Okay, so if you use Android, you may have heard of launchers and wonder what are they. Well, today we are going to talk about them.
So basically, launchers are your home screens. The part of your phone you look at most of the time while using your phone. So you may ask, "What is the hype about?", "Why are there so many launchers?". Well, the launchers that come built in with your phone are not very customizable. You cannot really do anything exciting with them.
Here is my top list of features custom launchers provide that some stock launchers(anything that comes built-into your phone is referred to as 'stock') cannot:
1) Gestures
You can set some certain custom gestures to do certain tasks. For e.g: swipe down to open notifications(this is really helpful incase your phone is too big), rotate counter-clockwise to call someone
or swipe up to access recently used applications and so on..
2) Icon packs
Icon packs give your phone a new feel. They basically change the look of all of your icons to your liking. Please note that most of the good icon packs will be paid and they will only work with custom launcher I will provide at the end of the page.
Here are some of the best icon packs for android:
So basically, launchers are your home screens. The part of your phone you look at most of the time while using your phone. So you may ask, "What is the hype about?", "Why are there so many launchers?". Well, the launchers that come built in with your phone are not very customizable. You cannot really do anything exciting with them.
Here is my top list of features custom launchers provide that some stock launchers(anything that comes built-into your phone is referred to as 'stock') cannot:
1) Gestures
You can set some certain custom gestures to do certain tasks. For e.g: swipe down to open notifications(this is really helpful incase your phone is too big), rotate counter-clockwise to call someone
or swipe up to access recently used applications and so on..
2) Icon packs
Icon packs give your phone a new feel. They basically change the look of all of your icons to your liking. Please note that most of the good icon packs will be paid and they will only work with custom launcher I will provide at the end of the page.
Here are some of the best icon packs for android:
- Minimal UI https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.launchertheme.kxnt.ui
- Click UI https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.launchertheme.kxnt.click
- Goolors https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.ds.goolors
- Stark icons https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=kov.theme.stark
- Square Icon pack https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.heavyfork.sq
- Nox icons https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=kov.theme.nox
3) Customization
There is a ton of customization options in custom launchers in Android. Here are some:
- Change app drawer behaviour(default is horizontal)
- Change app drawer transparency
- Multiple pages in docks
- Shortcuts to other pages
- Overlapping widgets(if you want to save screen space)
- Hide apps in app drawer
Now that you know about Android launchers, here are some to name a few:
- Nova launcher https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.teslacoilsw.launcher
- Apex launcher https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.anddoes.launcher
- Themer(in closed beta as of 21/10/2013) https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mycolorscreen.themer
- Buzz launcher https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.buzzpia.aqua.launcher
- Trebuchet (stock launcher of cyanogenmod)
- Solo launcher https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=home.solo.launcher.free
There are many more, if you want search on play store.
Okay, so I think that you guys finally understood what an Android launcher is and hope to see you soon!
