Needle: True North Compass

Open any other compass app and you get a circle floating in the middle of a large screen, with the rest given over to nothing in particular. Needle takes the whole display. The instrument fills it, edge to edge, with no chrome in the way.

It's drawn as a real object. A red-lacquered needle on bare steel, turning on a ruby pivot, with a shadow that shifts as you tilt the phone. Two faces: FIELD in bone and charcoal for daylight, NIGHT STEEL in gunmetal for the dark. Double-tap to swap between them.

The needle doesn't animate. It runs on damped-spring physics, so it darts past north, swings back and settles the way a needle floating in fluid actually behaves. If you prefer it calmer or quicker, there's a regulator knob to retune it.

Turn the dial with your thumb and it works like an orienteering bezel — click-stops every five degrees, holding your bearing until you release it. Your heading reads out on a mechanical drum counter cut into the face, the digits rolling as you turn.

Underneath the look, it's a working instrument. True north as well as magnetic. A live reading of magnetic field strength, so you can tell when something nearby is pulling the needle off. And a spirit level set into the housing, so you can get the thing flat before you trust it.

Made by Bloomix Labs.