Microsoft launches lockscreen apps for Android, Windows Phone

Microsoft app launches are usually predictable. Most are offerings which aim to get us hooked on the software giant's most-prominent products, like Office, OneDrive, Outlook.com and Xbox. But, every once in a while, Microsoft does something out of the ordinary, like it wants to tell the world that, much like startups, it too is capable of intriguing and exciting things.

After launching a lovely keyboard for Android Wear, Microsoft just released a whole bunch of apps for Android, iOS and Windows Phone, made by an in-house team of "hackers, makers, artists, tinkerers, musicians, inventors" called Microsoft Garage. The most interesting offerings are Torque, which my colleague Brian Fagioli just covered, and two lockscreen apps, for Android and Windows Phone.

The Android lockscreen app is called Next Lock Screen. It is designed to offer much more useful information, compared to typical Android lockscreens, and provide intelligent access to certain apps.

You can see calendar entries, emails, missed calls and messages, and open the most-used apps based on location. It also gives you the option to connect to conference calls right from the homescreen. It also looks quite nice.

For Windows Phone users, Microsoft launched Tetra Lockscreen. It is very different compared to the stock Windows Phone lockscreen, that is still very sparse feature-wise, and the ones offered by Microsoft through its Live Lock Screen beta app, as, like Next Lock Screen, it shows a tremendous amount of information.

It even supports widgets, which, currently, show your calendar entries, location and give access to a stopwatch. There is swipe support, which works nice with the calendar functionality.

Even though both apps are quite decent from the start, Microsoft is looking to improve such offerings further through your feedback. "Tell us what rocks, and what doesn’t", says the team behind these apps.

Next Lock Screen is available to download from Google Play. Tetra Lockscreen is available to download from Windows Phone Store.