I do a personal launcher comparison every 2-3 months to deicide which is currently the best launcher (based on...
I do a personal launcher comparison every 2-3 months to deicide which is currently the best launcher (based on Google's stock jellybean launcher), last time I did it it was in first week of December and nova launcher was best launchet that time according to me.
I decided to another such comparison yesterday and just finished testing the last launcher.
I have a nexus 7 and Samsung galaxy s, but as performance is pretty much good enough for all launchers on the nexus 7 cause of powerful GPU and CPU so I did this test on my galaxy s.
The launchers I tested last time -
Nova launcher (only free)
Apex launcher (only free)
Trebuchet launcher (from cm 10.1)
Stock android launcher
Holo launcher (only free)
All were above average, except holo launcher which was pretty damn pathetic, but nova was best that time.
Launchers I tested this time
Nova launcher (both free and prime, but I am not going to consider prime in this comparison). Latest beta was tested.
Apex launcher (free). Latest version was tested.
Trebuchet launcher (from latest, yesterday's nightly).
Action launcher (its only paid ).
Results and thoughts
Nova - performance 4.5/5. Great performance, absolutely smooth on my old phone, smooth and consistent scrolling, animations and traditions were also fast, consistent and smooth. No redraws (option checked in settings, under 'advanced'). Though ram usage was a little bit higher than apex. There were some rare hiccups. Widgets had smooth scrolling.
Features - 4/5. Personally I found it having all features I required. Expecting more from a launcher that's free should be a bit too much I guess. Though I think as all free launchers have tons of animation, they could have added a few more in there.
It also has some unique features like 'reverse wallpaper scrolling'. It also have a great backing and restoring system.
UI and layout - 5/5 Nova launcher is easy to use, all of its tweaks and features are easy to understand. Additionally it has some great little ui features like icon size screen and wallpaper selector screen.
Overall - 13.5/15
Apex - performance 3/5 Scrolling was smooth and fast on most places but the launcher has some major issues with animations and transitions, I noticed in many places it was trying to push tasks and hence skipping animations and hence creating a jaggy experience. For ex - when we long press an app/widget from app drawer to drop on home screen, when rearranging shortcuts on home screen. In app drawer I noticed jaggy scrolling when using 'stack' animations and some others as well.
Features - 4.5/5. Apex has tons of options for tweaking, personally I think most of them are useless and should not be up to the user to decide but some people find them useful so I ignore the extra features. Additionally, it has tons of traditions in the free version which is good. It mostly has all options that are in nova or any other launcher.
UI/layout - 4/5 - Most places it has fine layout and UI but in some places its ugly and just too simple. Long pressing widgets on home screen brings down an ugly menu (its gingerbread style).
11.5/15
Trebuchet - performance 4.5/5. Trebuchet provides great performance. Its on par with nova. Everything was smooth and good. No lag or hiccups.
Features - 3.5 /5 - Though it has quite a lot of feature, it doesn't compare to nova/apex and I found myself looking for some feature that weren't there. Also it doesn't have theme option so we can't apply icon packs, I know we can use CyanogenMod theme engine but most themes for that are full system themes, so we can't use normal icon packs.
UI/layout - 4/5. It uses simple and clean UI, nothing special but nothing ugly as well.
Overall 12/15.
Action launcher - Action launcher is a unique launcher with a different and unique layout.
Performance - 3.5/5 - scrolling was mostly smooth and transitions were fine. Though it redraws a lot and has some hiccups with animations while selecting and dropping widgets.
Features - 3/5. It just has basic options that nearly all launchers on the market have, it has nothing special or even many features that the others which were compared have. I also found some bugs like widgets and apps were overlapped by its action bat and docked and didn't got adjusted. Action launcher has a great cover feature which is like a folder but u have to double tap to see contents of the cover while a single tap will open the main app in the cover, its quite good.
UI/layout 4/5. Action launcher uses a different layout for app drawer that is on the left most side of all screens. I liked this simple and clean app drawer. But I personally think maybe a different type of action bar can be used cause currently the action bar uses (WASTES) a lot of space.
Overall-10.5/15 - this is pretty good as this is a fairly new launcher compared to others.
Nova launcher is the best holo based launcher right now.
Also, nova launcher's premium version is totally worth it. Provides some great features and u can donate the developers.
Note - stock launcher wasn't compared cause it has no additional features and hence will get 0/5 in that category and will be unfair, so better to keep it out. Its the father of these launchers anyway...:p
Holo launcher wasn't compared cause it just unusable, totally pathetic.
3 screenshots have been attached of my three home screens using nova launcher which will be my default launcher till may end.
I decided to another such comparison yesterday and just finished testing the last launcher.
I have a nexus 7 and Samsung galaxy s, but as performance is pretty much good enough for all launchers on the nexus 7 cause of powerful GPU and CPU so I did this test on my galaxy s.
The launchers I tested last time -
Nova launcher (only free)
Apex launcher (only free)
Trebuchet launcher (from cm 10.1)
Stock android launcher
Holo launcher (only free)
All were above average, except holo launcher which was pretty damn pathetic, but nova was best that time.
Launchers I tested this time
Nova launcher (both free and prime, but I am not going to consider prime in this comparison). Latest beta was tested.
Apex launcher (free). Latest version was tested.
Trebuchet launcher (from latest, yesterday's nightly).
Action launcher (its only paid ).
Results and thoughts
Nova - performance 4.5/5. Great performance, absolutely smooth on my old phone, smooth and consistent scrolling, animations and traditions were also fast, consistent and smooth. No redraws (option checked in settings, under 'advanced'). Though ram usage was a little bit higher than apex. There were some rare hiccups. Widgets had smooth scrolling.
Features - 4/5. Personally I found it having all features I required. Expecting more from a launcher that's free should be a bit too much I guess. Though I think as all free launchers have tons of animation, they could have added a few more in there.
It also has some unique features like 'reverse wallpaper scrolling'. It also have a great backing and restoring system.
UI and layout - 5/5 Nova launcher is easy to use, all of its tweaks and features are easy to understand. Additionally it has some great little ui features like icon size screen and wallpaper selector screen.
Overall - 13.5/15
Apex - performance 3/5 Scrolling was smooth and fast on most places but the launcher has some major issues with animations and transitions, I noticed in many places it was trying to push tasks and hence skipping animations and hence creating a jaggy experience. For ex - when we long press an app/widget from app drawer to drop on home screen, when rearranging shortcuts on home screen. In app drawer I noticed jaggy scrolling when using 'stack' animations and some others as well.
Features - 4.5/5. Apex has tons of options for tweaking, personally I think most of them are useless and should not be up to the user to decide but some people find them useful so I ignore the extra features. Additionally, it has tons of traditions in the free version which is good. It mostly has all options that are in nova or any other launcher.
UI/layout - 4/5 - Most places it has fine layout and UI but in some places its ugly and just too simple. Long pressing widgets on home screen brings down an ugly menu (its gingerbread style).
11.5/15
Trebuchet - performance 4.5/5. Trebuchet provides great performance. Its on par with nova. Everything was smooth and good. No lag or hiccups.
Features - 3.5 /5 - Though it has quite a lot of feature, it doesn't compare to nova/apex and I found myself looking for some feature that weren't there. Also it doesn't have theme option so we can't apply icon packs, I know we can use CyanogenMod theme engine but most themes for that are full system themes, so we can't use normal icon packs.
UI/layout - 4/5. It uses simple and clean UI, nothing special but nothing ugly as well.
Overall 12/15.
Action launcher - Action launcher is a unique launcher with a different and unique layout.
Performance - 3.5/5 - scrolling was mostly smooth and transitions were fine. Though it redraws a lot and has some hiccups with animations while selecting and dropping widgets.
Features - 3/5. It just has basic options that nearly all launchers on the market have, it has nothing special or even many features that the others which were compared have. I also found some bugs like widgets and apps were overlapped by its action bat and docked and didn't got adjusted. Action launcher has a great cover feature which is like a folder but u have to double tap to see contents of the cover while a single tap will open the main app in the cover, its quite good.
UI/layout 4/5. Action launcher uses a different layout for app drawer that is on the left most side of all screens. I liked this simple and clean app drawer. But I personally think maybe a different type of action bar can be used cause currently the action bar uses (WASTES) a lot of space.
Overall-10.5/15 - this is pretty good as this is a fairly new launcher compared to others.
Nova launcher is the best holo based launcher right now.
Also, nova launcher's premium version is totally worth it. Provides some great features and u can donate the developers.
Note - stock launcher wasn't compared cause it has no additional features and hence will get 0/5 in that category and will be unfair, so better to keep it out. Its the father of these launchers anyway...:p
Holo launcher wasn't compared cause it just unusable, totally pathetic.
3 screenshots have been attached of my three home screens using nova launcher which will be my default launcher till may end.
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