Moving to a new home feels a lot like going through final exams while in the middle of getting a cavity filled.

I’m in the middle of a major move right now, hauling furniture, boxes of photos, clothes, artwork, knick-knacks – and, of course, gadgets – on an interstate journey to a new home. And while I’m no stranger to relocation, it’s still a massive inconvenience at best.

I know it’s for the best. I’ve been dreaming about it for years and I can already feel the delight of it being done. But the actual task of hauling an entire life’s worth of accumulated keepsakes from one house to another? Absolute torture.

But I’m tech-savvy and write about gadgets for a living, so surely I have an army of box-toting robots at my behest, right? Not so much. I do, however, have a smartphone and believe it or not, there are several apps that most definitely make moving marginally less annoying and even – dare I say it – enjoyable.

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Google Keep

Google Keep (free, iOS, Android) is the ultimate sharable note super tool. When you’re planning a move – or perhaps woke up on moving day and realized you had no idea how to prioritize things – you’ll quickly find yourself making lists… and then making lists of those lists. It’s how we humans like to try to keep ourselves on task and it tends to work if everyone involved is on the same page. That’s where Google Keep’s shareable, synced lists and notes come in so incredibly handy.

Need a tally of everything that goes in the office at your new home? A few taps and you’ve got a list ready for entries. Once you finish, you’ll remember that the list is basically useless if your spouse/roommate/partner doesn’t also have access to it, so you quickly share it with them and within seconds you’re both working on the same task. When things get really hectic you can even record voice memos and Keep will actually transcribe them into readable text for you to browse later. There are so many ways to use Keep – and so many ways it can keep you and your fellow movers in sync – that it belongs on your smartphone.