Live wallpaper is a simple yet effective way of sprucing up your smartphone’s Home screen. Even when it isn’t live, a good wallpaper background for your Home screen can really make your smartphone use more positive and upbeat. So just imagine the difference a live wallpaper — which will move like a GIF — could make to your Android or iPhone user experience.
Sound tempting? This article explains how to make a live wallpaper for iPhone and Android. It covers how to do this natively on the iPhone, without needing to download live wallpaper apps. It also covers how to do this through the use of third-party apps on Android.
How to make a live wallpaper on iPhone
If you have an iPhone 6S or later, you can make a live wallpaper on iPhone natively, without having to download an app. This is because the iPhone 6S and later models (not including the first-generation iPhone SE) allow you to take Live Photos and also enable 3D or Haptic Touch. In case you aren’t aware, Live Photos are very short snippets of video. Normally, they allow you to edit and choose the perfect frame for your photo. However, they can also be used as live wallpaper. Here’s what you have to do:
Step 1: Go to Settings > Wallpaper.
Step 2: Tap Choose a New Wallpaper. Scroll down and tap Live Photos.
Step 3: Select a photo. Make sure that you have Live Photo: On activated.
Step 4: Tap Set. Choose either Set Lock Screen or Set Both. Don’t choose Set Home Screen, since the wallpaper won’t actually move on the Home screen.
Once you’ve done this, you’ll have a live wallpaper. That said, it will be live only on the Lock screen, and only if you tap and hold the image.
You can also use a number of iOS apps to save a GIF or video as a Live Photo, which you’ll then be able to set as a live wallpaper (as described above). For example, IntoLive is a very popular iOS app that can convert videos you’ve taken to Live Photos. Likewise, Giphy can convert GIFs into Live Photos.
How to make a live wallpaper on Android
To make a live wallpaper on Android, you need to download a third-party live wallpaper app. There are several of these currently available, with some of the most popular including Idutchsolutions’ Video Live Wallpaper, KLWP Live Wallpaper Maker, GIF Live Wallpaper, and Walloop’s Live Wallpapers HD & Backgrounds 4k/3D.
There is also a wide range of other live wallpaper apps that make and set different live wallpapers for you. For example, Muzei Live Wallpaper updates your Android smartphone every day with a new live wallpaper based on a famous work of art. Meanwhile, Forest Live Wallpaper provides you with forest-themed live wallpapers.
However, if you want to make your own live wallpapers on Android, here’s how you can use Video Live Wallpaper to do so.
Step 1: Open the app, then tap Gallery. Select the video you’d like to set as a live wallpaper.
Step 2: Next, choose the settings you’d like for the live wallpaper. There’s an option to Play Audio, which probably isn’t the best idea if you want to save battery or be discreet. You can also choose to loop the video, so it plays repeatedly. You can even choose to Play video screen, which keeps the live wallpaper running even when you’re in an app.
Step 3: Once you’ve chosen your desired settings, tap Set Live Wallpaper.
That’s it. While there are lots of similar live wallpaper apps out there (there’s another one called Video Live Wallpaper that is also worth a look), they all work in more or less the same way. Experiment and — above all — have fun.