HTC Sense Home Update will Include a Pixel Launcher Style App Drawer

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Smartphone OEMs like to use software to differentiate themselves from the competition. This results in OEM ROMs attempting to have a different style and feature set compared to devices from other companies. HTC has Sense, with their own HTC Sense Home launcher. Right now, this functions like a normal launcher where you have your commonly used apps on a page and then a button to open the home screen. However, a new video shows that an upcoming update will add in the swipe up gesture to open up the application drawer.

When leaks of the Pixel Launcher were first making headlines, many people within the community got paranoid that Google was doing away with the application drawer entirely. This was because the application drawer button was no longer there and they weren’t privy to the idea that swiping up on the home screen was the idea to open up the app drawer. Since then, we’ve seen some custom launchers add in this feature so the user can replace that app drawer button with a useful application icon.

We’ve even seen OnePlus transition to this app drawer style, as well as Samsung, and now a new leak suggests HTC will be doing something similar. XDA Recognized Contributor LlabTooFeR is known for their HTC custom ROM as well as the HTC leaks they’re able to provide to the community. Earlier today on Twitter, they uploaded a video of what is said to be an upcoming update to the HTC Sense Home launcher for eligible HTC smartphones.

Upcoming Sense Home update. Now it's more like Pixel Launcher behavior. pic.twitter.com/euQ0bBZECE — LlabTooFeR (@LlabTooFeR) September 29, 2017

The video that we see shows a swipe up gesture expanding the application drawer just like we see in the Pixel Launcher. Interestingly though, is this version still has the application drawer icon so it’s possible that either this is an unfinished version of the launcher, or that the app drawer and/or swipe up gesture is included as options so the end user can mix and match how they have it setup. The end of the video also shows that app shortcuts also function just as you would expect