One Friday per month, I’ll write about my favorite diabetes products. These items make the cut because they’re functional, fashionable, or fun – but usually, all three at once!

Diabetes is a chronic condition that involves several different pieces of technology. Unsurprisingly, quite a few of these technological components are available via mobile apps, and some of them have become instrumental in helping me understand the patterns that my own diabetes follows. Let’s walk through the four that are mainstays on my iPhone home screen.

For starters, there’s the Dexcom CGM apps (there’s one for the G5, another for the G6). When I first downloaded the app for my G5, I marveled at how stinkin’ cool it was to be able to check my blood sugar on my phone. I spend far too much time each day playing with various apps on my phone, anyway, so it was very convenient for me to have this particular app installed.

Dexcom also makes an app called Clarity, which happens to be something I’ve come to rely on in between appointments with my endocrinologist. That’s because Clarity links directly to my CGM and gathers data from it that creates reports for my analysis. With just a few taps, I can view information such as my time spent in range, average glucose, patterns, and risk for hypoglycemia. Even better, I can generate results for periods of time ranging from 48 hours to 90 days. The app also produces results in clean, easy-to-read charts and graphs, making it extremely easy for me to figure out how I can improve my A1c.

A few years ago, I found an app called Glucagon that’s made by Eli Lilly. As you could probably tell by the name of the app, it’s all about Glucagon: namely, how to inject it. It’s an interactive experience that I like to walk myself through every now and then so I’m familiar with how to use Glucagon – because you never know if and when it could come in handy.

A more recent discovery is DiaBits. Besides having a cute name, this app provides another breakdown of blood sugar data. It has a neat feature that estimates your current A1c, as well as other predictors that indicate how rapidly your blood sugar is rising or falling. It doesn’t replace any of my tools that more accurately check my blood sugar levels; it merely is a complementary app that gives me more insight on trends and averages.

One quick visit to the Apple App Store shows me that there are tons more diabetes-related apps out there. Quite frankly, I don’t know which ones to try next! Do you have any favorites or recommendations? Leave them in the comments!