Microsoft Launcher

Following the successful launch of the Next Lock Screen for Android, the Loop team found that several capabilities they wanted to add to the lock screen just were not possible. So, the idea to build Arrow Launcher was born, a full launcher replacement for Android.

The team knew they wanted to leverage what they had learned in building Next Lock Screen and continue to work with the large engaged fanbase from that release. Their development team in Beijing was able to quickly take the core ideas they had come up with and build an initial version of the launcher. The team started dialog with the Next fanbase early on and this provided both early feedback on feature direction and created a buildup of interest. When V1 of Arrow Launcher (later renamed Microsoft Launcher) was released, the team onboarded a lot of early users quickly through this fanbase and received a good amount of word-of-mouth press, which helped raise visibility of Arrow to new users.

From the start, it was critical to differentiate since the launcher space was very crowded and several incumbents had deep feature lists and hundreds of millions of users. The team also knew they wanted to leverage the contextual capabilities they had built for Next and explore the contextual computing/AI space much more deeply with Arrow. The biggest breakthrough came in the early design when it was decided to forgo any form of customization. This approach was unheard of in the Android space and created a lot of pushback both with users and within the team. But the team had a strong point of view that the launcher couldn’t compete on customization since their competitors had years head start in this area.

The team’s commitment to this direction and building of a deep community that they engaged with and listened to allowed them to not only differentiate against huge incumbents but create what become the #1 launcher in the Android Play Store. Arrow’s ratio of beta testers to users and reviews to users was always significantly higher than its competitors. It was this deep connection with their user base that allowed the team to make rapid progress and build a world class launcher on a competitor’s platform.
The first few years of this project was a collaboration between Bellevue and Beijing teams. While there are always unique challenges when your team is split over 5,000 miles, the relationships they created and the ability to operate as a single unit was a defining strength that accelerated their growth and progress.

In Oct 2017, Arrow Launcher officially graduated from the Garage as Microsoft Launcher, and it has been a very important part of the overall Windows Mobility and Merchandising Experience (MMX) to improve overall cross-device experience between PC and mobile. A few months later, Microsoft Launcher celebrated 15 million installs and has become an important part of the Microsoft 365 offering.