This free Windows wallpaper app gives your desktop superpowers

No disrespect to Microsoft’s splashy Windows 11 wallpapers, however there’s a greater solution to make your Windows desktop really feel extra inspiring.

It’s known as Lively Wallpaper by rockdanister, and it’s a free app that transforms your Windows desktop with stay, dynamic backgrounds. Lively is an open supply venture and runner-up for 2022’s Microsoft Store App Awards, and it’s rapidly turn out to be certainly one of my favourite apps since putting in it final yr.

While Lively Wallpaper isn’t the one stay wallpaper app for Windows, it’s one of the best free choice I’ve discovered, and it has one particularly neat trick: You can flip any web site right into a stay desktop background, elevating the standard wallpaper from an aesthetic enhancement into a useful gizmo.

How to arrange Lively Wallpaper

First, you’ll must resolve which model of Lively Wallpaper to put in. Most people ought to simply seize the Microsoft Store app, however you can even download Lively directly from the developer’s web site.

While the 2 variations are largely the identical, some web site wallpapers could not show correctly and not using a plugin that solely works with the direct obtain. (More on that shortly.)

Once you’ve put in the app, double-click the Lively Wallpaper icon from the system tray. The app comes with a dozen stay wallpapers out of the field, and clicking anybody will set it as your energetic wallpaper.

You may attempt right-clicking on a wallpaper and in search of a Customize choice. Some wallpapers, such because the built-in “Triangles & Light,” allow you to regulate coloration, lighting, and different particulars via this menu, and a few may even reply to system audio.

For people with a number of screens, Lively helps you to set completely different backgrounds for every show. Click the Active Wallpapers button on the prime, then ensure that Selected display screen solely is highlighted to keep away from any undesirable wallpaper stretching. You also needs to examine off Always decide display screen when selecting wallpaper, which brings up a monitor selector everytime you decide a brand new background.

Turn web sites into wallpapers

Jared Newman / Foundry

Dynamic wallpapers and looping movies are neat, however Lively’s true potential comes from turning web sites into desktop backgrounds. This transforms the app from a supply of fairly surroundings into an countless supply of amusement or productiveness.

To add an internet site in Lively, simply click on the Add Wallpaper button on the prime, paste your web site into the URL discipline, then click on the arrow button.

Pretty a lot any web site with stay, updating info or visuals could make an ideal background in Lively Wallpaper. Here are some concepts:

Jared Newman / Foundry

By default, web site backgrounds will reply to mouse enter, however not keyboard controls. To allow the keyboard or disable mouse enter, head to Settings (⚙) > Wallpaper. Note that enabling the keyboard can even disguise your desktop icons.

You may wish to disable audio on no matter web site you’ve chosen. Look for the audio slider beneath Settings > General.

Find extra stay wallpapers

If you wish to discover the dynamic wallpaper idea additional, there are a number of locations you possibly can look.

Lively Wallpaper’s DeviantArt gallery, as an example, features a assortment of animated and interactive stay wallpapers. (You’ll want a DeviantArt account to obtain the information.) You may skim via the Lively Wallpaper subreddit for concepts, or examine the venture’s GitHub discussion page.

Jared Newman / Foundry

The app additionally helps setting movies as wallpapers. Sites like Pexels and Pixabay provide looping movies that work effectively as desktop backgrounds, and in case you select Customize in Lively, you possibly can regulate the playback pace, colours, and saturation.

To add a brand new wallpaper in Lively, simply click on the Add Wallpaper button on the prime. You can then choose a file or use drag and drop.

You can retailer these wallpapers anyplace, however Lively does provide its personal listing, which you’ll search for beneath Settings > General > Wallpaper Directory. Any wallpaper information on this listing might be deleted if you take away them from the app, and you’ll change the listing to maneuver all of the wallpapers in it.

A number of caveats

Lively Wallpaper continues to be beneath energetic growth and has seen a gradual stream of enhancements over the past yr, however it’s nonetheless not with out some tough edges. Some issues to concentrate on:

• Laptop customers could wish to disable stay wallpapers when on battery energy. This choice is accessible beneath Settings > Performance.
• The WebView2 plugin (required for Window Swap, above) appears to have some issues. Web wallpapers could disappear throughout full-screen purposes and fail to load till you take away and re-add them in Lively, and a few dynamic wallpapers could fail to work in any respect.
• Lively Wallpaper is technically able to operating EXE information as wallpapers, which may pair effectively with visualizer apps corresponding to Plane9 or ProjectM, however to this point I’ve but to get both app to work correctly.

Also value noting: My favourite web site to make use of with Lively Wallpaper is Window Swap, which reveals webcam footage looking from folks’s home windows around the globe. It pairs particularly effectively with a number of monitor setups, as you’ll get glimpses of world surroundings each time your additional screens aren’t in use.

But getting Window Swap to work has been an ordeal. It requires a separate WebView2 plugin, which in flip doesn’t work with the Microsoft Store model of the app. This plugin additionally appears to forestall a few of Lively’s dynamic wallpapers from working correctly, and enjoying video games in full-screen mode generally causes wallpapers to vanish fully.

For me, although, it’s been completely value it. Lively Wallpaper is a good useful resource for anybody who needs to boost their desktop wallpaper, and with web-based backgrounds, you’re solely restricted by what you possibly can dream up.

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