Get Marshmallow’s app tray on any phone

Martyn Casserly shows how to get Android M’s app tray

To get started, you’ll need to launch the Google Play app on your phone and search for, download and install the Google Now Launcher. Open the Google Now Launcher and you’ll be prompted to decide whether you want to use it Just once or Always. You can choose Just once if you’re not sure you’ll like it, but it’s easy to revert to

the way you had things by uninstalling the Google Now Launcher if you opt for Always instead.

You’ll notice a change to your app tray, whereby all your apps are listed alphabetically and on a clean white background. But this isn’t quite Android Marshmallow-style just yet.

You’ll need to download and install the latest Google App by sideloading its APK file. You can do so by plugging the phone into a PC or Mac and copying the APK file to its Downloads folder, then opening it on a File Manager app on your phone and tapping Install. (Note that you’ll need to enable the ability to install apps from unknown sources in the Settings, Security menu first.)

To get the latest Google App APK file you can do a simple Google search, or you can directly download from Google Play the latest version. To do so, you’ll need to be running the Google Chrome browser with a APK Downloader installed (download one from tinyurl.com/oLrt9f8). Next, navigate to the Google App on Google Play (tinyurl.com/94nkwej) and hit the Download APK button.

On your phone go to Settings > Apps > Google Now Launcher and tap Clear Cache. Do the same for the Google App.

Open your app tray and you should now see your frequently used apps listed at the top, and an alphabetical list of the other apps installed on your phone below.