In the fall of 2020, it was impossible to go anywhere on social media without seeing screenshot after screenshot of iPhone home screens. Apple added support for widgets in the then-new iOS 14 and, paired with the ability to create custom Siri Shortcut icons, it seemed like everyone decided to deck their devices out in all sorts of ways. Retro tech layouts, Animal Crossing-themed icons, even older iOS versions — Twitter, Instagram, and TikTok were all loaded with examples.
To Android users, this level of personalization was nothing new. Google’s vision for mobile phones has had this sort of feature baked in since the earliest iterations of the software. I still remember the first time I tried out Launcher Pro on an HTC Thunderbolt — it was like a breath of fresh air at the time. If you looked for it online, you’d find Android fans yelling to no one in particular about how phone themes were nothing new. One thing, I think, hadn’t been wholly considered: customization on Android had, to a certain extent, stalled out.
More than anything, the arrival of Android 12 has rendered that way of thinking outdated. With Google’s newest update, mobile customization is back in a big way. While some may argue they’ve never stopped personalizing their phone, loading up on custom launchers and ROMs to get their device working just as they intended, Android has become relatively stagnant in this field in recent years. The days of wild, unique, and downright ugly home screens have been replaced by a need for utility, especially as the best smartphones turn into productivity machines than ever before.
Android 12 — at least, Google’s version of it — looks to split the difference between your boring, basic layout and the hours it takes to tweak the animations just right when scrolling between screens. It’s still a fairly typical home screen, but with dynamic colors pulled automatically from your wallpaper. Suddenly, what would’ve been a dull, run-of-the-mill layout on Android 11 becomes far more creative in Android 12, without much more than a couple of taps in settings.
From the onset, Material You seems like an ideal compromise for any old-school smartphone user who finds themselves too busy these days to put much effort into customization. That said, there’s a catch: it only works for Google’s own apps right now, with no sign as to when third-party devs can tweak their icons to match. The second you place any other app on your home screen — podcast catchers, messaging apps, even just Twitter — you lose out on that monotone look. Sure, you can keep alternate apps on other home pages, but in keeping with that design trend, you’ll have to remove any third-party services from your dock as well.
And this is just looking at Google’s implementation of dynamic theming. Samsung has done a great job bringing Android 12 to its phones in a timely manner, but One UI 4 doesn’t use Material You themes for its custom icons. Instead, the company built a proprietary form of this technology with the exact same flaw: it’s only capable of coloring in Samsung’s own app icons. Services like Chrome will sit on your Galaxy S21’s home screen, clashing with the rest of the interface.
It’s entirely possible that future software versions — Android 12L, or even Android 13 — will improve this situation, offering APIs for Material You that open up automatic icon themes to all developers and phone manufacturers alike. Right now, however, anyone running Android 12, regardless of whether it’s a Google Pixel or Samsung device — has to make do with the majority of their app icons clashing with that beautiful monotone look.
I think this might create an interesting dilemma, where lapsed customizers and newcomers to personalization alike realize one thing: Material You, in its current state, just isn’t enough. Sure, these users might love the new look offered by their Pixel 6, but with most of their icons excluded from theming, is it even worth leaving enabled? And just like that, an old-school Android hobby comes back into play.
Left: Material You on Google’s Pixel Launcher. Right: Custom icons on Nova Launcher.
Icon packs have been around for as long as I can remember, and with the shortcomings of dynamic theming on full display in Android 12, I think they’re due for a comeback. As long as you’re willing to use a supported launcher, icon packs can deliver the look and feel of Material You, without relying on Google’s eventual third-party support.
A quick search for “Material You icon packs” on the Play Store reveals a dozen or more options to pick from, and while my experience wasn’t perfect, it did coat most of the apps on my phone in fresh colors. “Pix Material You Icons” — the first result, and the one I chose — includes support for hundreds of apps and matches the general colors of whatever wallpaper I have set. My home screen was nearly completely coated in Material You-esque artwork just a few minutes of installation.
Left: Pix Material You Icons list. Right: Themed icons in red.
As it turns out, it’s easy to fall down a personalization hole if you’re not paying attention. Since I had to switch from the Pixel Launcher to a third-party service — Nova, aka “ol’ reliable” — I suddenly had a ton of tweaks and customization available at my fingertips. Obviously, I had to finish applying custom themes to my unsupported icons — even if the match wasn’t perfect, using a generic Material You icon was more than enough. That’s a good start, but the search bar wasn’t matching, so that has to be fixed as well. And while I was scrolling through home pages, I noticed I didn’t love the bounce-back effect. And maybe the grid is oversized — a little padding tweaking would do a lot of good. And, oh man, the app drawer font really needs some work.
You see where this is going, right? In the chase to perfect what Google started in Android 12, falling back into old habits — or rediscovering new ones — might be enough to kick off a new golden age of customization. And while future updates might make Material You a little more welcoming to third parties, you don’t need to wait. Launchers, icon packs, even custom ROMs — they’re all still online, waiting for you to devote a couple of hours on a lazy Sunday afternoon to make your phone your own.
iOS users had their moment on social media, but Android has always been the king of personalization. Maybe it’s high time we reclaim the crown and lean all the way back into customized home screens — no matter how embarrassing they might look a decade from now.
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