When comparing ADW.Launcher vs SF Launcher 2, the Slant community recommends ADW.Launcher for most people. In the question“What are the best launchers for Android?” ADW.Launcher is ranked 10th while SF Launcher 2 is ranked 51st. The most important reason people chose ADW.Launcher is:
New themes compatible with ADW Launcher can be downloaded directly from Google Play. The launcher conveniently provides a link from the Themes page in the ADW Settings menu. More impressively, the Themes page provides previews of each theme you've installed on your device, as well as info about whether the theme supports icons, folders, the dock and the wallpaper. However, the best feature, by far, proved to be the ability to mix and match functionalities from a variety of themes to create an entirely custom look. And most of the themes are free.
Specs
Ranked in these QuestionsQuestion Ranking
Pros
Pro Great theme support
New themes compatible with ADW Launcher can be downloaded directly from Google Play. The launcher conveniently provides a link from the Themes page in the ADW Settings menu. More impressively, the Themes page provides previews of each theme you've installed on your device, as well as info about whether the theme supports icons, folders, the dock and the wallpaper. However, the best feature, by far, proved to be the ability to mix and match functionalities from a variety of themes to create an entirely custom look. And most of the themes are free.
Pro Infinite scrolling
Infinite scrolling lets you loop through home screens without requiring you to change direction.
Pro Tablet support
ADW.Launcher, despite being old and abandoned does work well on a tablet with the icons and everything else scaling correctly.
Pro Customizable app drawer
The margins, rows and columns of the app drawer also can be modified to fit your preferences. In addition, ADW Launcher supports a variety of visual styles for the app drawer, such as Horizontal Paginated, Vertical New and the standard Ice Cream Sandwich Paginated style.
Pro Customizable desktop
Adjust the size of the margins or the number of columns and rows on the desktop to a maximum grid size of 10 rows and columns.
Pro Stock Android experience
Made to look like stock Android with additional features.
Pro Group app drawers
ADW Launcher allows you to create your own groups in the app drawer.
Pro Easy to use, card-based interface
The home screen is organized into cards that can be scrolled vertically. Cards can contain widgets or collections of apps. Swiping from the left gives access to all apps and swiping from the right gives access to all widgets. These can then be added to the homescreen. It's possible to customize the order, color, transparency, size and what how much information or apps a card displays.
Pro Clean, material design inspired aesthetic
The look of the launcher is inspired by Android 5.0 Lollipop and material design. It follows material design color scheme, has a card-based layout and a Google Now-like, header with a stylized image of a city at the top of the homescreen that changes throughout the day.
Cons
Con Last updated July 27, 2013
ADW.Launcher has not been updated since 2013, basically meaning it is abandoned.
Con Interface is not optimized for widgets that can be scrolled
Since the interface is based on vertical scrolling cards, widgets that can be scrolled (like a calendar widget) can get in the way of easily scrolling through the list of cards. It is possible to turn off widget scrolling in the settings to avoid these issues, but limits functionality of widgets.