When Josh asked me if I was interested in writing for Android Australia I was immediately keen. I’ve been an Android fanatic for a while now and am known among many of my friends as a go-to-guy for phone/tablet advice, as long as you don’t want to buy Apple that is. The problem then was to figure out what to write first, I wanted it to be more than just a standard news piece, it’s my opening impression on this site after-all.

Therefore I would like to introduce you to my Android launcher round-up (you may all cheer now)!! For many Android users, the launcher is among the first apps to go on a new phone, but for many others it’s completely unknown, one of those beautiful features of Android that so many users will never know even existed. Never fear, dear readers, for I am here to introduce you to the wonderful world of changing your launcher!

In Android, everything’s an app, and that includes things that we would normally consider as “core” functionality of the phone. This is includes the “phone” part, SMS, your contacts, the lockscreen, all of these are merely apps, and apps can be replaced with other apps, if you feel like it. Some popular SMS replacements apps are Handcent and Chomp if you want to check them out.

The launcher is the app you use to open your apps. It’s what you see each time you first turn your phone on. It’s your homescreens, where your widgets go, and it’s your app drawer. Everything starts with the launcher, and so replacing the launcher can very much change how you use your phone. In fact one of the easiest ways to see different launchers is to just pick up an Android by two different manufacturers. Different manufacturers each have their own launchers (Samsung’s is called Touchwiz, HTC’s is Sense, Motorola’s is Motoblur, etc) that differ from the original Android launcher found on a Nexus device. These usually aren’t very different from the original, with Samsung’s and HTC’s efforts generally considered as the most different from stock.

What you’ll see after installing a new launcher and hitting the home button for the first time. On the left is what you’ll see on a Jelly Bean device, and on the right is what you’ll see on an Ice Cream Sandwich or earlier device.

Replacing the launcher is easy. First you need to find a replacement (obviously) you find it in Google Play, just like any other app. After you download and install it, the next time you hit the “Home” button, you should get a screen like those to the right.

On the right of the image is for Ice Cream Sandwich or earlier users, on the left is what you’ll see if you’re running Jelly Bean (or later, I assume). This is because you now have two or more apps that Android could open when you click the home button, and Android needs to know what one you want. For Jelly Bean you simply press on the one you want, so that it’s highlighted, then you press “Just Once” if you want the phone to ask you every time you hit the Home button (super annoying) or press “Always” if you want the phone to remember your choice and just do that from now on. If you are pre Jelly Bean, you tick the “Use by default for this action” box if you want the phone to remember, then press on the one you want. If you want want your phone to ask you every time, just press the one you want. Well done, you’ve changed your launcher and it was as simple as installing an app!

If you want your phone to forget the default and ask you which one to use again, just go into settings, then to apps. Go down to the launcher you have chosen as a default, then press on it. In the information window for that app scroll down until you see this:

Press “Clear defaults”. Next time you hit the home button, your phone will ask you which launcher you want to use again, and you can change.

Now a quick little word of warning! Changing your launcher is easy, this is true. However changing your launcher could mean that how you reach things within your phone could have changed substantially, which means it could take a little while for you to find out how to do some things again. Remember though that there’s nothing to lose from trying another launcher, if you don’t like it, delete it, just like any ordinary app. Don’t worry, Android doesn’t let you delete the original launcher, you can’t break your phone by doing this.

Now to the fun part, the launchers themselves! Launchers range greatly, from the barely different to default, to the radically different. Here I’m going to outline some of the most popular, and some of the more out there. I can’t review them all so this list isn’t even close to comprehensive. Also there were some launchers I was keen to include, but did not work on my phone. This is quite possibly because my phone is running JellyBean, and the launcher hasn’t yet been updated to support JellyBean. Since I think it’s a bit unreasonable to punish a developer for not updating their app to support the new version only a few weeks after it was released, I’m not going to name those launchers and give them a bad rep, they simply aren’t included here. And with no further ado, I give you the launchers!

Apex Launcher, Nova Launcher, Launcher Pro, etc!

The stock mob.

There’s a pile of launchers out there that don’t mess much with the traditional formula. The aim of these launchers is to give a bit more functionality without really trying to change the look and feel of the phone. I’ve lumped them together here because they offer very similar features, and differences between them are minor. The one’s I’ve included in the heading are a few of the most popular, but don’t treat that as a complete list of all the launchers I would consider part of the “stock enhanced” category. These are particularly popular with people that don’t like the launcher that the manufacturer has put on their phone (Touchwiz for Samsung, Sense for HTC, etc) and would prefer something closer to Android as Google intended it. These are among the most conservative launchers, but the trade off is they are usually among the most polished in terms of usability, animation smoothness, stability, etc. The killer features these launchers usually have over stock is the ability to easily change your icon set, lots of pretty transition animations, and a scrollable dock so you can fit more than 4 shortcuts in there.

A special mention must go out to Launcher Pro. Whilst the others were built around Ice Cream Sandwich, Launcher Pro has been around much longer, dating back to Froyo days if memory serves me correctly. Because of this Launcher Pro is VERY smooth, even on older phones. People often assumed my HTC Desire was a much newer and more powerful phone than it was because of Launcher Pro. For this reason I recommend it for people with older phones who get frustrated by lagginess on their phone.

FEATURES

Stock look

Lots of polish

Changeable Icons/ Theme manager

Scrollable/swipable dock

Transition animations

More home screens (usually up to 7)/ can choose how many home screens you want.

WHAT WE LIKED

More features than stock

Polish

WHAT WE DIDN’T LIKE

Conservative, can look a bit boring.

GO Launcher EX

Aging king, or still in its prime?

Left to Right: The default home screen, showing off a couple of the widgets that you can download separately to go with it. The animation chooser, with very helpful demonstrations. One of the more elaborate animations in mid-swing. The image browser, which is built into the app launcher, there’s also a video and music browser.

GO launcher has been around for a long long time and it shows. It’s got a huge number of features, an almost endless supply of themes, complementing widgets and lockscreen, and more transition animations than I would have thought possible. If you don’t beleive me on how many themes there are, just do an app search for GO launcher and look for yourself. It even has its own Go Store to handle all the content. The selection means you can theme your icons/ wallpaper/ fonts pretty much however you want, and little features like previews when browsing the transition animations mean you are rarely unsure what things do. Allowing folders in the app drawer is a nice touch and app drawer also doubles as its own in-built image, music and video browser, a rare feature in launchers.

Despite all the great features though the underlying launcher feels a little too Gingerbread to me though. I’m not sure what exactly it is, but somehow it feels like a launcher from Android past. I’m a big fan of the “holo” theme in the newer versions of Android, so this turns me off a bit, but if holo is a bit too stark for you, perhaps you’ll find this a bit more inviting.

One last point I should mention is that in the past I have not used this launcher because it can be a bit more laggy than some other options. I didn’t notice any lag on my HTC One X, but perhaps that’s unsurprising given the quad-core powerhouse inside my phone. On my old HTC Desire, running a single-core 1GHz processor, however, the lag was very noticeable and meant I quickly got rid of it. For this reason I wouldn’t recommend this launcher for aging phones.

FEATURES

LOTS

Folders in app drawer

App drawer media browser

Complimenting widgets, lockscreens

Scrollable dock

GO Store with huge number of themes, Icons, Widgets, Lockscreen themes, etc.

WHAT WE LIKED

Huge selection of everything

Polish

WHAT WE DIDN’T LIKE

Starting to feel dated

Can lag on older devices

MiHome

Would you like some iPhone with your Android?

Left: The default home screen upon first downloading MIUI. Right: The theme downloader/manager.

For a long time the only way to get this launcher was to install a custom MIUI rom, making it out of reach for those unwilling to compromise their warrantee. Now it’s available from the Play Store for anyone who wants it.

Adopting an iPhone style, MiHome has no app-drawer. Rather, all the apps must be on the home screens, and you can arrange those icons any way you like, just like an iPhone. This is obviously going to be a hate/love feature, depending on your stance. Widgets can also go on the home screens, and MiHome has several ready to go, but unfortunately you can’t resize widgets, which is a big minus for those that like the resizable widgets of ICS. It’s got a theme finder/manager and a large selection of themes, and all in all is a nice simple launcher with plenty of polish.

For me the standout of MIUI roms is the lock-screen. It’s a great, customisable lock screen with a great selection of themes. You can download that separately to the launcher now though, so it really doesn’t help with the appeal of MiHome, now that they are both available on the Play Store.

FEATURES

No app-drawer

Theme finder with lots of themes.

Plenty of animations.

Complementing widgets

WHAT WE LIKED

No app-drawer

Polish

WHAT WE DIDN’T LIKE

No app-drawer

Widgets aren’t resizable.

Launcher 7

Would you like some Windows Phone with your Android?

Left: The homescreen of Launcher 7. Right: The app drawer.
Side Note: Yes, when you live in Italy, a movie in English IS an event worthy of putting in your calendar.

Some people might disagree with me, but I think the Windows Phone interface is bold, simple, and elegant. The relatively small selection of apps, complemented by lower resolution screens and poor multicore support, however, make Windows Phones a very tough sell. Fear not, for there are several launchers out there that aim to emulate the Windows Phone homescreens. Launcher 7 is the most popular I could find, and offers a simple, complete package for those that love that Metro look.

The main home screen is dominated by a series of tiles, that can be moved around or changed to your liking. The tiles can use the default white icon on coloured tile look (there’s a good selection of white icons that come with the launcher, and the tiles can be any colour), or you can choose your own icon to put over the tile, or the entire tile can be replaced with an image for a different look. Several active tiles are available for things like contacts, calendar, etc and you can use standard widgets. Slide to the right and your apps are in a vertical list.

Animations are smooth and the settings menus are nice and clearly labelled, something disappointingly rare in custom launchers. The Windows Phone interface naturally doesn’t offer the same scope for personalisation as Android, as it is a simpler layout, but if you like the Windows Phone look, then this is certainly something to have a look at.

WHAT FEATURES

Windows Phone 7 look

Active tiles

Tiles can be replaced with images

Complementing widgets

WHAT WE LIKED

Windows Phone 7 look

Smooth transitions

Easy to follow settings

WHAT WE DIDN’T LIKE

Most normal widgets look awkward as a tile

Limited options to personalise

ssLauncher

If you’re phone was a magazine, what would it look like?

Left to Right: The default home screen, demonstrating 5 different overlapping text-based widgets. The Bookmarks page (yes I don’t use bookmarks much, it’s a mess). The Contacts Page. The vertically-scrolling Applications page (This replaces the standard app-drawer).

Unlike the launchers above, ssLauncher tries something a little different, not just to stock Android, but also different to the other phone interfaces as well. It operates on a series of side-by-side pages, similar to Android homescreens. What makes ssLauncher different is the different types of pages you can have. You can have a standard page, for widgets or whatnot. There’s no app-drawer, but rather a dedicated app page, with the apps scrolling vertically. There’s also vertical scrolling pages for contacts (including categories of contacts), app categories (I liked having a favourites page, with my top 12 or so apps there), and bookmarks.

Each page has a heading at the top (although that can be disabled), as can be seen in the images, and each page can have its own background, which is a nice touch.

Widgets are great in this launcher! Widgets can be resized to any size, not locked to a grid. Likewise widgets and shortcuts can be moved anywhere, not locking to a grid, and widgets can be placed overlapping, with the ability to determine what widget is on top. There’s also a built-in widget-maker, similar to the Minimalistic Text Widgets available from the Play Store. These text (or icon/image) widgets can display a range of information (date, missed calll count, unread sms count, etc) and can also be links to apps. A good example of this is the first image underneath the above title. That actually shows the default home screen you get when first installing the launcher, and has 5 different overlapping widgets, giving shortcuts to the phone, browser, Google Talk, and calendar, as well as showing the date and number of missed calls.

It’s a really well thought out launcher and I think it’s got a lot of potential, but it’s let down by a few things. Of the two transition animations available with the free version, the page-turning animation was unfortunately jerky, even on my One X. Saying that, the sliding transition worked fine. Also some of the menus were a bit confusing to follow. For instance there was actually 13 different slight variations of each transition animation, but since they were named Effect 1, Effect 2, etc it was difficult to figure out exactly what was changing.

I really hope this launcher keeps going and fixes up these minor flaws, because it really has some top features and a lot of potential

WHAT FEATURES

Unique, paginated style

Dedicated pages for contacts, app-drawer, app-category, and bookmarks.

Different backgrounds for each page.

No widget grid

Widgets infinitely resizable

Overlapping Widgets

Built-in text widget maker.

WHAT WE LIKED

The manipulation of widgets is second to none

Different interface that works

WHAT WE DIDN’T LIKE

Launcher settings need to be tidied up

Transitions need to be smoother

General polish could use work

MXHome

Because who doesn’t want flying 3D lovehearts buzzing across their screen?

Left to Right: The default homescreen, after much tapping to ensure maximum loveheart-age. The excellent app-drawer, demonstrating categories. The “coffee clock” theme, a large animated clock that tilts with the orientation of the phone. The theme browser, showing the three themes I downloaded.

MXHome is a launcher that follows in some ways in the footsteps of GO Launcher. What I mean by that is it’s very Gingerbread inspired, but with a fruitier color scheme by default, and it has a large selection of themes that can be browsed and downloaded from an inbuilt theme manager.

What sets MXHome apart, however, is the selection of 3D objects and animations that you can put on top of your desktop. The default one is lots of red lovehearts (or yellow…. petals?) that flutter across your screen, as you can see in the screenshots. There’s a large clock, completely with turning gears, that tilts to reflect the orientation of the phone, and the list goes on. Icons jiggle when you go to a new screen as if to get your attention, and long pressing brings up the different options in an array of colorful circles.

I’m sure you’re getting the idea now, this launcher is about bright colors and extravagant animations. If you’re the sort of person who has thought to themselves “You know what? My phone needs more……. lovehearts flying across the screen” then this is definitely the launcher for you.

If you haven’t picked up on what I’m saying, I’m going to get to the point. This was my least favourite launcher of the bunch. Not because it was a bad launcher as such, but more because the abundance of bouncing pebble-icons and things buzzing across my screen made me feel that I should be putting my hair in pigtails and looking forward to my 11th birthday. It also was a bit confusing at times, for instance the default theme had an icon that turned on and off the effects. I deleted that icon and then couldn’t figure out for to get it back. Also the themes are inconsistent about what is included, be it icons/fonts/dockbars meaning it’s hard to tell what you’re getting just from the small picture.

It does have an excellent app-drawer that easily allows you to sort your apps into a series of categories, and categories could be simply expanded or compacted, making getting around your apps very simple. If you think you’d like an animation-filled experience and are willing to occasionally put up with occasional confusion then this will be a good launcher for you. For other people, the great app drawer is not enough to make up for distracting animations that will likely take a toll on your battery life.

WHAT FEATURES

3D animations and themes

Built-in theme finder and manager

Categorised app-drawer

WHAT WE LIKED

App drawer

WHAT WE DIDN’T LIKE

Overabundance of animations

Occasionally confusing, particularly with theming

Probably a battery hog

Summary

This is but a small sample of what launchers out there can do for your phone. Heck this isn’t even all the launchers I’ve tested over the past few weeks. What I’ve aimed to show you is some of the major launchers, as well as some of the more unique launchers available.

Whether you just want a small tweak of the stock experience or you want something completely different, there is probably a launcher that will suit you. Keep in mind that it is not guaranteed that every launcher will work smoothly (or at all, in fact) on every device. Always make sure you download the free version first and see how it works before you consider paying for the full version.

Lastly, don’t be scared. It may look like the changes to your phone are drastic, but in fact it’s no different to installing any app. If you don’t like it, uninstall it. If you are a user of custom launchers, please let me know what you use, and what phone you use it on, in the comments below.