Android emulator for PC or MACs is one of the best emulators for gamers to focus and improve their gaming skills. There are many reasons for emulating Android on your Windows PC because with the help of emulation it is much easier to test apps on-screen or desktop than on a mobile device.
Android emulators are used by developers to test their application before pushing them to the play store and it can serve other purposes as well. Mostly Android emulators are used by gamers to use. All emulators đź claim they are #1 Android emulator that are capable for playing any latest game on minimum system resources.
Android developers can debug their app right onto their desktops and gamers can enjoy any game on a bigger screen. Android Emulator for PC is very popular and favorable for players and gamers who want to play mobile games with a larger screen and faster processor.
Generally, it provides a virtual environment, or in other words, it is an Android Virtual Device (AVD) in which you can try or test your android applications on your PC.
Nowadays there are numerous Android emulators present for PCs and Macs. These android emulators are especially for those who are wondering that they have a variety of features available on a single application.
By using Android Emulators you can resemble a different network speed at a particular time, GPS location, incoming calls, and text messages, hardware sensors, etc.
3 Main Uses for Android Emulator For PCâ
There are three main uses for emulators-
1. The First is for Gamingâ Gamers can use emulators on their computers to make some easy to play games. Here, gamers donât have to rely on the battery life of their devices and the existence of macros and other tricks help the process.
In most cases, these little tricks arenât illegal (in most games) so nobody really has a problem with it. The best Android emulators for gaming include LDPlayer, Bluestacks, MeMu, KoPlayer, and Nox.
2. The Second use case is Developmentâ Android app and game developers like to test apps and games on as many devices as possible before their actual launch. Usually, an Android Studio emulator is fine for this kind of work.
However, Xamarin and Genymotion are also considered excellent for this type.
3. The Third is Productivityâ This isnât nearly as common because Chromebooks are cheaper and better for using Android apps on something other than a phone and most productivity tools are cross-platform. Any gaming emulator works as a productivity emulator to some extent.
We will pick some best lists of Android emulators for PC that helps to optimize gaming and the great point is that you can try these for free and are easy to install at any android application.
Here are the best Android emulator for PC and Mac-
Top 10 Android Emulator for PC
- Andriod studio emulator
- GameLoop
- Blue Stacks
- Bliss OS
- Remix OS
- Genymotion
- ARChon
- Nox player
- MEmu
- KO player
1. Android Studio Emulator
This Android studio emulator is one of the most popular Android Emulator for PC. It comes with predefined configurations for various Android phones, tablets, Wear OS, and Android TV devices.
According to the working of Android Studio Player, it is the best way of controlling the audio and video files and streams. It accesses built-in media player services like playing, audio, video, etc. This emulator provides various features of a real Android device. It can resemble incoming phone calls and text messages, indicate the location and, other hardware sensors, and many more.
Install the emulator: To install the Android emulator, choose the Android emulator component in the SDK tools tabs in the SDK manager.
In simple words, we can say that the Android studio emulator controls all the multimedia platforms.
Pros:
- This emulator has many advanced features and you can resemble various hardware such as network connectivity, GPs location, motion sensors, and multi-touch input.
- The emulator has an easy installation process and starts the app faster than a real device.
- You can test this emulator in various Android devices such as phones, tablets, Windows, and Android TV devices.
2. GameLoop
Tencent wants to develop multiplayer games that assets from explicit control, so basically this upgrade in feature further provides a comfortable experience to gaming. And now GameLoop is their new official Android emulator.
It is the latest and the advanced, next-generation feature-rich android emulator for PC.
Some of the most prominent mobile games are present out there, including Mobile Legends and Call of duty, Free fire, PUBG Mobile (one of my most favorite), and many other android games using this emulator with the perfect key mapping. It runs every game smoothly by covering all kinds of the category.
How GameLoop works: For the installation of a Gameloop Android emulator, youâll need to require 4GB of RAM, a minimum hard disk space of 1.5 GB, and an Intel or AMD processor of 15 or higher.
One of the best parts of the GameLoop feature is, all features come in three different languages, such as English, Chinese, and Vietnamese.
Pros:
- GameLoop emulator has a collection of most popular games in the game center.
- With the help of this emulator, the games run smoothly and flexibly.
- GameLoop uses a lobby feature for making good contact between the users and friends.
- Start direct Livestream within the emulator.
3. Blue Stacks
Blue stacks is a fast and very known Andriod emulator, the app player which is designed to enable Andriod applications to run on PCs. It was founded in 2011 in San Francisco California United States.
More than 210 million people around the world are using these mobile games on their PCs. It has a unique platform that combines digital and traditional advertising channels to maximize both in a way no has done before.
However, it is a multitasking emulator in which an ideal game session would last for at least 12 hours and again you should continue playing within, moving anywhere.
Blue stack player has its own Playstore through which we can download the Andriod application we need. You can also download Blustacks 4 High Octane gaming action.
This emulator is especially about games and the interface is essentially a front end for downloading and installing them, but itâs also possible to visit the Google Play Store and search for other apps.
Pros:
- Blue stacks emulator runs almost all your Android apps.
- The freeware optimized for Gaming & General usage.
- It has a very fast ability to understand user experience than any other emulator.
- This android emulator for PC is one of the widely used emulators in all of them.
4. Bliss OS
Bliss OS is an open-source Android operating system. It has many features and expanded device support which helps to boost the working of this emulator. It is another effort to experience Android gaming to the computing market covering from smartphones to computers.
Bliss OS player works similar to an Android Tablet in this operating system. Also, the play store is pre-installed and we have to only log in our Gmail account or any account into the operating system, and then we can install and use each and every Android app.
Best Android Emulator For Mac Big Surgery
Generally, this Bliss OS emulator is much compatible with every device we own. PC builds include extras for ARM/ARM64 app compatibility.
It offers many custom options for big screens and small screen alike that allows us to set up our device for different tasks.
Pros:
- Bliss OS emulator has great features like- taskbar launcher and pixel launcher.
- It is like Android x-86, outcomes with ARM virtualization support, so you can run many Android ARM apps on your x-86 device.
- Bliss OS has a very simple user interface that is easy to understand and can be used just like Chromium OS.
- This is a unique android emulator for PC as compared to traditional GNU based Linux distraction.
5. Remix OS
Remix OS player was first available for Windows PC and it is a computer operating system that was initially released in January 2016 and discontinued computer system for personal computer which is written in C (core), C++, Java(UI).
Furthermore, Remix OS is one of the fastest and most optimized android emulators for PC. For the more devoted games, this emulator has superb features which include a key mapping tool that allows Android games with touch control schemes to be played more effectively with keyboard and mouse.
In other words, the Remix operating system is a modified version of Android that can run on any personal computer. This Operating system has an Android play store too, with the help of which we can install and run Android applications on the personal computer.
Remix OS Player will let Android developers optimize their apps for the Android PC/Chrome OS environment because of its mouse and multiple window support.
Pros:
- Run Android games on the latest version of Android OS, on your PC.
- Map unlimited buttons to controls in the game.
- Remix OS is a complete Android withe collection of a mouse, keyboard, a bigger screen, and powerful processing.
6. Genymotion
Genymotion is another Android emulator for PC, which is considered as much smoother to run apps on desktop than any other emulators. This emulator is available for Windows, Mac, and Linux.
It works by creating a virtual machine through VirtualBox to deliver an Android emulator with support for hardware sensors such as GPS, accelerometer, and battery.
Best Android Emulator For Mac Big Sur App
This emulator is great for developers because you can test phones without having to actually own them and also we can pick the advice which we want.
Genymotion emulator uses x86 architecture virtualization and open GL hardware acceleration which makes running our apps more efficient. It works by creating a virtual machine through Virtualbox with support for hardware sensors such a GPS, accelerometer.
Pros:
- Genymotion is available on Windows, OS X, and Linux.
- Genymotion has plugins for Eclipse and Android Studio allowing you to launch Genymotion right from within those IDEs.
- Genymotion allows using a webcam connected to a computer as a camera for the emulated device.
- It can also enable a dummy webcam that will display a Genymotion logo in motion.
7. ARChon
ArChon is an Android tool that is installed as an extension for Google Chrome with which you can Android applications in your favorite web browser. It is also known as ArChon Runtime for chrome and it has a chromium-browser that can easily run android apps on Windows PC and many other different supported platforms.
This is the first Android Emulator for PC that works on the Chrome Operating system and Chromebooks. Many games and other gaming applications can run on it.
This extension can only load Chrome OS apps which means users are forced to first convert their Android APK files to this format using a small âChromeOS-APKâ app that is built on top of the Node.js platform
Unfortunately, ARChon does not support all the games, but it also comes for Windows 64-bit, 32-bit. It can be used on chrome across various platforms including Windows, Linux, Mac OS.
Basically, it is integrated with Google Chrome.
Pros:
- It has no troublesome installation and it is good for productivity apps.
- ARChon can work with any Operating system.
- It is one of the best emulators for every gaming platform.
8. Nox Player
Nox player is one of the fastest and sleekest Android Emulator for PC and Mac. This emulator gives you a stock version of Android and you easily installed more apps from the Google play store too.
If you are going to use this Nox player, youâll be fully satisfied with your review because you can use favorite Gamepad and you have options of mapping keys or buttons to perform android indicators.
Another advantage of the NOX player is that it is fully compatible with Windows 10.
This emulator is based on Android 4.2.2 which may be old, but should not create any problem for other apps. These are basically built for gamers by incorporating complete compatibility gamepads, joysticks, etc.
Pros:
- Nox player has plenty of customization and option features in it.
- It is the safest emulator.
- Nox is much better and safe than blue stacks, Andy and MeMU, because it has a huge majority of Noxâs viruses/spyware that can be blocked.
9. MEmu
MEmu player is another stunning Android Emulator that has lots of features in it. This software is based on Android Nougat (7.12) by default and can also run Kit Kat (4..4) and Lollipop (5.0).
In fact, according to the compatibility point of view, it has one of the most outstanding features that supports both Intel and AMD CPUs. Obviously, it sounds amazing because this feature is not available on many Android emulators out there.
This MEmu player is most similar to the Blue stacks player or we can say that it gives the best replacement to Blue stacks player. However, this player has the ability to run multiple instances of app and Android versions at once.
The key point of the MEmu player is it supports a 4k gaming experience, which is the best thing that usually gamer wants.
Pros:
- It is a fast and easiest android emulator for everyone to get.
- You can play your favorite mobile games on your PC by just downloading the app.
- Inbuilt play store services and the company did add bloatware.
- The developers added an advanced option for gaming purposes, but sometimes it lacks power according to my frank opinion.
10. KO Player
KO Player is another Android Emulator for PC that works in multiple instances and is specially designed with gaming in mind.
Furthermore KO player has two modes such as Speed and Compatability, you can use the Speed option to maximize the Game performance and the other one to fall back on.
This emulator has one more specific feature i.e., a rather neat Multi-Manager tool that lets you run two or more instances of the emulator at once.
But unfortunately, KO Player bit hit, miss and sometimes it crashes even in compatibility mode. Also, it has lots of APKs available to download and can run a large range of other apps.
Pros:
- KO Player is the gamerâs first choice for Android emulator.
- The users can run multiple emulators on a single computer.
- There are gameplay recording capabilities, and it is a masterpiece for video creators.
Conclusion
Android emulator for PC work on the principle of proper platform visualization for both hardware and software. It helps in translating ABI to match the host device. Then the user integrates it with the operating system and runs it like a program or application on their computers.
In any case, Android emulation on PC is possible and much easier than it used to be. Some old favorites either left the space or become unusable (Andy, AmiduOS, and Leapdroid), but everything else here should work well for most people.
Which one are you using and enjoying? Share your experience and views with the android emulator for PC in the comment section below!
Check out our list of the best Android emulators available for Windows PC and Mac in 2020. Android emulators are seemingly becoming more popular as Androidâs popularity keeps growing. From developers testing apps to gamers playing on a large screen, users yearn for experiencing Android OS on a Windows PC, complimented with a mouse and keyboard. Some iOS emulators for PC and Mac are also available but Android ones offer a better performance.Maybe you are switching from iPhone to Android, or you merely want to test out a custom ROM, the possibilities with an Android emulator are endless. While BlueStacks has always topped the list of phone emulators for PC and Mac, few others are catching up insanely fast.
There are three main uses for emulators. The main and the most common use for Android Emulator is gaming. Gamers can use emulators on their computers to make some games easier to play. They donât have to rely on the battery life of their devices and the existence of macros and other tricks help the process. In most cases, these little tricks arenât illegal (in most games) so nobody really has a problem with it. So lets take a look at the best Android Emulators of 2020 for PC and Mac.
With most of such devices being powered by Operating Systems such as Windows and macOS, Android emulators come to the rescue when it is necessary on such non-Android platforms. If you are confused about which is the best Mac and PC Android emulator, the following article would serve as a guide.
List of Best Android Emulators in 2020:
Here is the list of our picks for the best Android emulators available for Windows PC, Mac and Linux platforms. PC support for emulators is more common than Mac and Linux. However, we have covered the best ones you can download right away. We have also included a few standalone Android builds that you can install on your computer.
- Nox Player
- BlueStacks
- LDPlayer
- MEmu
- Ko Player
- Genymotion
- Droid4X
- Android Studio Emulator
- Remix OS
- ARChon
- Bliss OS
- Phoenix OS
To know more about these best Android emulators, continue reading ahead:
1. Nox Player
Nox Player especially targets Android gamers. Although the emulator works perfectly fine for other Android apps and enjoying the whole Android experience, it is best suited for playing massive games like PUBG or Justice League. The best part of Nox Emulator is that itâs absolutely free with no sponsored ads at all.
The Nox Player allows you to map keys of keyboard, mouse, and gamepad. You can even assign keyboard keys for gestures, for instance, mapping shortcut for swiping right.Also, you can specify the CPU and RAM usage in the settings option to get the best gaming results. If rooting Android is your focus, Nox Player makes it easy to root the virtual device under one minute.
The only problem with Nox is that it puts a lot of load on the system. Thus, you canât use tons of other apps. Another thing is it is based on Android 5 Lollipop which might be a concern for you. For a complete setup and install guide, read: How to Install Nox Player 6
Compatibility: Windows and Mac
2. BlueStacks
BlueStacks is probably the most known Android emulator among Android users. The emulator is preferred for gaming and is ridiculously easy to set up. Other than Play Store, you have the option of downloading BlueStacks optimized apps from its own app store. Although, BlueStacks supports keyboard mapping but does not go well with gestures.
A major drawback of BlueStacks emulator is that it gets sluggish in productivity apps. Other than that, the sponsored ads make the emulator lose behind other best free Android emulators for Windows. Talking specifically about BlueStacks 4, it brings an excellent gaming performance, thanks to low CPU and memory usage. It also claims to be 6x faster than Samsung Galaxy S9+. For a complete setup and install guide, read: How to Install Bluestacks 4
Compatibility: Windows and Mac
3. LDPlayer
LDPlayer is a free Android emulator for Windows PC users to play Android games easily on computer. This emulator is built with gaming in behind with all the features targeted for optimization of Android games. LDPlayer is based on Android 5.1.1 and Android 7.1.2 Nougat and provides the best compatibility with games like PUBG Mobile, Call of Duty: Mobile and Free Fire.
The team claims this emulator performs much better than playing Android games on a real phone. You can install games directly from APK + OBB data and you can also download Android games from the Google Play Store.
Compatibility: Windows PC only
4. MEmu
MEmu is relatively a new app player in comparison to the others. Launched in 2015, the MeMu Play, again, is focused on gaming. Regarding the speed, this Android emulator gives similar results as Nox and BlueStacks.One of the most important features of MeMu Android emulator is its support for both AMD and Nvidia chips. It also supports different Android versions like Android Jelly Bean, Kit Kat, and Lollipop. While MeMu advocates for high-performance gaming, the graphics performance is relatively poor. I saw textures and smoothness missing in comparison to other app players.
MEmu is currently based on Android Lollipop and works top of the class with productivity apps. And if you are looking forward to playing games like Ingress or Pokémon Go, this should be your choice.
Compatibility: Windows PC only
5. Ko Player
Just like other Android gaming emulators out there, Ko Player focuses on delivering lag-free gaming experience with a lightweight software.As Ko Player is free of cost yet you might see few ads here and there. The app player is easy to install and navigate through the apps. It also supports keyboard mapping and gamepad emulation.The downside of this Android emulator is that it sometimes freezes out of the blue. Also, the player is a little buggy and makes it difficult for the user to uninstall the Android emulator.
Compatibility: Windows and Mac
6. Genymotion
Genymotion is not your casual Android emulator; it is only targeted at developers. The Android simulator lets you test apps on a variety of virtual devices with different versions of Android. The emulator is compatible with Android SDK and Android Studio. It even works macOS and Linux.Since Genymotion is inclined towards developers, it is equipped with lots of developer-friendly features. And it might not be the right choice for people looking for Android gaming experience.
Compatibility: Windows, Mac and Linux
7. Droid4X
Droid4x is an Android virtual machine/simulator that runs as a guest operating system on your PC or your Mac. It is a full, working Android operating system with networking (wi-fi), Google Play Store, and functional apps. You can play games, install apps, configure settings, test your apps, navigate the system, and anything else you can do with an Android device. Droid4x works on Windows and on Mac OS X. Android version 4.2.2 is the current version running on Droid4x.
Compatibility: Windows and Mac
8. Android Studio Emulator
Android Studio is a development IDE (Integrated development environment) from Google itself and especially caters to developers. It basically comes with a bunch of tools and plugins to help developers build and test their apps.Android Studio has a built-in emulator but packs fewer features in comparison to Genymotion. The emulator is unquestionably not for general usage and playing heavy games. Android Studio is tough to set up but simultaneously favorite of many developers.
For a complete setup and installation instructions, we would recommend you read through the following tutorials:
- First, download and install the latest Android Studio.
- Second, install and setup Android 10 emulator.
Compatibility: Windows and Mac
9. Remix OS
Well, Remix OS is nothing like other Android emulators out there. It is an entire Android OS which you can boot into. Unlike the other emulators that can easily on top of the Window, Remix OS needs to be installed on a separate partition.Remix OS is a Jide Technology product, a company formed by Googleâs former employees. You can put Remix OS on a USB device and boot from there to any computer on the planet. The Android emulator is good for productivity apps but does not support heavy gaming.Although Jide technology has killed its support, you can still download the last Android Marshmallow version. Meanwhile, a similar project known as Phoenix OS is being well-liked among the Remix OS fans. And recently, the project was updated to Android 7 Nougat.
Compatibility: Windows PC only
10. ARChon
ARChon is not some big shot Android emulator, nor it has a huge fan following, itâs more of a fix to run Android apps on Chrome OS.It started out when Google brought support for two or three Android apps on Chrome Web Browser. Following which, a GitHub developer took it a little notch further and released ARChon to run all Android apps on Chrome.The ARChon Android emulator is not suited for hardcore gaming, but it is excellent for using productivity app due to its easy access
Compatibility: Windows and Mac
11. Bliss OS
Bliss OS is a little different from the above emulators. Where âAndroid Emulatorsâ emulate Android on your Windows PC, Bliss OS, on the other hand, is Android itself and needs to be installed as a separate OS. As for its installation, you could use a Virtual Box or you can create a bootable USB drive and install the Bliss OS ROM on the external storage.Now, installing Bliss OS or any other Android x86 based projects is always better if you are looking for the exact Android experience on your PC. Not to mention the fact is Bliss OS is open source and donât encompass ads or any Android emulator clutter.
Compatibility: Windows PC only
12. Phoenix OS
Phoenix OS is a big-screen Android operating system that can run on bigger display screens like a computer monitor. This OS is designed with Android at the backend, but is customized to run like a full desktop platform. And most importantly, it has been optimized to run Android games on PC. Phoenix OS also support keymapping for all popular games like PUBG Mobile, Fortnite and other FPS / MOBA games. You can download and install Phoenix in a virtual environment on any laptop or MacBook easily. This emulator is available in two variants. One is based on Android 7.1 Nougat and one is based on Android 5.1 Lollipop.
Compatibility: Windows PC, Mac, Linux
This was a detailed look at different Android emulators available for computers â Mac, Windows and Linux systems. Do you think we missed any? Let us know in the comments!