Wallpaper Engine Is on Android!

A few years ago I made a video showing off the Wallpaper Engine program on Windows. To this day, I still use that program for all of my Windows computers daily. For only $3.99, that was probably the best app I’ve ever purchased on any platform. With a constantly expanding wallpaper library made by talented users, my monitor always displays a relevant background to trending pop culture references. I didn’t think it could get any better until I stumbled upon the Wallpaper Engine Android companion app a few weeks ago. I don’t know how this got past my radar for half a year, but with this companion app, my Android wallpaper game has completely elevated to a whole other level.

What is Wallpaper Engine?

If you don’t know what Wallpaper Engine is, it’s a program that can be purchased on the Steam store to control your wallpapers. Even though it’s on the Steam store, It technically isn’t a game. The program is essentially an interface to manage live wallpapers as well as a digital storefront to download them from other users who upload their designs. There’s such a wide variety of wallpapers for download that there’s something for everyone whether it be anime oriented, nature themed, or even on the meme spectrum. The motion in each wallpaper ranges from significant to nearly non-existent. It’d be really hard to not be able to find something you’d like to use on Wallpaper Engine.

That being said, the live wallpaper space is a bit more populated than on Windows. A quick search on the Google Play Store and you’re swamped with a bunch of Zedge-like apps. It can be a bit jarring to find quality movement to display on your background. With the Wallpaper Engine companion app, we can actually transfer those same high quality wallpapers onto our Android devices. 

How’s It work on Android?

After downloading the Android app and simultaneously having the Windows variant open, a mobile device section will be accessible to wirelessly connect the two systems. Once you select your phone, the Wallpaper companion app will recognize the PC and highlight green. On the right panel, under the Mobile Devices category, selecting the icon will open a new menu that allows users to customize the wallpaper to best fit on the mobile screen. This is where the cropping for aspect ratio differences as well as the FPS and video resolution can be adjusted to optimize for performance based on the specs of your phone. Since most wallpapers on Wallpaper Engine have a 16:9 or wider aspect ratio, this process allows us to align the 9:16 or narrower aspect ratio to hit whatever spot we want to display on the image. I love the flexibility and depth we can accomplish here on the PC, so that when you click accept, you don’t have to tinker with anything on the phone. Once the progress bar is complete, the wallpaper is now stored on your companion app on the phone and no longer needs the PC to influence it. It’s essentially a wireless iTunes store (wow that’s an old reference).

The Best Live Wallpapers

You can also import files from your smartphone into the Wallpaper Engine companion app and use it as your smartphone’s wallpaper gallery to keep everything in one place. As for the concern of whether the animated wallpapers drain battery life on a smartphone, the app doesn’t even register as a top 10 offender in battery consumption for me. After being on iOS for nearly a year, it’s refreshing to have PC-like desktop customization on my handheld again. With this Android companion app, that $3.99 I spent last decade just keeps on giving.  

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