10 tricks to get the most out of Nova Launcher on your Android mobile
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One of the best options that Android users have is the enormous customization that is offered to us thanks to third-party applications. Among the most used to give a new look to our device are the launchers or 'launchers'. The Android launcher is the most important application that we have installed on the phone. It comes already pre-installed and is usually offered by the brand of the terminal. Thanks to it, we can 'launch' the installed applications and place application shortcuts on the home screens, as well as widgets, search bars, bottom bars... In short, everything necessary for us to use our phone.
One of the most famous launchers in the entire Android Play Store is known by the name of Nova Launcher. It is a launcher that is highly appreciated by users, with advanced customization functions and with two variants: one free and the other paid. With the free version we can have everything we need to give our mobile a new look. With the paid version we can access such interesting functions as an unread notifications counter, configure gestures on the screen and modify the size of the icons to our liking. The premium version is priced at 5.25 euros.
And with this we are going to stay to present you 10 tricks that you can do with Nova Launcher to 'release', today, another mobile.
Nova Launcher: Getting Started
If you want to download Nova Launcher for free, you have to go to its link in the Play Store and click on 'Install'.Remember that you are going to install the free version, a version that does not contain ads but with disabled functions. Once installed, we are going to open it for the first time. In this first screen we have to choose the initial design of the launcher, recommending clicking on 'Start again'. Next we choose the general theme (light, dark or automatic, in which it will turn one color or another depending on the sunset, recommended option), action to open the application drawer... and that's it.
Now, let's choose Nova Launcher as system default launcher, that is, it doesn't automatically 'jump' the launcher you had pre-installed on your phone. To do this we are going to go to the settings of your phone and look for the 'start' option. In 'Predefined launcher' we choose from the list 'Nova Launcher' and that's it. We can now start configuring our new Nova Launcher.
10 Nova Launcher tricks to give your Android phone a new look
Explanatory note: all the tricks and configurations that we are going to teach you next can be carried out with the free version of Nova Launcher.
Activate the Google Discover feed
By default, in the Nova launcher we cannot slide the screen to the right to display the Discover news feed, having to access it through the Google application itself. What should we do then to make it appear? We have to download a separate application called 'Nova Google Companion' in this same link. Once installed, we open it. You will see that nothing happens, but if we now slide the home screen to the right, we can see the integrated Google Discover section as if we had pure Android.
Now, let's look at some customizations we can do with the Discover feed.We enter the Nova Launcher settings application and we are going to go to the 'Integrations' section. Here we can decide if we want to have the Google screen sliding from the main one, be able to slide from the edge of any page to show it, apply light, dark or automatic mode to the page and adjust a transition animation.
Change default icons
Thanks to Nova Launcher we will be able to place the pack of icons that we want, previously downloaded from the Google Play Store. To do this, first, you have to enter the application store and download one, for example, H20 Icon, which are the ones I personally carry. It is a free icon pack, like many others that we can track thanks to the applications to download paid applications for free.
Once you have your icon pack downloaded, we are going to go to Nova's settings (remember that it is a separate application), to the 'Appearance' section. In 'Icon style' we can choose the theme that we have downloaded by clicking on 'Icon theme' and adjust its shape, among other options related to the icons.
How to uninstall an application
If you come from any other launcher, in Nova it may be difficult to find how to uninstall a certain application. The fastest way to do this is as follows:
- In the app drawer, touch and hold the icon of the app you want to get rid of
- Then, in the pop-up menu that appears, click on 'Uninstall'
If we do the same on the home screen, we will see that the previous option does not appear in the drop-down menu. How do we get it to show?
We are going to go back to the 'Appearance' section in the Nova Launcher settings. Now we press 'Popup menu style', where we see two different options, 'Desktop' and 'Drawer'. Before, we are going to choose the form in which we want the popup menu (that is, the menu that appears when we hold down an icon) between two: blocks and pills. Personally, I prefer the second. Now, we are going to choose the elements that we want to appear in said menu, both when we are on the desktop and in the application drawer. To make the uninstall option appear in the desktop pop-up menu, check the corresponding box.
Add application icons automatically
If you want to have the shortcuts of all the applications you download on your desktop, automatically, you must do the following.
- Let's go, within the 'Nova Settings' application to the first section 'Desktop'.
- We scroll down to 'New applications' and activate the switch 'Add icon to the home screen'.
Place the Google search bar on the desktop
By default, when you install Nova Launcher, the Google search bar widget is placed on your desktop. This bar is perfectly configurable, we can even change its place until it is brought to the dock itself. How to make all these adjustments? Well, very simple, we are going to go to the Nova Launcher settings and, as in the previous step, then press the 'Desktop' section. The section that interests us is that of 'Search'.
First we are going to select the place where we want the bar to be. For example, we can select that the bar appear at the top of the screen or place it right in the dock, below the icons, as shown in the following screenshot.
Now we are going to change the appearance of the bar. In the 'Search' section within the 'Desktop' section of Nova's settings we are going to go to 'Search bar style'. The best thing about this section is that all the changes that we make can be seen in a 'preview' mode in the upper half of the screen. Here we are going to change the style of the bar, its color, the style of the Google logo that we want to see and the content of the bar.
If we want to remove the desktop bar, all we have to do is hold it down and, in the pop-up menu that appears, choose 'remove'.
Lock desktop so changes are not modified
It's a real pain to spend a lot of time configuring all the elements of Nova Launcher to get the perfect desktop, and then watch a single gesture change everything.For this, it is best that we lock the desktop once we have finished and have the final launcher. To do this, we go back to the 'Desktop' section (we continue in the Nova Launcher settings) and, at the bottom, we are going to display a hidden menu that bears the name of 'Advanced'.To finish, click on the first switch that appears, 'Lock desktop'. From now on you will not be able to make any changes to the desktop, having to turn off the switch if we want to make some changes.
How to remove the notification bar
Everyone knows that the trend of mobile phones in terms of screen is to offer the more panel the better, eliminating the lower and upper frames, thus providing an immersive experience when consuming multimedia content . Even without consuming videos, the user may want to enjoy the view of the screen without any elements that bother him, such as the permanent notification bar that appears on the desktop, where we see the clock, the WiFi signal and data and notifications pending to be read.Thanks to this option we will be able to hide the notification bar, but not eliminate it. That is, the user will be able to make the bar appear again with a single finger gesture.
To do this we are going to go to the Nova settings, section 'Appearance' and 'Notifications bar'. Among other settings that you will have to investigate we have ‘Show notification bar‘. Make sure you have this switch turned off to enjoy a fully immersive screen, with no distracting elements. To 'remove' the bar you just have to slide your finger from the top of the screen downwards.
Dark Mode Settings
We are going to teach you how to choose between dark and light mode and also how to automatically activate dark mode depending on whether it is day or night in our time zone.To do this we are going to go to the Nova settings, ‘Night mode‘ and, then, we can choose between:
- On: always dark
- Off: light mode on
- Automatic: light or dark mode according to our time zone
- Custom: set the time you want the dark and light mode
Next we will be able to choose which elements we want to adopt dark mode such as the search bar, the application drawer, the drawer icon and the desktop folders.
Restart Nova Launcher
Nova Launcher is a very stable application although sometimes it can crash like any other. To correct the different stability failures that the application can give, we can 'restart' it. To do this we doing the next:
Within the Nova settings we are going to go all the way down to the section 'Advanced'. We display the section and click on ' Restart Nova Launcher' and you're done.
Disable functions hide 'Labs'
To activate this section that will allow you, among other things, to place the weather widget in the Google search bar, you must press and hold the 'Volume Down' button within the Nova settings. Now, look for the 'Labs' section and enter it. The most interesting option is the first one, ‘time in search bar‘.
