Soo... About those Android Launchers

[waraukaeru]

I loved my Windows Phones, but it was never Live Tiles that were the defining characteristic to me. I loved that I could swipe to the side and get an alphabetical list of apps. I loved the flat design and, when it was consistent, the overall design language of the apps, where nothing was a cheesy icon-grid interface reminiscent of 90s computers. I hate the icon grid layouts that so many Android launchers have, Microsoft Launcher included.

I really like Nokia Z Launcher though. Simple, clean lists. There improvements I'd love to see, but I think it is the paradigm from which future interfaces should be built from. Microsoft should take some notes.

 

[Guytronic]

Personal preference here.
Icons, Widgets, Tiles, screen clutter in general for me becomes extremely tiresome. On Android with the launcher I use allows for a tremendous amount of adjustment.
I'm keeping everything on an organized tabbed app drawer. With one or two simple widgets and certain gestures everything can be accessed easily.
That's not to mention what jumps up in the notification bar for a quick look.
Just trying to keep it simple.

 

[tgp]

I've been using Nova Launcher Prime on all my Android devices, ever since I started using Android.

I never bothered messing with launchers much. I usually use whatever comes stock with the device. Google Launcher, Touchwiz, whatever. They're all fine to me.

However, I did recently switch to Nova Launcher, mainly because it can easily be backed up and restored.

 

[badtzbuzz]

The biggest downside with any launcher or other attempts to maximize MS services, is integration of Cortana into the phone skills. That is, I can't get Cortana to play a song or write a text message easily, with voice controls. Also handsfree mode is not like that of W10m, there are apps that can reason messages and respond, but none I've found are as good as W10m.

 

[Scienceguy Labs]

I tried just about every Windows style launcher on the Play Store, but none of them felt genuine. Maybe that's because a launcher can't replace an OS or I'm just kind of removed from the WP interface. Regardless, Squarehome and Launcher 10 are the best in my opinion. However, once I set up all of my apps on the home screen, I realized that there were just too many apps. I never had that problem using W10M.
It just looked crazy busy, but Launcher 10 works really well.

 

[Guytronic]

I tried just about every Windows style launcher on the Play Store, but none of them felt genuine. Maybe that's because a launcher can't replace an OS or I'm just kind of removed from the WP interface. Regardless, Squarehome and Launcher 10 are the best in my opinion. However, once I set up all of my apps on the home screen, I realized that there were just too many apps. I never had that problem using W10M.
It just looked crazy busy, but Launcher 10 works really well.
//uploads.tapatalk-cdn.com/20171121/9c163e7a7e3ae26eef3c929052ec053d.jpg

Wow...
That makes me dizzy LOL...

 

[Scienceguy Labs]

Wow...
That makes me dizzy LOL...

I know. I quit setting it up about 30 minutes after installing it.

 

[Guytronic]

I know. I quit setting it up about 30 minutes after installing it.

On a 6 or 6.4 inch screen you could have a million tiles!

 

[Scienceguy Labs]

On my 7" Mediapad I had 1.5 million.

 

[Laura Knotek]

The biggest downside with any launcher or other attempts to maximize MS services, is integration of Cortana into the phone skills. That is, I can't get Cortana to play a song or write a text message easily, with voice controls. Also handsfree mode is not like that of W10m, there are apps that can reason messages and respond, but none I've found are as good as W10m.

I never bothered with Cortana when I used Windows Phone, so I never bothered with it on Android either. Google Assistant works well for me in the few instances where I use it.

 

[G4Grandad]

I recommend anyone to watch Marc the Geek's video of Microsoft Launcher on YouTube to see how brilliantly it can look and function on a large screen Samsung android phone. Sadly it didn't look quite as good when applied to my 5 inch screen.

 

[MR CATFISH]

That home screen is a mess

 

[eigenscape]

I use Microsoft Launcher. It's good, but it has some annoying problems and lacks integration.

1. For the vertical layout of the app list, when scrolling up to the top of the app list, instead of doing nothing which is what should happen, it closes the app list.

2. For the horizontal layout of the app list, the app icons on the first page are larger than the icons on later pages, there are 3 rows instead of 4 in all later pages. This inconsistency looks really bad. So both layouts of the app list have problems.

3. Many features are replicated from other Microsoft services but are not connected to them. E.g. the to-do list in the launcher is separate from the to-do list in Cortana. Adding an item to one doesn't add it to the other because they're not connected. News on the Launcher is separate from News on Cortana which is separate from News on Bing which is separate from News on the MSN News App which is separate from News on the MSN website. It's ridiculous. How many times are Microsoft going to replicate the same thing across different products without connecting them? Features should be consistent across all the ways they can be accessed and the settings should be synced across all of them.

4. Clicking on the weather on the Clock and Weather widget brings up some weather page that is bare of anything but the most basic info, instead of opening the MSN Weather app which has far more useful info.

4. It lacks live tiles.

 

[Localhorst86]

With a homescreen like that I bet you wished you still lived in the app gap now

 

[etphoto]

Android Central has a thread "best launchers" pretty good thread. I made my decision based on that thread.

 

[romo11]

I use MS Launcher. It works nice, only one thing - in the all apps list move the right panel with letters A-Z down horizontally (aka Trebuchet, the default Lineage OS launcher has)

 

[tofferne]

How exactly do they work and is every recently or coming Android Phone supposed to be customizable with them? For example the recently released Razer Phone.

At one time or another I might feel like switching from W10M to Android but old habits die hard and I'd like to get as close to W10M as possible which would require a Launcher like the Microsoft one - Being unfamiliar with Android though raised the question if every Android Phone is supposed to work with it?

 

[libra89]

I know. I quit setting it up about 30 minutes after installing it. ??????

Haha, very busy screen. I would have done the same.

 

[Scienceguy Labs]

That home screen is a mess

Yeah. It looks bad. I had good intentions, but I just got tired of arranging and rearranging. Finally, just gave up.

 

[Scienceguy Labs]

With a homescreen like that I bet you wished you still lived in the app gap now

Yep. Lol