Sandy Writtenhouse · October 23, 2024 (Updated) · 6 min read Talking to your baby, playing games with them, and teaching them words is essential to their mental development. However, for those times when your little one is in the car seat on your way to the store or in their playpen while you prepare their bottle, your infant’s mental growth and learning doesn’t have to stop.
You can provide your baby with iPad, iPhone, or Android apps that help with their visual development, hand-eye coordination, and audio recognition including sounds and music. The following are the best apps for babies to support their growth and development.
1. Visual Stimulation
In the early months of an infant’s life, their vision is limited. By showing them black and white images with simple shapes and contrasting colors like red, you can help their visual development.
The Visual Stimulation app provides these types of images as full-screen cards. Simply tap to move between the images that display in black and white with a splash of red. You can also turn on Slide Show mode to show the images automatically and set the slide appearance time.
Visual Stimulation is available for free on iPhone, iPad, and Android without in-app purchases.
2. Infant+
Similar to the Visual Stimulation app is Infant+ which adds music to the contrasting images. You can set the animated pictures of shapes in black, white, and red to change automatically or with a swipe.
The background music is a soothing, classical instrumental that you can change if you like. Set it for random or pick a song like Mozart’s Sonata No. 10 or Debussy’s Reverie.
Infant+ is available for free on iPhone and iPad with in-app purchases for additional scenes, dark mode, and ad-removal.
3. Mommy Saver: High Contrast Baby Visual Stimulation
For Android users interested in a visual development app that offers instrumental background music comes Mommy Saver.
Like Infant+ for iOS, the app provides images of basic shapes in black, white, and red. Mommy Saver takes the images a step further by displaying other bright colors when you touch the screen.
Mommy Saver: High Contrast Baby Visual Stimulation is available for free on Android. You can also check out Mommy Saver Plus which provides more images and songs.
4. Infant Zoo LITE for Babies
With Infant Zoo, your little one can enjoy animated images of animals in basic colors and hear the sounds they make.
You can choose Watch for your baby to simply see each animated character or Play which allows them to tap and make the magic happen. The app also plays an upbeat, happy tune that you can mute if you wish.
Infant Zoo LITE for Babies is available for free on iPhone and iPad with an in-app purchase to upgrade and receive more animal friends, use the app in portrait or landscape view, and watch endlessly.
5. Baby Color Tap
For a different type of visual stimulation and the addition of physical movement, check out Baby Color Tap. The app offers a variety of different background colors with fun, unique sounds and pops of colored confetti when you tap.
You can enable full-screen mode and a child lock so that the app can’t be closed accidentally.
Baby Color Tap is available for free on Android with no ads or in-app purchases.
6. Onni & Ilona: Happy Animals
Onni & Ilona: Happy Animals is a cute and colorful app for babies that offers images of animals and the sounds they make. This lets your infant watch and listen to help them visually focus and enhance their overall development.
Each image has an animation you can play where the animal moves and makes sounds. The colors are simple black and white with basic colors of green, yellow, and red.
Onni & Ilona: Happy Animals is available for free on iPhone and iPad with an in-app purchase to unlock all 12 characters.
7. Baby Rattle Toy + Child Lock
Along with the importance of your infant’s visual development is the advancement of their hand-eye coordination. Baby Rattle Toy is one of the best apps for babies to provide help with that.
Select a theme like fish, animals, or a holiday. You’ll then see the characters bounce around the screen for your baby to tap. The character then circles the screen while making a fun sound. There’s jolly background music and the ability to change the size of the characters. You’ll need to enter a code to adjust the settings, keeping it safe from an accidental change.
Baby Rattle Toy + Child Lock is available for free on iPhone, iPad, and Android. You can review in-app purchases to unlock additional scenes and enable the camera.
8. Sensory Baby: Games for Babies
A similar app for enhancing hand-eye coordination is Sensory Baby. Just like Baby Rattle Toy, you’ll see characters like pretty butterflies and birds fly about the screen. Tap to hear a neat sound and see colorful twinkles and stars.
You can choose from different characters, effects, backgrounds, and themes. As you move the device, the scene moves with you for a nice experience and one your little one will enjoy.
Sensory Baby: Games for Babies is available for free on Android with an in-app purchase to unlock all items and remove the ads.
9. Baby Games: Piano & Baby Phone
If you’re in the market for an app that offers a variety of games and visuals for your infant, Baby Games: Piano & Baby Phone is a terrific choice. You can choose from eight activities including animals and their sounds, playing and singing rhymes, and a baby phone to call animals.
For visual stimulation, open Fireworks and view a nice display of those colorful lights in the dark sky. For hand-eye coordination, open Pop ‘n Play where your baby can tap to pop balloons or smiley faces that make fun sounds. For learning words, open First Words and choose a category to see and hear each word.
Baby Games: Piano & Baby Phone is available for free on iPhone, iPad, and Android with no in-app purchases.
10. First Words for Baby
For an entertaining way to introduce new words to your infant, check out First Words for Baby. The app offers a variety of common words with animations, sounds, and professional pronunciation.
Select a category and then move through each image. Tap the screen to hear the sound and watch the animation. Teach your baby basic words like cat, dog, or ball, or have them look at other babies who laugh, cry, and crawl.
First Words for Baby is available for free on iPhone, iPad, and Android with an in-app purchase to remove the ads.
An infant’s mental development relies on many factors. When you can’t be hands-on with your baby, reading them a story or playing peek-a-boo, you can still help enhance their visual, audio, and motor skills as they grow into their first year. Hopefully one or more of these best apps for babies will make their way onto your device and to your little one.
