Apex Launcher Pro vs Next Launcher 3D Shell

Apex Launcher lets the user customize the app drawer, including its style (Horizontal Paginated, Vertical Paginated, Vertical Continuous or Vertical List), the method of sorting and the background transparency.

Apex Launcher allows the user to change the grid size of their home screens (up to a maximum size of 10 rows and columns) and adjust the margins on the left, right, top and bottom. Icons can be made larger by as much as 150% or reduced to as little as 50% of their original size.

Made to look like stock Android with additional features.

A marketplace where the user can download extra themes is provided. Some of the themes must be purchased via Google Play, but many are free. Paid version allows the use of themes from other launchers.

There is an option in the Apex Launcher drawer to sort apps by the most used, making for a convenient way for users to get back to their most often used apps.

Apex Launcher also allows users to hide unused or unwanted apps from the drawer.

The free version of Apex comes with swipe gesture support.

Unread count notifications create badges for home screen, dock and drawer icons that let the user know how many unread messages they have.

Infinite scrolling allows you to cycle among your home screens without ever changing directions.

Apex, which requires Android 4.0 or later, boasts a dedicated tablet UI mode. Turning this on enables the persistent search bar at the top of the display, and somewhat inexplicably disables the dock at the bottom of the screen.

The launcher offers a variety of animations and themes for different parts of the UI that can all be changed to suit individual preferences.

The launcher has a lot of flashy animations and transitions. For example, the app drawer by default imitates a cube when switching between pages, tapping applications create ripples around the application icon, the live wallpapers are affected by gravity, etc.

A "Lite" limited time free trial version is available.