Considering this philosophy, while they don’t offer any groundbreaking features, Evie truly shines in its simplicity. It gives users enough customization options to let you change icon packs and do basic configurations like changing dock size and aesthetics, altering folder behavior, and adjusting the home screen grid dimensions. Critically, there aren’t so many options that you get flooded with them or can’t find what you’re looking for (as can happen with alternatives like Nova), but still enough to set everything just so. The result is a launcher that lets you give your device a fresh look exactly the way you want it. As with many launchers, Nova allows custom icons and is compatible with practically every icon pack you could want to install. Its main focus, though, is customizations, and it gives you plenty of them to choose from. These include basic UI elements like home screen grid size, screen edge padding size, dock look, and feel, and even the page indicator behavior. However, Nova goes much further, such as by letting you fully tweak the orientation, grid size, transparency, opening gestures, and hidden apps for the drawer. It even lets you enable a built-in night mode, which is especially helpful for older versions of Android that don’t have it integrated by default. The final feature worth noting (though certainly not the final one you could find) is the ability to set the type and function of gestures, to a degree that is probably second only to Action Launcher. Shutters are the centerpiece of Action Launcher, allowing you to swipe on an app icon on the home screen to get that app’s widget functionality (if it has some) in a popup window. This is really great if you have a lot of high-functionality widget options but don’t want to dedicate pages and pages of your home screen to fit them all. This feature, as integral as it is to the Action Launcher experience is sadly, only available in their “Plus” in-app purchase option. True to its focus on productivity, there is no clutter on the main (center) home screen, as you can’t put widgets or apps on it. With a slide from the left edge, you can access an app drawer, and a slide from the right edge brings up quick toggles, putting all the essentials at your fingertips. Like many launchers that are keeping current, it allows gesture setting, and it also has straightforward theming options that are still consistent with Material Design principles. In addition to the fundamentals you can expect from most of its competitors, it includes nice settings for the top Google search bar, as well as the weather and date display. Its light, dark and black themes also afford some elegant theming possibilities. Overall, though, Lawnchair tries not to stray too far from Android’s aesthetics and functionality, electing not to reinvent the wheel. Microsoft Launcher has a similar layout to the stock Android home screen, but with some extra finishing touches. First and foremost, the dock can be swiped up to reveal a second row of dock space for more apps, and some quick toggles for Bluetooth, flashlight and other apps, as well as a brightness slider. As is becoming more popular across Android launchers, and mobile OSes in general, the left-hand page is a feed for news and personal information such as calendar events and to-do items. This feed can be easily customized for the types of news you want to see, or to display different information in the ‘Glance’ personal feed. The launcher also offers integration of Microsoft’s Cortana virtual assistant, if you prefer that over Google’s. It’s worth noting that this is probably the only launcher that has a mature virtual assistant and one of the few you can get on Android besides Google. For everything that is not immediately in reach on the home screen, displayed on one of the onscreen widgets, there is a universal search button hovering in the lower-right. More than the other launchers here, AIO’s is a solidly widget-focused UI. This puts convenient features in easy reach, like a home screen calculator or timer. On top of that, it adds power user features by default, like a real-time RAM usage bar. Instead of a dock, your main home screen is simply the date, time, and up to eight of your most-used apps (which you pick at initialization). For all your other apps, you simply swipe down the vertically descending alphabet on the right side to bring up all the apps that start with the selected letter. When you let go to select a letter, adjacent letters and their apps become visible, with the selected letter in the middle of the screen so you can tap the desired app. Despite its simplicity, Niagara does give you a reasonable degree of customization. You can still set an icon pack if you want, and pick between light and dark themes. You can also decide whether to display the date or time or even the vertical alphabet (though swiping where it was still functioning as normal). If your phone is about your apps first and foremost, this launcher is for you.
