The lockscreen on our smartphone or tablets can be highly customized, although we know some tend to leave them stock just to keep things simple and familiar. For those that love customization and don’t want to root and have a custom ROM we have an awesome new app to share. We were recently tipped off about Active Lockscreen, an app that brings the utmost customization to our Android lockscreens. Take a peek below.
For those diehard users that are always looking for ways to tweak and customize their Android devices, this is certainly worth checking out. Especially if you don’t want to root or flash a custom ROM and always have to redo your lockscreen. We’ll start by mentioning this is a completely free app, works like a charm, and has tons of options and themes to completely make your lockscreen personal again.
With Active Lockscreen everything is just a swipe away before you even unlock your device. In the same way that lockscreen shortcuts are present on HTC Sense and Samsung’s TouchWiz, here we have the same thing taken to another level. Every aspect can be changed, tweaked, improved, or set to your liking. From their multiple theme options, or even build your own digital skin to be used. The developers, Celltick, offer tons of themes with different looks, new colors, and even for holidays. Here’s a few features to expect right from the lockscreen, then take a peek at our hands-on video review.
• Call your favorite numbers, recent contacts or open the phone’s dialer
• Launch recently used apps, such as Facebook, Twitter or LinkedIn
• Stream social media updates on your locked screen
• Send text messages or communicate through Skype, WhatsApp, Viber, Email and Gmail
• Launch your camera or any picture related apps such as Instagram
• Define your most common contacts for quick and convenient calling
After a few minutes with the app I was already a fan for the simplistic design and ease of use, not to mention all the features galore it brought to my handset. Being able to instantly turn my phone to silent, open Instagram, stream some Google Music, or even directly call back the last caller within seconds from powering on my screen just won me over. I’m a fan, but the settings UI could use a little work.
Between having old system menus and Android 2.3 Gingerbread slider bars the app certainly is a little outdated in that regard, but all the options and features it provides certainly isn’t. I’d love to see a few UI elements updated to the Holo theme, but in the end it’s all about how well the app works — which works great!
From the lockscreen as the video showed, each of the 4 shortcut icons are more than just a single shortcut like most 3rd party skins. Instead they are folders bringing up a “wheel” if you will of apps and options. Then in settings you can change how many appear and customize it as you wish. We like the fact that all 4 main shortcuts act just as they usually do. Going to the camera launches the camera, but sliding into the camera and not selecting it brings up all those additional shortcuts for Instagram, Gallery, and whatever else you’d like. It’s the best of both worlds when it comes to shortcuts and folders on the lockscreen.
Celltick also has add-ons and plugins aside from all the different colored themes. This essentially brings lockscreen widgets (like Android 4.2 Jelly Bean) to your lockscreen. While this requires the few available plugins to be downloaded — the option is there for those that don’t have the latest version of Jelly Bean. We’d love to see an improved settings UI and the option for stock icons, otherwise this is a pretty solid app.
The video above should give you a pretty good idea of what you’re in for with Active Lockscreen, but you’ll just need to run down to the Play Store and get it yourself to truly enjoy it. Again, this is completely free so might as well give it a spin.
Active Lockscreen App download link
TRON theme link
Dark theme link (what we used)
Deep Sea theme link
This is stupid on nexus 4 or pretty much any other device pressing home button will bypass the local screen ….
Pretty much, I was going to mention this. I don’t think you’re going to get a decent replacement lockscreen though. On my S3-I9300, I used Widget Locker from the developers of Nova Launcher, and from the outset it looked really promising until I used the back button and unlocked my phone without even touching the lockscreen. I guess it may be different on other phones but especially with the tablets that don’t have dedicated softkeys like the Nexus range you’re pretty much not gaining anything if the app can’t lock or hide those shortcuts.