Nova launcher has been known among the Android community for being the best launcher for Android Devices in terms of the customization options it offers and the stability it gives to the phones. Before Google launched the Google Now launcher and then the Pixel launcher, Nova launcher was the only launcher of choice for all the Android devices and it simply is the best with stability improvements and updates with unique features.
Nova launcher has been updated once again and this time it is getting Dynamic Notification Badges for the apps which is an alternative to the notification badges on the apps which only show the number of pending notifications for the particular app. Here, the dynamic app badges can be used to save a particular contact as a different badge. For example if we want to save a particular chat from Whatsapp on homescreen, we can add the icon and when we tap on it, the app will directly open in that particular chat.
The dynamic notification badges work by pulling contact images from messaging apps to show who called you, or sent you a message or a mail. It works in a similar way for music apps or even app icons from the Play Store. One of the reasons cited by the Nova Launcher developer behind the notification badges update is that ‘unread counts are often misleading’ as ‘every app counts things differently which is the case in any messaging app where the app notification badge shows a count of 2 which is not the number of messages received in the application but the number of messages received from the different conversations.
The developers at Nova have not shut down the notification badge option completely and there is still an option to turn the Dynamic badges feature off in the Nova Settings menu.
And for those who are interested in trying it out, they can download the beta version from Google Play Store or download the APK version.
