We’ve seen several attempts in the past for running mobile applications on desktop computers. However, most of them have been futile or sluggish to actually prove themselves useful. Fortunately, there’s a new player in town and it’s called Remix OS Player. Remix OS, if you aren’t cool enough to know, is a full-fledged operating system that you can either install on a PC or buy a hardware that comes with out-of-the-box. It essentially merges the vast Android ecosystem with some desktop tricks like floating windows, multitasking, and more.
What is Remix OS Player
Remix OS Player, however, is a virtual machine or you can say “emulator” of the complete operating system which you can launch by merely executing a .exe file. It’s free and doesn’t require any setup process whatsoever. You can run any Android game or application such as Facebook, WhatsApp or Clash of Clans inside a dedicated window. It can even access Google Play services, hence, it even allows syncing Play Games’ data. Thanks to the freeform window support, you can also run two games side by side. Although, it’s not a lightweight solution and consumes about 2GB of RAM all together, so it would be a lot better if your machine has at least 8GB of RAM. Jide (the parent company) says that it will run fine on an i3 processor coupled with 4GB RAM.
We disagree.
How to Install Remix OS Player?
For running Remix OS Player, first and foremost, you’ll need to download the source package (about 700MB) from here. Select any host, I went for SourceForge if you’re wondering. Once done, double-click the downloaded file to extract it. Open the extracted folder and there you have it, “RemixOSPlayer.exe”.
In the popped up window, you’ll see two options – Start and Advanced Settings. Tap the latter for altering hardware details for the emulator, I would recommend sticking to 2GB of RAM (unless you’re planning to play a lot of games) and a 3-core CPU. Now, click “Start” to load Remix OS. It’s will take about 10-20 minutes for booting initially.
Getting Familiar
For concluding the setup process, select your language, choose any suggested apps if you would like to them start downloading immediately, and you’re done. Browse applications by hitting the Jide logo on the bottom left corner, you can move opened apps by the conventional hold and move method. For installing additional content, head over to the play store, enter your Google credentials and download any app like you would normally do on a phone. You can even check notifications by clicking the bottom right corner. Moreover, further configurations can be made through the settings and enable features like “always keep apps in landscape mode”, “auto-hide taskbar” etc.
Remix OS Player is a straightforward as well as a comprehensive way of running Android apps on any Windows machine. Additionally, unlike platforms like Bluestacks, the process doesn’t feel exhausting and lengthy. Although, it is quite slow, resource-hungry and requires some optimization right now. Nonetheless, it is worth trying out once especially if you have a touch-screen.
13 thoughts on “Remix OS Player Lets You Run Any Android App on Windows PC [Guide]”
Interesting article. If it’s better than Bluestacks then it will be worth trying.Many thanks, geoffc :)
will it conflict with vmware or windows’ hyper-v?
It’s a direct Android Studio emulator, so I’m guessing no.
ive tried leapdroid that runs on virtualbox, does this work the same way?
There’s no VirtualBox here. Works directly.
it is not working
my remix os player application is not opening
not even a single dialog box is appearing
Did you download the source and run the exe file?
What OS are you running?
Even I am facing the same problem. After i double-click on RemixOSPlayer.exe nothing happens. Not a single dialog box appears. I have tried re-downloading from all sources. I have enaled virtualisation and installed haxm too. No luck.
OS: Windows 10 (Anniversary update)
it takes a lot of time if you’ve a slower machine. What’s your CPU configuration?
Also, in the tasks manager, check if it’s running in the background already. If yes, end that process and try launching again.
It’s Intel(R) Core i3-2330M CPU @ 2.20GHz
4GB RAM
I have waited long enough and the task manager shows no process related to Remix OS.
P.S I don’t have any Microsoft Visual C++ Redistributable installed coz I recently reset my PC. And windows updates donot download or install them automatically. Can these missing files be the problem?
They can be but as I mentioned in the article, an Intel i3 and 4GB of RAM is just not enough for Remix Player to run.
Have downloaded and installed Remix OS on a USB thumb drive and it works just fine. However running off a USB thumb drive is somewhat slow even using a USB 3.0 port and USB 3.0 thumb drive.
Just couldn’t find a use for it so deleted it. Unless you want to play some specific Android game; why would you even need it is the question that nagged me? What does if offer that Windows 10 doesn’t offer other than its ability to run Android apps.
I guess I am not much of an Android fan since my Android TV box never has worked right since the day it was new even after a firmware update. Oh and while Android on my phone works, it hasn’t been updated in years. To me Android is an operating system that seems to need about another 10 years of development work before it goes primetime, ha ha.