e be unto you, non-xel owner. Your current Android phone is probably feeling a bit primitive after you’ve seen all of the cool features has bestowed upon the xel. There’s that whip-smart Assistant, a new homescreen design, quick access to tasks with app shortcuts, unlimited photo storage. The party’s raging, but you’re not invited.
Don’t fret. ke many good parties there’s another way to sneak in the back. This is Android after all, the l of sideloading As endless customization. In that spirit, I’m offering a few suggestions on how to get as close as possible to the xel experience without actually buying one.
These solutions aren’t perfect, as time goes on is probably going to make the xel even more distinct from the other Android phones out there. But if you like what you see in the xel but aren’t ready to pull the trigger on one yet, this is the best way to get as close as you can without buying new hardware.
Step one: grab a new launcher
Your home screen launcher controls the look performance of many aspects of your phone, making it the critical first step to any software renovation project.
My recommendation here is simple: Action uncher 3. And don’t be cheap. y for the full version, because developers who make quality software like this should be able to make money from it. Then they can keep working on the app to make it more awesome.
Action uncher 3 brings app launchers other features that come on the xel.
Action uncher 3 includes a mode that directly emulates the new design of ’s own xel uncher. You get five icons on the dock that “pill” search tab. More importantly, you also get some of the features that are currently exclusive to Android 7.1, like app shortcuts support for the new stard round icon format. That version is only available on the xel or in dev preview for Nexus devices. So this is the best way to get it.
However, instead of a tap–hold you’ll need to create a custom gesture to launch the shortcuts. You’re also not able to drag an action onto the screen to make its own widget, although I find it’s more convenient just to use the shortcut instead of adding on another widget.
However, it’s worth noting that due to an A restriction you can’t slide over to Now just off the side of the home screen. If you miss that functionality, the best workaround is to drop a four-by-four widget onto the screen all the way to the left. It’s not perfect, but it gets you close.
If you’re adventurous, you can also sideload the xel uncher A yourself.
You can get the xel look by installing an A of the official launcher.
Since it’s not officially supported on non-xel devices, your experience may not be buttery smooth. However, I found that it works rather well on a Nexus 5X with a few caveats. For one, the slide over to Now doesn’t work. Touching the “pill” search button will take you there, although it doesn’t fire up a search quite as lightning-fast as it does when used on a xel.
Make some aesthetic changes
ile the launcher will do most of the heavy lifting there are other ways to xel-ize your phone. has put the llpapers app in the ay Store, so you can throw down some of those impressive lscapes or urban scenes.
Choose from a very impressive range of images from ’s own llpapers app.
You don’t get the ultra cool live Earth, which changes the view of the globe based on where the sun is, but at least most of the other wallpapers are there.
Oh, don’t forget about small touches like the ringtones notification sounds. Unlike on Nexus phones, those on the xel sound pleasant feel well thought out. These were very well thought out in comparison to past Nexus devices. It’s clear that really thought through all of the elements that can make a phone great.
Users have extracted them put up downloads of the ringtones notification sounds.
Get the Assistant (well, kind of)
The Assistant is baked right into the xel, making it one of the great differentiators compared to other Android phones. Unfortunately, that means there’s no way to get that kind of integration on your own. However, the Assistant is baked into lo, it’s no slouch. You can still do plenty, like use it to send voice messages, get detailed weather information, create appointments, ask to see certain images from your otos.
The Assistant can still offer you some assistance inside of lo.
Since it lives inside of lo there’s no way to access these powers outside of opening the app. Adding a homescreen widget or app shortcut would be a nice compromise until the Assistant comes to more phones.
In the end, you can do a lot to get close to the xel experience thanks to the customization available in Android. But when it is time to upgrade, we do highly recommend the xel for the optimal all- experience.
