AppCrayon (for iPad)

Worried about your kid getting her grubby little fingers all over your iPad? You need an AppCrayon. This simple, rubbery, $9.99 stylus was a huge hit with both our six-year-old and adult testers, making it a clear Editors' Choice for children's tablet styli.

Kids love to draw and color, and a stylus makes those tasks easier. It gets your finger out of the way, so you can see what you're working on. And perhaps most importantly from a parent's perspective, it lets a kid draw and eat Cheddar Bunnies without getting orange grease all over the iPad's screen.

The AppCrayon is made from a nice squishy material, and it comes in five bright colors. At 4.25 inches long, it fit well in our six-year-old tester's hand. The triangle grip makes it easy to hold for kids just learning to write. The rubbery tip has excellent friction against the screen, making it feel like you're really drawing, and lines were responsive in both ProCreate and Crayola ColorStudio HD on an iPad. Our child tester wouldn't use any other stylus after handling this one.

The AppCrayon beats out the Crayola iMarker ($29, 2 stars) and Nomad Play ($18, 2.5 stars) as our choice for a child's stylus. While the Nomad Play is a beautiful object, it's just less practical; it looks like a brush, but doesn't act like one. The Crayola iMarker, on the other hand, is clunkier, more expensive, and only works properly with Crayola's app.

The AppCrayon has two flaws. The design is very childlike; it looks so much like a crayon that I can see even older children being turned off by its first-grade appearance. Older kids who still want a larger stylus may enjoy the Cosmonaut ($25, 3 stars), which has the chubbiness of a piece of sidewalk chalk but comes in basic black.

The stylus also isn't quite available yet. Maker DanoToys's site says the gadget will be "shipping late May." But if you can wait, this looks like a terrific companion for the iPad 3 you'll be buying soon. It's certainly worthy of our Editors' Choice.

More Accessory Reviews:
??? Crayola ColorStudio HD iMarker (for iPad)
??? Nomad Play (for iPad)
??? AppCrayon (for iPad)
??? Pogo Sketch Pro (for iPad)
??? Cosmonaut Stylus (for iPad)
?? more

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stephen hawking jesse ventura drew barrymore keri russell will kopelman portland trailblazers bill o brien