Five apps to help you 'breathe' in Beijing

Let's face it, we all have concerns over Beijing's air quality. There is no sign the situation will improve significantly anytime soon and you, for whatever reason, have to stay here, at least for the time being. So you may wish for some alleviation to the pollution's impact on your health.

In order to help you better survive in the sometimes smoggy city, we recommend five applications that can keep you informed about the air quality through a smartphone. For this report, reviews of the apps were done on an android phone, and we provide the download links. If the app happens to have an iPhone version, we also attach the iTunes download link.

1, Beijing Air Quality (by city authorities)

It's the official air quality monitoring application released by the Beijing Municipal Environmental Monitoring Center, featuring real-time readings and a forecast function.

The app doesn't have an English version, but the pollutant readings are highlighted and it's not hard to read for those who know a little Chinese.

It provides PM 2.5 readings for some areas but only PM 10 readings, which are of less concern, for others.

If you press the "Forecast (预报)" button, PM 2.5 forecast for the next 24 hours is provided, but sometimes the data can't be retrieved.