How I customize my Android home screen to make it truly mine

It feels cliché to say, but only because it’s never been more true: Your phone is the most personal computer you own. Not only is it so portable that you in some sense “wear” it, either in a pocket or a bag, but it’s the first (and in some cases only) place people go to find information, communicate, and create. Making your phone feel like your own should make it feel better to use — or at the very least, it will help it feel deserving of the large role it plays in your life.

Not every smartphone offers the same level of customization, but both Android and iOS have gotten better over the years in terms of how easy they make it to change how your phone looks and works (iOS has taken huge strides), but if customization is what matters most to you, you’re still going to get the most flexibility out of an Android phone. So, in an effort to have the coolest or at least the most “me” Pixel out there, here are some of the steps I take to customize my phone’s home screen, that should be applicable to anyone else with a modern Android phone.

1 Set a new wallpaper

It’s the visual hiding behind everything

2 Install a new launcher

A launcher can fundamentally change how your phone behaves

3 Swap in new icons

Change how apps look from the outside

You don’t need to open an app to get things done

5 Take inspiration from someone else

The best designs are often based on pre-existing work

Make your phone your own

It’s true that it’s easy to make something that looks bad. There are so many options and so many ways to tweak how your home screen looks, that you’re bound to make something that’s not “good design.” But at least it will be yours. As long as you keep functionality in mind and consider how you actually want to use your smartphone, you’ll be okay.

If the list above doesn’t satisfy your desire for gadget customization, Pocket-lint has covered a unique tool for tweaking Samsung’s Galaxy devices and plenty of different ways you can make Windows a lot better.