friends around the world.

Manish Vaidya, Founder & VP of Streamzoo shares his excitement over the recognition and what are the fresh ideas they are bringing to the plate:

“We are excited to win this vote of confidence for Streamzoo. While the photosharing space is crowded, we have differentiated our product through an innovative approach of combining photo sharing with social gaming. Our app has succeeded in pleasing people of all ages and both Android and iPhone users.”

Google Play link

Pixlr-O-Matic

The retro look that Instagram app boasts is not ultimately exclusive to them. If you feel like going vintage, Pixlr-O-Matic is a good alternative. The app has 68 filters, 73 lighting effects and 193 borders. Users will have the opportunity to play with more than 2 million finishes to make your photos look spectacular depending on your mood and however you want to intensify the tone or add surreal shades, drama, sparkle, neon, light leaks and grunge. Reviews mention that Pixlr-O-Matic is a great tool for those who are into iPhoneography or artful photo editing in mobile devices. After making those pro-like adjustments, you may share your photos directly with your social platforms like Facebook, imm.io, dropbox, iTunes, Flickr or email.

Google Play link

Hipster

Digital postcard app maker Hipster offers parallel features as Instagram, but allows text overlays on photos—a non-existent feature in the former. The app also post geo-tagged digital picture postcards from both iPhone and Android phones. Hipster allows users to create a real-time, visual record of locations and events and post on the major social networks such as Twitter and Facebook. There are ten themes to choose from to craft photgrpahic postcards.

Google Play link

Lightbox Photos

Similar to Instagram, Lightbox Photos offers cool filters and effects to share photos on social platforms like Facebook, Twitter, Flickr, Foursquare and Tumblr and with Lightbox community worldwide. But unlike the limited choices in Instagram to make snaps just public or private, this app gives you an option to make your photos private, public or viewable by friends only. You may also build your own photo blog with Lightbox.

Google Play link

Vignette

The film and camera effects of Vignette for Android include 76 effects and 57 frames, retro and vintage style that popularized Instagram, Cross-process, tilt-shift, photobooth, double exposure and tons more. The editing options can be combined and saved as shortcuts to your home screen for the next snaps.

One of the reviews reads: This is my go-to app for photo effects, etc on my Android phone. Better range and more flexibility than other “more-famous-and-supposedly-soon-to-arrive-on-Android” competitors. I often use Vignette to process shots prior to posting them on other social photo platforms.”

Google Play link

Aside from hitting the Android platform, Instagram also heads to Facebook with the help of Virtue’s latest module.


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