The morning commute can be hard. Sometimes you wake up early but, by the time all things are set and done and you hit the road, you might end up being late for work. You thought you left with enough time to get to work and be early for once, but the world had other plans.

Traffic, the horror of any commuter. One bad driver can turn a ten minute commute into an hour long stop-and-go jam. You don’t want to go through that. I know I don’t want to go through that. So, instead of going through a traffic jam, here are three apps that will help you stay ahead of traffic.

  1. ETA

Sometimes you wake up, check the clock, and know what time you need to leave by to make it exactly on time. You get on the road, drive along, and reach your destination only to realize that you hit fantastic traffic and are actually about half-an-hour early. Or other times you wake up and go through all the motions and hit horrible traffic. If this has happened to you before, then ETA is a good app to have in your back pocket.

Just put in destinations that you frequent, and ETA will give you up-to-date directions and will calculate the amount of time it will take you to get to wherever you want to go. Start from anywhere and it will guide you on how to get to work, the gym, wherever.

All of that for only $.99 on the App Store

  1. Waze

An app by Google, Waze is an app that will turn your smartphone into a futuristic GPS. It shows real-time traffic, an expected ETA based on your current route, reported gas prices, and even the locations of traffic cops who are just waiting with the speed radar.

And the best part, you get all of that for only $0.00 on the App Store and Google Play, yes that’s right. Free.

  1. MotionX GPS Drives

An amazing piece of software that can do everything from verbally direct you on where you need to go, thus removing the need for a physical GPS, to giving real-time speed limit readouts, the MotionX GPS Drives is perfect for a commuter that wants to get ahead of traffic. The MotionX GPS can even help you get out by providing lane-assist visuals to make sure that you are not drifting in and out of lanes on your now smoother ride to work.

All that for only $.99 on the App Store.

There are many ways and tools that you can use to avoid traffic, these are just a few of them. Take care, and drive safe.