One of Android’s most useful features is the ability to switch launchers. It differentiates it from competing platforms like Apple’s iOS, and it’s been wholeheartedly adopted by enthusiasts — third-party launchers with custom themes, app drawers, and the like remain one of the most popular categories of apps on the Play Store. But while there are many great third-party launchers for Android, only a few manage to stand out from the crowd. Action Launcher is one one of them.
In the past few weeks, Action Launcher received a number of upgrades. The v29 update brought a Google Pixel 2-style dock search bar, and the v30 update introduced the “At a Glance” search widget, as well as colored search box icons. The most recent v32 update added 200 icons to the AdaptivePack companion app for Action Launcher, which brings Android Oreo‘s adaptive icons feature to phones running Android Nougat and earlier. (It also defaulted to a Pixel Launcher 2-style home screen, and made free several key features such as the dock search box and Oreo-style app shortcuts.)
Now, with the release of Action Launcher v33, there’s a new feature to look forward to: AdaptiveZoom. When users tap on an app, AdaptiveZoom makes icons “naturally animate” toward the center of the screen as the app loads.
The developer notes that AdaptiveZoom requires software support for adaptive icons. It’ll work out-of-the-box for users running Android Oreo, but users running Android Nougat and earlier will have to install AdaptivePack to take advantage.
The v33 update also brings an Android 8.1 style “bounce” animation to the All Apps drawer and allows the use of empty home screens. Users can now drag to delete the contents of an entire home screen, and the developer says that the v33 update re-enables Android’s Accessibility API with Google’s approval, which improves the reliability of opening the notification shade and the Android recent apps list. (Google recently stated that it was pausing a planned Play Store ban of apps that used Accessibility Services in an unofficial manner as it evaluated “innovative uses” of the API.) Finally, the update includes memory usage improvements and bug fixes.
Here’s the full changelog for the v33 update:
Action Launcher v33
- Android 8.1 style “bounce” animation in All Apps drawer.
- Polish appearance and animations of home screen indicator.
- Drag to delete the contents of an entire Home screen.
- Allow use of empty home screens.
- Re-enable usage of Android’s Accessibility APIs (with Google’s blessing), improving reliability of opening the notification shade and recents list.
- A round of welcome memory usage improvements and bug fixes round out the v33 update. See here for a detailed change log.
The developer notes that AdaptivePack has received an update to v4.0, which brings the supported app count to over 3500 and total icon count to over 1100.
Action Launcher - Oreo + Pixel on your phone (Free+, Google Play) →
AdaptivePack - Pixel + Oreo style Adaptive Icons ($4.99, Google Play) →
Source: Action Launcher
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