What is animated wallpaper?
Animated wallpaper is a cross between a screensaver and desktop wallpaper. Like a normal wallpaper, an animated wallpaper serves as the background on your desktop, which is visible to you only when your workspace is empty, i.e. no program windows block it from view.
The only difference with desktop wallpaper is that an animated wallpaper, as the name implies, is animated, much like an animated screensaver but, unlike screensavers, keeping the user interface of the operating system available at all times. Whereas "regular" wallpaper is a static image, an animated wallpaper can feature animated elements.
Due to its lively nature, animated wallpaper is sometimes also referred to as live wallpaper.
Third-party tools
Modern versions of the Microsoft Windows and Apple Mac OS X operating systems do not support animated wallpaper out of the box. As such, a third-party software program, likes DeskScapes for Windows or NerdTools for OS X, needs to be installed before you can place animated wallpaper on your desktop. You may need to invest some time into setting up such a program and keeping it up to date.
Apple's App Store and the Windows Store may both also include various (often commercial) applications that can replace the static desktop background on your computer.
Computing power
While animated wallpaper can be a fun way to personalize your computer, it has a notable disadvantage over using static wallpaper and/or screensavers. An animated wallpaper is always active, even when it is not visible on the screen. Using one that features many simple or a few complex animations can require a lot of computing power, and leave fewer resources available for you to smoothly use your computer for other tasks such as browsing the internet. On a laptop, using more computing power also means a shorter battery life.
Static wallpaper, however, does not heavily task your computer, and screensavers have the benefit of activating only when the computer is not used for a certain period of time. While animated wallpaper seems to combine the best of both, they may not always be as practical.
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