Mediaboss Marketing

Your favourite Toronto TikTokers, Instagrammers, YouTubers and your favourite mobile apps

Toronto women seem to like making the first move. Thats the whole premise of Bumble (at least for straight daters) where conversations cannot begin until the woman initiates it. Bumble has expanded beyond dating in recent years to include opportunities for matches unrelated to romance, like networking and platonic relationships. For millennials living in cities, making new friends can be just as challenging as finding someone worth dating.

bumble.com

Hinge

hinge.co

Live a day (or many days) in the life of a local jazz and blues musician by hitting follow on Heather Luckharts Instagram. Whether shes riding a water-spewing dog statue at Berczy Park, hitting the recording studio or just making soup, you can go along for the ride.

@doggydatestoronto

Morgan Cameron Rosss feed devoted to archival images of the city is among the most popular with 109,000 followers on the Gram. Toronto history has become a popular genre on the photo-sharing app, and Old Torontos mix of archival cityscape shots, pop culture moments and neighbourhood-centric videoshave attracted brand sponsorships, allowing Ross to quit his day job as a songwriter.

@oldtoronto

The Flyer Vault

@theflyervault

If you like mouth-watering photos of beautiful junk food like pizza, smash burgers and lobster hot dogs populating your Insta feed, youre going to want to throw a follow to @eatfamous. Ryan Hinkson is the man behind the lens (and sometimes in front of it), and hes happy to throw his personality out there too. Fun fact: his favourite pizza topping is potatoes.

@OriDaganJazz

Pat ORourke, the self-taught photographer behind @Chilligansisland, is clearly an outdoors type. His Instagram is filled with pics and videos of him biking, skateboarding or generally finding himself at the best spots to capture birds flocking in apocalyptic looking patterns around the CN Tower, a doe grazing in cottage country during golden hour and those magenta Toronto skies that so frequently break the app.

@jgazze

Photographer and dog walker Jack Jackson is a past winner with @doggydatestoronto, which brings their two callings together. They create heavenly portraits of furry friends posing, smiling and leaping across Toronto shores. Jackson makes it look easy, getting energetic pets to stay, lay down and hand over their paw long enough while they get the light and angles just right.

Jackson also sponsors @dontyouwantmeproject, a collaboration that posts beautiful portraits of LGBTQ+ people with their rescue dogs.

@doggydatestoronto, doggydatestoronto.com

@HortonMcSnorton

A standout in the world of dating apps, Lex has no profile photos or cis men. Aimed at lesbian, bisexual, non-binary, trans, genderqueer, intersex, Two Spirit, asexual and queer people, its entirely text based, making it a throwback to old-school newspaper personal ads that many queer people used to meet before the internet was a thing. Its a refreshing take on online dating, which has become so focused on optimal photos and looks.

thisislex.app

Hinge

hinge.co

More than 16 million people have fallen in love with Leenda Dong, a TikTok persona created by former YouTuber Linda Dong. With her hair in a messy bun, glasses perched precariously on her nose and affecting an exaggerated accent the Vietnamese-Canadian content creator has perfected the art of making people laugh with just a facial expression or well-timed splice. Of course, that hasnt cleared her from accusations of minstrelsy (no, thats not her real accent).

@bomanizer

TikTok has become a unique avenue towards music discovery, and Akintoyes account is one of the best examples of that phenomenon. Stumble upon the local rappers mile-a-minute flow on your For You page and youll be hooked right away. Next thing you know, youre watching all of his verses duetting with producers, showing up the rap skills of Dwayne The Rock Johnson or even turning Squid Games musical score into a certified banger.

@OriDaganJazz

Wardell is lucky enough to play video games for a living, and you can take a first-person shotgun ride with the Valorant pro on his Twitch stream. When hes not competing in the TSM FTX eSports league (or sometimes when he is), you can find him in the little corner box playing against some of Twitchs other favourite gaming stars.

@akaNemsko

Canadian decorator Alexandra Gater is all about walking you through budget-friendly and renter-friendly DIY hacks to make your condo or apartment look Instagram or Pinterest-ready in a hurry so perfect for people in Toronto. Shes so engaging and easy to follow, you might find yourself with a ruler and pencil in your hand whether you meant to or not.

youtube.com/alexandragater

Heather Luckhart

youtube.com/channel/UCekeRirMK4g2s3L7TjUHX8w

This note-taking app is designed with creatives in mind, so its more visual than the yellow legal pad or Post-It-mimicking note apps youre used to. You can create mood boards, drag around visual references and diagrams, work from built-in templates and collaborate remotely. Now is certainly the time.

milanote.com

Driftscape

driftscape.com

Wealthsimple is the standard-setter for a new crop of personal finance services geared towards millennials. Its a user-friendly, attractively designed app that builds the realities of being an urban-dwelling 20- or 30-something into its investment and financial planning tools. No avocado toast shaming here.

wealthsimple.com

You Need A Budget (YNAB)

youneedabudget.com

Online recipes are supposed to make it easy to decide what to make for dinner, but sometimes you find yourself scrolling through multiple sites and long personal preambles to find out your chosen dish includes provisions that arent in your fridge. SuperCook simplifies that search. Its essentially a recipe-only Google, sifting through sites to give you recipes based on the ingredients you already have.

supercook.com

Recipe Keeper

recipekeeperonline.com

This app has gotten hundreds and thousands and millions of mindfulness-curious beginners into meditation, and it continues to expand its empire. Now you can hear its guides soothing British accent from the app to Jimmy Fallon to Netflix, where Headspace has its own series of streaming meditation guides.

headspace.com

MyFitnessPal

myfitnesspal.com

@nowtoronto

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Readers' Choice 2021: Toronto's best tech, apps and social media - NOW Toronto