How to Use Your Smartphone to Quit Smoking

There's no doubt that quitting smoking can help cut your risk of many health problems, including cancer, emphysema, cardiovascular disease and more, but giving up cigarettes is incredibly difficult. While there are many products aimed at helping you kick the habit -- think patches, gums, pills and more -- the best tool for quitting smoking might already be in your pocket.

Smoking kills approximately 443,000 people each year in the U.S. alone, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, yet "the track record of smoking cessation solutions is abysmal," says Scott Snyder, a senior fellow with the University of Pennsylvania's Mack Institute for Innovation Management and president and co-founder of the mobile strategy company Mobiquity. About 70 percent of American smokers want to quit smoking, and 40 percent will try to this year, but only 7 percent will succeed, according to the American Cancer Society. "With new digital tools now available such as smartphones, wearables and social media," Snyder says, "there is an opportunity to rethink the approach to smoking cessation and driving positive behavior change for smokers trying to quit."

[Read: How Do I Quit Smoking?]

On the smartphone, intervention and smoking cessation help comes in the form of apps. For iPhone and Apple devices, the most popular app for quitting smoking is LIVESTRONG MyQuit Coach, according to Snyder, which devises a personalized plan to help you wean off cigarettes. You input the number of cigarettes you smoke per day, and the app helps you cut back slowly, until you no longer smoke at all. On Android, Snyder says the most popular app is QuitNow!, which helps you track cravings and shows data on how much money you've saved and how your health has improved since you quit.

While those two stand out among the smoking cessation apps, there are a variety available with different approaches to help you quit. "Some apps focus on nicotine tracking like MyQuit Coach and Quit Smoking," Snyder says. "Others, like Quit It Lite and My Last Cigarette, focus on behavior economics, such averting negative health impacts or the economic gain of not smoking. Still others leverage games or social, peer reinforcement like Cessation Nation. Apps like Craving to Quit and Quitter serve up inspirational content like pictures of your kids." There are also some apps, such as UCSF Stop Smoking, QuitNow and NHS Stop Smoking, that help you set a goal and try to stick to it.

The right app for you is the one that you stick with, Snyder says. It might take some time to figure out which one that is, but eventually you'll find one that will help you quit.

Using apps to help you quit helps keep you mindful of your goal, Beckjord says. "There's something fundamentally wrong with the approach that psychologists take in trying to help people change a behavior," says Ellen Beckjord, an assistant professor of psychiatry and clinical and translational science at the University of Pittsburgh. "Face-to-face counseling can't reach people when they really need it. We need to have real-time interventions, and the smartphone is the platform to do so."

Beckjord is currently working on a smoking cessation app called QuitNinja, which, unlike other apps currently available, is undergoing randomized clinical trials. "QuitNinja captures data on when users have urges to smoke, what they attribute the urges to and how long it's been since they last smoked," she says. "It then offers interventions, such as a positive message, photos or videos, to try and keep them from smoking."

[See: Pharmacists' Top Recommended Smoking Cessation Aids.]

One thing many of these apps have in common is a community feature, which lets you connect with other people trying to quit right from your phone -- giving you the all-important support you need, without the having to go to meetings.

"Support is critical," Beckjord says. "Whether you have support or not can make all the difference in how successful you are at quitting."

But it's not just about apps. New devices, like the Smokio electronic cigarette, that work in tandem with your smartphone can help you quit smoking without having to put on patches or chew gum. "The electronic cigarette is a great help for people who want to quit, because it mimics the gesture and the feeling you have in the mouth when you smoke cigarettes," says Alexandre Prot, co-founder and CEO of marketing at Smokio. "However, we found that people weren't sure how much they had been using their e-cigarette. You know if you use regular cigarettes how many you've had just by looking at the pack, but it's not as obvious with an e-cigarette, so some people were actually smoking more."

[Read: Can E-Cigarettes Help You Quit Smoking?]

The Smokio e-cigarette solves that problem by syncing with your smartphone to show you how many puffs you've taken and how many cigarettes that equals. It also shows how much money you've saved by not buying pack after pack of cigarettes, which Prot says encourages people to use the device more. "What we're adding on top of the physical sensation of regular e-cigarettes is psychological support through the app," he says. "People can monitor their usage and get coaching and support to help them quit."

The field of smoking cessation apps is only going to continue to grow, says Prot, who envisions smartphones as one day becoming the primary tool to help people stop smoking. "Having a tool in your pocket that can help you monitor how you're doing at all times helps you ensure you're heading in the right direction," he says, "and keep you on that path."

Amir Khan is a Health + Wellness reporter at U.S. News. You can follow him on Twitter, connect with him on LinkedIn or email him at akhan@usnews.com.