How to get the most out of the UEFA EURO 2016 Official App

Euro 2016 is underway in France, and is guaranteed to turn the football mad among us into ... well, even more football mad types, probably. While the tournament is getting no lack of television coverage, it's a sad fact of life that we can't be near a flatscreen every waking hour.

So the question when it comes to Euro 2016 inevitably turns to, "Is there an app for that?" And the answer is, "Of course."

Presented by Turkish Airlines (also the title sponsor for the tournament as a whole), the UEFA EURO 2016 Official App is a free download, and is intended to be a one stop hub for anything you could possibly need to keep track of the action in France. How can you get the most out of the app? Read on and find out.

Choose a team to follow

Given the home of 148Apps, we're just going to assume that the first thing you do when logging in for the first time is to pick England. But there are always those contrary supporters out there, and the app allows you to select any of the 24 Euro 2016 teams as a favourite. And yes, Wales is now included.

Pick favourite players too

Here's where you can spread out a bit and say that you're simply a fan of European football as a whole. The app presents an alphabetical list of notable players from all 24 countries, and while it appears to give you just four favourite player slots, you can happily go on selecting more than that.

Decide if you want notifications

The app will send Euro 2016 ticket news and match updates to your phone if you decide you want notifications. The default setting is to approve notifications, but you can easily turn them off with one tap during the initial setup. Obviously, since this is a piece about getting the most out of the app, we'd expect you want notifications on. At least until your country is eliminated and you don't want to be reminded that others are playing football, that is.

Explore the main menu

The UEFA EURO 2016 Official App has a very simple main navigation menu that greets you upon logging in and can also be accessed by tapping on the hamburger icon in the upper-left corner of any other screen. The options it presents are as follows:

• Matches - Full match schedules and information, synced to your local time zone.
• Latest - Offers both news and video feeds from the tournament.
• Groups - Up to date tables for all of the groups. A cool feature allows you to rotate your phone horizontally to see expanded details.
• Teams - Allows you to explore all of the various information in other sections by country.
• Players - Gives you access to info on the players in the tournament by barometer (how popular they are with all app users), your selected players, or by picking them from a list.
• Ticketing - Provides a portal to purchase tickets for matches that still have remaining inventory, and shows graphically which contests might have some seats left.
• Fanzone - A portal to fantasy contests, games, and adverts from Euro 2016 sponsors.
• Host cities - Takes you to the App Store, presumably to provide more information on the cities where the matches are taking place.
• Profile - Shows the team and players you've chosen to follow.

That should be all you need to have the app keep you completely up to date on all the happenings from France. Enjoy the football, and best of luck to your team.