Microsoft’s Android apps have earned a great reputation and rightly so. With so many apps on the Play Store, Microsoft’s versions stand out by adding new features regularly.
One of the most popular apps in this collection is the Microsoft Launcher, which has today bagged yet another major update.
This update brings along a handful of new customization features, such as creating folders in the app drawer, enable/ disable the dock, meeting updates in the calendar card, as well as recurring reminders. Let’s take a closer look at some of these features:
1. Create Folders in App Drawer
We all have created folders to club together apps on the homescreen, but have you ever seen folders inside the app drawer? Well, Microsoft Launcher is bringing the functionality for you with its latest update.
To make folders in the app drawer, you need to long-press an app icon to open a set of options and select multiple apps. You then need to tap the folder icon at the top right of the screen to create the folder. You can rename them. Here’s how the folders will look:
In addition to folder creation, the latest update brings batch mode for apps on the home screen and app drawer. It’s the set of shortcuts (seen above, right) that appear when an app icon is long-pressed.
2. Support for Intune Data Protection
Microsoft is not only making its launcher useful for the average consumer, it’s also looking to make Android devices easily approachable by enterprises as well. If you have Microsoft Intune’s data protection policies enforced on your devices, then Microsoft Launcher can be used to securely view private corporate data.
This is a great feature, which might come in handy within Microsoft’s offices around the world, where Android may be the norm. It may be heavily skinned to make it compatible to support Microsoft’s productivity suite.
3. UI/UX Improvements
Microsoft Launcher’s latest update also packs a lot of improvements to further make the user experience more fluent. You get new app animations, changes to pill count for social apps such as Line, BBM, Instagram, Yammer, Textra, WhatsApp and more. It has also updated the weather and time widget to eliminate refresh issues.
The latest update also makes it possible for you to add new blank pages in vertical mode, adjust the icon size throughout the system and set wallpapers for both the lock and home screen. It supports Oreo shortcut creation as well. So, if you haven’t yet downloaded the Microsoft Launcher, you can download it from the Play Store right here.
