Action Launcher v50 embraces non-paying users & enhances search
Fully embracing freemium
Action Launcher has long followed the “freemium” industry app trend, with the app being free to install and attempting to earn revenue once people are using the app.
But the devil is always in the details, and in truth, Action Launcher’s freemium implementation has historically been terrible. It was far too aggressive in pushing people to purchase the Plus upgrade, which turned a great many people off, and the app was barely usable for non-paying customers.
The experience of using Action Launcher has been completely revamped for v50, with the goal of making the app vastly more appealing for all users, whether they opt to buy the Plus in-app upgrade or not.
In an effort to balance the desire to appeal to as many people as possible with the reality that the app must continue to generate revenue to be sustainable, Action Launcher v50 introduces a dynamic monetization system for different regions:
The result: Action Launcher v50 offers a terrific experience for everyone, whether you opt to purchase the Plus upgrade or not.
Search levels up
Action Search is Action Launcher’s in-built search functionality accessible directly from the home screen. Similar to Pixel Launcher, Action Search allows you to search the web and your device directly from your home screen. The web, your apps and contacts, and even system and Action Launcher settings are just a few keystrokes.
Action Launcher v50 contains numerous search improvements we think you’ll love.
A more helpful Action Search
Action Launcher v50 introduces recently changed app settings into your search history. And we don’t mind saying, this is quite the enhancement.
Settings history in Action Search
Action Launcher v50 displays any recently changed settings directly in the Action Search history. From here you can change the setting itself, or quickly jump to the parent settings screen. This rapidly reduces the time taken to tweak a setting until it’s juuust right.
Say goodbye to the days of Open settings ➡️ Open desired settings screen ➡️ navigate to the setting ➡️ change setting value ➡️ return to launcher to view result ➡️ Go back to step 1 until you’re happy.
Customization including Action Search Targets
Action Launcher v50 introduces Action Search Targets, allowing you to quickly jump to popular search destinations directly from Action Search.
Other Action Search enhancements include:
- Customize Action Search sources
- New option to always open searches in a browser
- Search suggestions for first time users
A more helpful settings experience
Along side adding settings to Action Search history, v50 sees Action Launcher’s main settings screen gain two major new enhancements: a dedicated settings search bar, and shortcuts to recently changed settings.
We’ve also re-jigged some internals to ensure that all available settings can be found via search.
Tweaking your home screen has never been easier or more efficient!
Bug fixes
Continuing Action Launcher’s 2022 development theme of “improvement”, we’d be remiss to not make mention of the countless bug fixes that we’ve made since Action Launcher v49.0 released in early March. A total of 23 point releases of v49 were released, with many long standing bugs squashed in the process.
We’re biased, but we feel the combination of Action Launcher’s historical feature set, v49’s gesture navigation animations, v49.x’s countless bug fixes and v50’s improved freemium unlocks and Action Search enhancements make Action Launcher v50 the most feature rich, bug free and accessible for all release ever. We hope you agree.
Release notes
• NEW: Greatly reduce features requiring Plus upgrade and make the app more appealing to non-paying customers.
• NEW: Action Search displays recently changed settings in its history, allowing one to tweak settings changes directly from the home screen.
• NEW: Add Search Target bar which displays at the top of Action Search results. Allows one to direct searches directly to popular services such as Wikipedia, YouTube, Play Store, etc.
• NEW: Settings displays dedicated search bar.
• NEW: Shortcuts to recently changed settings display at top of settings. Toggle on/off via "Help -> Recent settings".
• NEW: Customize Action Search sources.
• NEW: "Open searches in browser" setting.
• NEW: Add initial Action Search suggestions that display if there's no search history.
• NEW: Add Google Search shortcut to Quickbar's quick select panel.
• NEW: Display Plus banner on settings toolbar.
• NEW: Add 10th wallpaper to 2022 Supporter Pack.
• IMPROVEMENT: No longer request WRITE_EXTERNAL_STORAGE permission. The only code that used that was legacy backup code which has been disabled for more than a month.
• IMPROVEMENT: Revamp Help menu items, including adding FAQ link.
• IMPROVEMENT: Change picker settings UI to use a bottom sheet style picker.
• IMPROVEMENT: Increase max auto complete suggestions from 3 to 5.
• IMPROVEMENT: Improve algorithm for identifying settings items to display from an Action Search query.
• FIX: Squashed dock/search box on large tablets (thanks myculito#1992, Sid6Niner#5646, Grantman#1499 and others).
• FIX: Increase default workspace margin for devices with gesture navigation.
• FIX: Google search opens to google.com in a browser if the Google App is not available/disabled.
• FIX: Stability fix using composite emoji in Action Search (thanks ritsl#1461).
• FIX: Prevent opening widget picker when desktop is locked.
