I've been using lawnchair, and I like it's simplicity. They're latest "real" released version is from 2018, but not long ago they jumped from Version 14-beta3 to 15-beta1. I can't say I understand their development philosophy, but the product is pretty decent with an occasional issue. I have had some intermittent problems with widgets on this latest beta.
Everyone has different needs, so all these recommendations without any explanation are frustrating.
My reason to use Nova before was:
- REMOVE search bar from home screen, unlike the Pixel launcher
- Have the usual, customizable row of quick launchers across the bottom
- Have basic app drawer and background apps gestures pull up from bottom
- Add a couple basic widgets like Calendar and clock to home screen, or other app shortcuts
- Minimal permissions, no ads, no network-based features
Based on this, I just started trying out Fossify Launcher Beta, installed from F-Droid. It seems OK so far. My only complaint is that there seem to be multiple gestures that open up a Launcher menu, and I wish this was limited to just long press on the home screen background.
Fossify Launcher looks to fit my needs, maybe. I can't see how to make the app list a button instead of having to drag up (I am anti-gesture. The only gesture I want to make in connection with a computer is obscene)
Also having some issues getting widgets on there... But Android is Android, so I'm sure it's not Fossify Launcher's fault, I had the widget I wanted and then I removed it cause I wanted a different size, and it won't add again. A restart will probably help. (Spoiler: it didn't)
Would also be nice if I could make widgets 2.5 columns wide. I like a 5 wide screen, but I want two widgets to share the screen width.
Yeah I resisted gestures but gave up when I found that enabling legacy nav buttons seemed to make things unreliable for me. Maybe when I first switched to Nova?
I also noticed that the widget editing is a bit clumsy with resizing on Fossify Launcher. It seems like there is some hidden state where long-press doesn't quite work the same way after some interaction. But I was able make progress after going through several other interactions like opening the menu via back gesture from home screen, locking and unlocking the screen, etc.
I don't know if it is Android or the launcher itself that makes the widget sizing so annoying. It seems to have a different bounding box for the resizing tool than what is actually rendered, so I end up with way more dead space around the widgets than I wanted.
Kvaesitso! I've been using it for about two years. It takes a little bit getting used to a search based launcher but once you've gotten used to it, everything is so quick. Speed up animation speeds to 0.5x in dev settings and man it's like doing kung fu with your finger tips.
Besides being a good, very simple, minimalistic launcher, it's also Open Source (https://github.com/tanujnotes/Olauncher), ad-free, and collects and shares no data.
[Olauncher dev here] There's no Firebase integration in the Olauncher and never was. It literally collects no data. The releases on the Play Store, F-Droid and Github releases [APK] are all built from the same codebase, which is available on Github. Not sure why it's flagged.
That looks neat. I don't remember ever seeing any ads in the original though, so I'm a bit confused about what they removed. Regardless, having the choice is always good.
It has some extra features added, plus unnecessary ones removed, but I won’t recall the difference, since I use the fork for years (four or five, if I’m correct). I’m just pointing out this fork is worth anyone’s attention, it’s easy to compare by installing the two.
I appreciate it. But it sounds kinda weird to say "better fork" when you aren't sure of the actual differences and tell people to go figure it out for themselves.
Could also be that 0launcher has changed over the past four or five years.
Any recommendations for a launcher close to the original android one, but that supports grouping? I find it so much more useful to group my apps by category. I use search most of the time, but sometimes I can't remember a name but I do remember the category and it comes useful. Also means recently apps are unclassified and can easily be separated.
I use NeoLauncher for this same reason: sometimes I don't remember the name of whatever app I use once in a while (eg WLANScanner or Ning).
It's available on IzzyOnDroid, though I installed the GitHub release. It does have some bugs, every now and then it freezes and you need to go to the Apps submenu in Configuration to restart it.
I looked at several yesterday. I landed on Action Launcher because it has a scrollable dock and infinite scrolling homepages. It lacks tabs in the app drawer, but it does let you create folders there.
Hyperion seemed to have all necessary features, but the UI was unintuitive and the documentation non-existent.
I also liked Lynx, but that would be a major change for me.
I use Square Home which looks like the old Microsoft tiles in windows 8 phone. I always found the the MS tiles worked really well on a phone and actually had it installed on a old android phone.
