What’s the first thing you see on your smartphone when you wake up? It’s your Lockscreen and from there you’re going to get into the morning routine of checking your messages, seeing if there’s any e-mail, that sort of thing. I know I do it every morning and my Lockscreen is often the thing I ignore the most but, it needn’t be that way after all, if it weren’t for the Lockscreen our phones would run wild in our pockets. What if your Lockscreen could become far more useful, what if it could help you throughout the day and not just in the morning? Read on to see if Celltick’s Active Lockscreen is that app.
Description: As you’d imagine, Active Lockscreen is a Lockscreen replacement that will override your existing Lockscreen, which of course depends on which phone you have. All of the big device manufacturers are trying something new when it comes to Lockscreen and in Android 4.2 Google them selves added some extra functionality. Even still, these Lockscreens are never too helpful but, with Celltick’s Active Lockscreen there is added functionality and quick access to all of your messages, recent apps, recent calls and more. Read on to find out how to use the app.
How it Works: To start making your device look and act better than all you have to do is to download the app from the Play Store and then launch the app from your app drawer. To set the app up you’ll have to enable it from the app’s menu:
From there you can also set up plug-ins, for instance if you set up the editor’s choice plug-in you’ll be greeted with a new news story on the Lockscreen. With the Lockscreen set up and this plug-in in theLockscreen will look something like this:
As you can see there are two sliders on the left and right sides of the Lockscreen and the one on the left will unlock to your home screen – or whatever you have open – and the one on the right will let you silence the device. The ring in the middle of the screen is where the Lockscreen really comes into its own. It’s through this ring that you’ll get all of the functionality of the app. There are a number of different apps and services you can access from the Lockscreen through this. If you drag up you will see four more rings and these will take you to other rings of apps etc.If you more the ring to the right, you’ll see a list of recent apps and you’ll be given your recent apps and the ability to open any one of them up, this is a really great feature for a Lockscreen and it works well:
As well as this there is access to messaging apps, recent calls, and camera apps. What’s really nice about this is that it scans your phone an discovers other messaging apps, so if you have Google+ installed it’ll be included in the ring as well. The same goes for camera apps, Instagram, Retro Camera and more will be in the ring as well. One other aspect of Active Lockscreen is the ability to theme the app to your liking and they can all be found on the Play Store for free:
The staff here at AH will tell you that I’m a big coffee fan so when I saw that there was a coffee theme available for the Lockscreen I made sure to download it and give it a try:
Opinion: I really like Active Lockscreen and don’t get me wrong, I’ve tried a lot of different Lockscreen and I love to customize my device but the one that brings me the most functionality? Definitely Active Lockscreen, it’s the one Lockscreen that adds functionality without taking a hit on form, either. There’s a lot to love about Celltick’s solution here and it really does help you get to apps and messages on your phone a lot quicker than you would normally.
Ratings
- Speed (5/5) – For the style and function of Active Lockscreen it’s very quick and smooth.
- Features (5/5) – I’ve tried Widget Locker and all the rest and yet this has enabled me to do more than any of them.
- Theme (5/5) – Active Lockscreen has a whole lot of free themes in the Play Store and you can really match it the overall look of your device.
- Overall (5/5) – This is why we love Android – apps like this come along and let us enjoy our phones in a whole new way, Active Lockscreen is great!
Pros
- Lots of themes available on the Play Store to make the Lockscreen feel truly yours.
- The app sorts out your messaging apps, camera apps and so on so you can have them all right where you want them.
- It just works, there was no need for root or anything during my use of the app.
- Stunning design and function make the app all you want in a Lockscreen.
Cons
- Customizable themes would be nice.
- Some of the themes can be confusing at first.
Conclusion: For those that want to customize their devices a little bit further than the normal options then Active Lockscreen is one of the better apps to do this with. Not only does the Lockscreen look really good but it also offers a vast range of functionality as well, often times apps are very good-looking but they offer little in the way of functionality but with Active Lockscreen there really is a lot of added functionality. Never before has it been so easy to ring someone from your Lockscreen as it is with Active Lockscreen. Celltick have a really great app on their hands here and it’s an app you really need to check out. What can you lose when it’s free?