How to set a wallpaper on any Android phone

Three ways to set a downloaded wallpaper on Motorola, Nothing, vivo, Honor and every other Android phone.

Every Android phone can set a picture as its wallpaper, but each brand names the menus a little differently. This guide covers the ones not listed separately, such as Motorola, Nothing, vivo, iQOO, Honor, Tecno, Infinix and Nokia. It gives three routes. If one does not match your phone, the next one will.

1. Download the wallpaper

Open the wallpaper and tap Download HD, or Download 4K if it has one.
Wait for the countdown and tap Download now.
Your browser saves it to the Download folder and shows a notification when it is done.

Route 1: from the download notification

This is the fastest, if you catch the notification in time.

Tap the Download complete notification. The picture opens in your phone's image viewer.
Tap the three dots (⋮) or More.
Tap Set as, Use as or Set as wallpaper, whichever is there.
If it asks which app to use, pick the one with wallpaper in its name.
Frame the picture and choose Home screen, Lock screen or both.

Route 2: from your gallery

Open your gallery app. It may be called Gallery, Photos or Albums.
Find the Download or Downloads album and open the wallpaper.
Use the three dots or More menu and look for Set as wallpaper.
Frame it and choose where it goes.

Route 3: from the Home screen

This works on almost every Android phone.

Touch and hold an empty part of the Home screen.
Tap Wallpaper, Wallpapers or Wallpaper & style.
Look for My photos, Gallery or Photos and pick the wallpaper.
Frame it and choose where it goes.

Where downloads are kept

If you cannot find the file at all, open your phone's file app. It is usually called Files, File Manager or My Files. Then open Downloads. Every browser on Android saves there unless you changed it. Sort by date and the wallpaper is at the top.

Keep the wallpaper you chose

Several brands ship a lock screen feed that swaps your wallpaper for new pictures, often with news or adverts on top. It goes by names like Glance, Lock screen magazine, Wallpaper carousel or Lock screen stories. If your wallpaper keeps disappearing, open Settings, search for one of those names, and turn it off.

If something goes wrong

“Set as” opens the wrong app. If a launcher or theme app took over, pick the phone's own wallpaper option from the list instead.
It looks blurry or cropped. See how to make a wallpaper fit and stay sharp.

Using a Samsung, Pixel, Xiaomi, OnePlus, OPPO or realme? Those have their own step-by-step guides on the guides page.

Other guides

Looking for something to put on your phone? Browse the wallpapers.