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Over the past several years, Samsung’s home-brewed TouchWiz user interface went through numerous changes, most of which have been arguably for the best. Needless to say, with each new release, TouchWiz UI slowly but surely became less “bloated” and the overall design continued to lean towards a cleaner look akin to Google’s Material Design vision. The Samsung Galaxy S7 with its new version of TouchWiz is proof of that, but apparently Samsung wasn’t too happy with the idea of abandoning its old ways entirely. Although TouchWiz UI on the Galaxy S7 is quite “clean” compared to previous versions, it looks like Samsung’s vision in regards to how a user interface should look like has been transplanted into a new, optional “advanced” UI designed for the latest flagship phones. It’s called “Good Lock” and is now available for download on the aforementioned devices through the Samsung Galaxy Apps store.
In a nutshell, Samsung’s Good Lock is an optional user interface for the Galaxy S7 series, which revolves mainly around changing the phone’s lock screen design. The manufacturer describes the application as “the advanced Samsung System UI”, suggesting that Good Lock offers users a more comprehensive lock screen with additional customization options. Sure enough, Good Lock gives users the option to group notification into folders and allows to “Keep” notifications by swiping right, or dismiss them for a certain period of time. Despite its name, however, the application expands to other areas of the user interface aside from the lock screen, and also brings major changes to the Recent apps menu which now shows all the recent applications in “list” format without a preview. It also includes its own apps drawer, which is rather odd considering the fact that the stock app drawer remains active as well. Last but not least, Good Lock redesigns the quick-toggle area in the notification shade and includes a “Routines” feature that lets users change the UI’s design based on location or time of day.
With all of the above being said, while Samsung Good Lock adds a handful of new features to stock TouchWiz UI, it seems to do so in a rather disorganized manner. The optional user interface appears to follow its own design guidelines which are more reminiscent of the old, colorful versions of TouchWiz, and this seems to conflict with the rest of the stock TouchWiz UI on the Samsung Galaxy S7, which has been toned down over the years. Ultimately, there’s only one way to find out if Good Lock UI is or isn’t your cup of tea, so if you happen to own the Samsung Galaxy S7 or Galaxy S7 Edge you can head down to Samsung’s Galaxy Apps store and take the optional lock screen out on a test drive.
