Many of us use Android phones but the layer we interact with, is the manufacturer’s third-party user interface. Some of these are designed well while some others can be simply horrid. They can be slow, consume a lot of memory while limiting features and customizability. Nova Launcher is a great alternate launcher that can be installed on practically every Android smartphone and it’s freely available on the Google Play Store. We highly recommend buying the Nova Launcher’s Prime version for its additional features. You could use the free version for a while and then upgrade to the paid version, which only costs around Rs. 100. Here are some of the things you should do to make the most of Nova Launcher.
Setting Nova as the default launcher
The first thing to do after downloading Nova Launcher is to set it as the default home manager. This can be achieved tapping on Settings > Apps & Notifications > Default Apps > Home app. Choose Nova Launcher to set it as the default Home launcher. This menu might be named differently in other phones. You should notice your Home screen change the next time you access it. Choose to use Nova Launcher as the default launcher always, if prompted.
Changing the home screen and app drawers’ density
Nova Launcher lets you adjust the density of the home screen and app drawers, letting you see more apps and widgets at once. Hold down the home screen and a menu should appear at the bottom. Tap Settings to open Nova Launcher’s settings. We will be using this Settings menu at every step to tweak Nova Launcher, through this article. Click on the Home screen option here, then on Desktop grid. You can set the number of rows and columns you want to be able to add to your home screen. Click on Done when you are ready. Go back and click on App Drawer. Here, you can add rows and columns by clicking on the drawer app grid option. Remember that adding too many blocks can clutter your app drawer. These steps should let you place more widgets on the home screen, and view more apps, on the home screen and the app drawer.
Using custom icon themes
Using custom icon themes is an easy way of changing the way your phone looks. Hold the home screen down and tap Settings > Look and Feel > Icon style. Here, you can choose the icon theme of your choice. There are many free icon packs available on the Google Play Store, which once installed, should show up in this list.
Creating groups within the app drawer
Most smartphones come with several apps, most of which we may never use but can’t be removed either. We also install several apps which can make finding the app you are looking for, difficult. What if, there was a way to quickly categorize them. Nova Launcher allows you to categorize apps in the app drawer. Under the Nova Launcher settings, tap App Drawer > Drawer Groups. You can create new drawer groups and tabs here. Tap the add button on the right top to do that. Once done, you can add apps to those drawers or tabs. This makes finding the most important apps easy, and it helps bring some order to the chaos.
Tweaking animations, making your phone more responsive
How fast our smartphones feel sometimes comes down to the nature of the animations and scrolling effects used by the default launcher. Nova Launcher allows you to change the speed of the animations. Go to the Settings, tap on Scroll Speed and choose the fastest scroll speed you can find there. Similarly, you can go back and change the Animation Speed. You should now notice your phone is more responsive and quicker to switch between apps. It may not be a lot, but it should feel faster.
Adding more icons to the home screen dock
The most used apps on our smartphones are placed on the home screen, in the dock at the bottom of the screen. Most smartphone manufacturers allow you to add up to five apps to that list, but Nova Launcher let you add more. Simply tap on Settings > Home Screen > Dock > Dock icons. You can increase this to your liking. You can also enable a scrolling dock by tapping the Infinite Scroll checkbox at the bottom. This lets us add many more apps to the dock, that you can slide between.
Using gestures to launch applications
One of the niftiest features is being able to launch new apps using finger gestures. Tap on Settings > Gestures and inputs. You should see a list of gestures and tapping on them will let you either launch an app or a shortcut. It’s a good idea to make the most of these to access your commonly used apps such as your mail client, chat messenger and calendar.
Apps to complement Nova Launcher
There are several other third-party apps that work alongside Nova Launcher. Two of the best ones are TeslaUnread and Sesame Shortcuts. TeslaUnread adds a counter for every app in your app drawer or home screen. It places a number, denoting pending notifications. This feature is useful for keeping a tab on the number of messages you might have received on WhatsApp or Facebook Messenger. Go to Settings > Notification badges, and you can choose from one of the presets.
Sesame shortcuts lets you add quick shortcuts for features within apps, without having to open the app first. For example, you could create a new chat message, add a new calendar entry directly. This feature combined with the gesture feature can help complete tasks in no time. Tap Settings > Integrations to enable it. With the checkboxes enabled, you should notice you can access the most used features in an app by simply holding down its icon.
Backing up and importing settings
One can spend hours and days tweaking Nova Launcher to their liking. It is a good idea to back up these settings, so you can either replicate or restore it on a new phone. Tap on the home screen, then on Settings > Backup & import settings. Tap Backup to create a new one. Give it a name and where you want to save it. Tap OK when you’re done. Similarly, you can restore backups by tapping the Restore managed backups. You can also import the layout from other launchers by tapping the Import button at the bottom of the screen.
These are just some of the most interesting features of Nova Launcher. It’s also one of the most affordable apps around, and it’s worth every rupee for a one-time investment. We suggest giving it a shot. To learn about more upcoming, trending apps and tips and tricks around technology, keep checking RelianceDigital.in.
