Live wallpaper apps for Windows: how to choose
There are several apps for animated wallpapers, and they differ mainly in price and in where the wallpapers come from. Here is what to look at before you install one.
Wallpaper Engine
The best known app of this kind. It is paid, sold on Steam, and its biggest strength is a huge library of user-made wallpapers in the Steam Workshop.
Lively Wallpaper
A free, open source app. A good choice if you want to use your own videos or web pages as a wallpaper and enjoy configuring things yourself.
Aurolis
A free app with a gallery in your browser, where you can see each wallpaper moving before you install it and set it with one click. It does not support the Steam Workshop or Wallpaper Engine wallpapers: the gallery is a separate collection under stated licenses. Anyone who makes their own wallpaper can also submit it.
What to look at when choosing
- Price and wallpaper source. Check that wallpapers have a clear license and where they come from.
- Pausing. The app should stop the animation during games and on battery.
- Multiple monitors. If you have more than one screen, check that each can have its own wallpaper.
- A trusted download. Install only from the maker's site or a store, not from random bundles.