For my money, Nova Launcher is the best of the AOSP-style launchers available in Android. Developer TeslaCoil Software has consistently updated the launcher for the better part of three years, and one of the biggest updates is coming soon. Nova 3.0 won't add any earth-shattering changes, but there are a bunch of little changes that will thrill the customization-obsessed in small ways.

On the homescreen, you can now customize the text below shortcuts to a greater degree with color and shadow options, and widgets can now have individual padding settings. If you like, you can squeeze widgets up to 4x1 into the shortcut dock on the bottom of the screen. Swipe actions on folders can be applied to the first item in the folder, and there's a new option for a Honeycomb-style search bar. The drawer gets the biggest set of changes: app labels can be collectively colored, groups/tabs can be given individual background colors, and the apps will now scroll underneath a transparent navigation bar in KitKat.

There are a lot of smaller fixes for individual devices. Verizon Motorola DROID phones now use the home button correctly (yes!), Samsung's KitKat phones now have a usable Bluetooth settings shortcut, and HTC phones will now scroll wallpaper correctly. Support for Today Calendar's auto-updating icon has been added. There are lots of smaller changes that you can check out in the source link below, the best of which is probably vertically-centered icons (no more lopsided shortcuts). The changes are available in the Google+ beta program: join in here, then go here to get it directly from the Play Store. If you don't like to mess with that, the beta APK is available here (direct link). Thanks, Tesla!

Source: Kevin Barry Google+