Microsoft Launcher

Microsoft today announces a major overhaul to the Microsoft Launcher on Android. This is probably for the second time that we are seeing such big changes, all happening at once. The launcher as promised earlier now supports Timeline and much more improvements were also made to the existing features.

To experience the new Timeline on your Launcher 5.0, you need to sign a with the Microsoft account which you used on your PC to log in. With the same Microsoft account being used on both your mobile and your PC(s), you will be having a glimpse of all the activities right on your phone screen. You can also do the other way of course; Activities on your phone will also appear on the timeline of your PC(s). Goes without saying that Timeline will only work on the apps that published by Microsoft on Play store. For example, if start a word document on your phone you can finish it on your PC by picking up the word document from the Timeline on your PC. This timeline support is not applicable to all the Microsoft application on Play store for obvious reasons. Nevertheless, you can see all your activities regardless of their availability of that particular service on your Android phone or PC(s).

Not much has changed in terms of functionality. Glance and News tab got shifted and now appears side-by-side with Timeline. And that is it. You always you can filter out any news items. One downside to this is that you will not be able to add a dedicated screen for news sections but that thing might change with future updates. The talking about the Glance, it is basically the same as earlier but with a new look and feel.

Microsoft Launcher 5.0 is now available for beta testers on Google Play store and of course, will come to the public later.