The 10 best virtual reality apps

How to use VR apps

You will need a headset to use VR apps on your smartphone. Examples of the best headsets include:

• Google Cardboard: This is a simple VR headset that works with many smartphones. Just download a Google Cardboard app and combine it with one of Google’s cheap headsets to immediately be immersed in virtual reality. Cardboard headsets are available on Amazon from £5.99.
• Google Daydream: Daydream has brought VR apps to more people and offers a far more immersive experience compared with the simplicity of Cardboard. It can be used with many apps from the Play store or Google’s Daydream app. Daydream is available in the UK on Amazon from £84.99.
• Samsung Gear VR: Unlike most other VR apps for Android, Gear VR uses apps made for Oculus Rift. Samsung’s high quality QHD screens offer a more immersive experience for their VR apps. To play Samsung Gear VR apps, however, you have to own a Samsung phone. The headset is available from Samsung for £99.99.
• Other VR headsets: There are plenty of other VR headsets from the likes of Homido, Fiit and Freefly that can be used to play apps for iPhones or Android devices.

The best apps for Google Cardboard

Cardboard

Starting with the basics, the Google Cardboard app is designed to accustom users to all the exciting features they can get out of VR on their phone. With the Cardboard app, explore 3D environments, famous places or fly through the Arctic.

Download on PlayStore and iTunes

End Space VR

Shoot through space in this flight simulator made for Cardboard. In End Space, you steer a space ship simply by tilting your head as you pilot the vessel through increasingly intense battles. Fly through unlimited gameplay as dogfights become progressively harder. You can also upgrade your ship and weapons to fight for even longer.

£0.99 on iTunes

Google Arts and Culture

Google’s culture app has been designed to immerse you in arts and culture. The tech giant has worked with more than 1,200 museums to offer a host of virtual tours and exhibitions of art.

The app can be used with Google’s Cardboard or other VR headsets. It lets you explore galleries around the world, or visit famous landmarks through your headset.

Download on PlayStore or iTunes

Within VR

This app brings you immersive content from documentaries to fantasy. The app works with partners including Apple, the New York Times, NBC and Vice, as well as bands such as U2, Muse and One Republic to offer a range of experiences from concerts to music videos.

Within is adding new content such as the VR fantasy adventures Asteroids! and Giant.

Download on Oculus, PlayStore or iTunes

The best apps for Google Daydream

YouTube and YouTube VR

YouTube has embraced VR with simple uses in the Google Cardboard and immersive experiences on the Daydream and Gear 2. The YouTube app offers 360-degree videos that simply require you to tap the cardboard icon to experience them in VR.

But for a more immersive experience, the YouTube VR app is exclusive to Google’s VR platforms, so there is no app for the Samsung Gear VR or iPhones. Instead, Google’s Daydream offers a more in-depth version of the app. Rather than just allowing you to watch videos in VR, you can control the whole app in a new way.

Download on PlayStore

Virtual, virtual reality

This VR game for Google’s Daydream explores the relationships between the virtual world and humans. With a feel of the original Portal game, all is not what it seems in this darkly comic and visually stunning outing for the Daydream.

Download on PlayStore

The best apps for Samsung Gear VR

Facebook 360

Download on Oculus

Eve Gunjack

Gunjack, a flight simulator based on the popular EVE online gaming franchise, is a simple, pick up and play shooter for the Samsung Gear VR. Fly through waves of enemy spacecraft determined to destroy you and your allies in this arcade-style shooter.

£7.99 on Oculus

Minecraft Gear VR Edition