Nova Launcher
When mobile app metrics company Branch acquired the popular and highly-rated Nova Launcher for Android in July 2022, the app’s site featured a self-helpful FAQ post about it. Under the heading of the question “What does Branch want with Nova?”, Nova founder and creator Kevin Barry began his response with, “We’re not going to spoil it for you, don’t worry!”
Branch (formerly/aka Branch Metrics) is a company that helps businesses track links that lead to their app from SMS, email, marketing, or within other apps. With its Sesame Search tool that helps users find and access deeper links (such as quickly hailing a car rather than just opening a ride-sharing app), Nova seemed like a good choice.
Barry wrote that he’d received numerous acquisition offers over the years, but he didn’t want to be swallowed up by a giant corporation, an OEM, or a shaky startup. “Not with Branch,” he wrote at the time, because they wanted to keep Nova mostly untouched, adding staff and keeping it open to the public.
After two years, Branch has isolated Nova Launcher a bit too much. According to Nova’s official X (formerly Twitter) account and Discord records, as of Thursday, Nova had gone from a team of about 12 people to being run by founder Barry alone. A former Nova employee said the Nova cuts were part of a “larger layoff” that estimated more than 100 people across Branch.
Barry wrote that Nova development will continue but with “resources reduced.” Future Nova releases will have to “reduce scope,” he wrote. Other employees noted that customer support, marketing and even communications could be squeezed or eliminated.
Ars has reached out to Branch for comment and will update this post if we hear back.

Here are some of the customization options for the icons that appear on your tablet within Nova Launcher.
Nova Launcher
A customized, clean Android home screen
I don’t know if Nova would have been better off not being part of Branch, or if it would have inevitably faced the thorny problem of how to get people to continue paying for an Android utility, but seeing Nova in jeopardy, or at least severely limited, is a shame for such a useful tool.
Installing a launcher on your Android lets you ignore the home screen, app tray, and search bar that come with your phone and create your own design. Nova Launcher lets you change how many and how large icons appear on your screen. It also lets you hide default apps that can’t be uninstalled. It was, and still is, one of the best ways to protect your phone from bad skins, shoddy OEM software, and stuff you didn’t ask for.
Over a dozen Ars reviews of Android devices (including Google’s own Pixel) that touted an organizational concept people might not like recommended Nova Launcher (except for one odd Razer/Nextbit phone that came with Nova Launcher by default). In his review of the Pixel 7 Pro, Ron Amadeo explained how Nova saved the day:
The worst part of the Pixel software package is the home screen launcher, the phone’s primary interface, which is not configurable enough. There are only two things I’d like. First, I’d like more sizing control for the icon grid. When I had a 3.2-inch, 480p display, the default 4×4 grid was fine, but now I’m using a 7×5 grid in Nova Launcher, and the Pixel Launcher looks awful. Second, I’d like them to get rid of Google’s useless “At a Glance” widget, which takes up a whopping four icon slots to display the date and the current outdoor temperature.
During the 10+ years I used (and occasionally reviewed) Android phones, I carried exported Nova config files around from one phone to another. I could experiment with theming, icon packs, and custom widgets (including deep links to app actions), but what exporting really gave me was the freedom to tinker and change layout ideas. At any time, I could go back to a solid, clean app layout with spacing just the way I liked it.
Nova isn’t dead (despite my and others’ eulogies), but it’s not in a position to announce bold new features or plan a new future. I hope Barry will stick with Nova Launcher for as long as it can.