com.google.android.apps.nexuslauncher Copy

Google's home screen app for Pixel devices. Its English label on this site is "Pixel Launcher" (a few English observations record plain "Launcher"), and it is recorded on 18 device entries: 17 under the Google make (Pixel 6 through Pixel 10 Pro, plus three sdk_gphone emulator images) and one Samsung SM-F971B entry at API 37. Where this site holds signer data, which is 9 of those 18 entries and all of them Google-make, the key is classified as Google and is not one that also signs the Android framework. The aggregate signer record additionally lists HP as a make, which does not appear in this package's device list; that discrepancy could not be explained here. Google publishes no source for this package, so what follows describes the AOSP code it is treated as a variant of rather than a documented account of Google's binary. The open source counterpart is Launcher3, package com.android.launcher3. Its manifest declares the main launcher activity with the HOME category, and its Quickstep manifest adds com.android.quickstep.TouchInteractionService (behind the action android.intent.action.QUICKSTEP_SERVICE) and com.android.quickstep.RecentsActivity. The platform's default configuration names com.android.launcher3/com.android.quickstep.RecentsActivity as the component "presenting the Recents UI" and tells builders to change it when using a different default launcher. A LineageOS tooling script that resolves the targets of Pixel resource overlays maps com.google.android.apps.nexuslauncher to com.android.launcher3, which is a community reading of the relationship rather than a Google statement. The permission list this site records for the Google package includes START_TASKS_FROM_RECENTS, REMOVE_TASKS, MANAGE_ACTIVITY_TASKS and STATUS_BAR_SERVICE, all of which the Quickstep manifest also requests. This site aggregates permissions across observations rather than per build. Taken together this suggests the Pixel package carries the recents and gesture components as well as the home screen, but which component a given Pixel build configures for recents could not be sourced. Version note: this site records version names from 13 to 17 on builds from API 31 to API 37. No change to the package's role across those releases could be sourced. For Android Enterprise, EMM and kiosk use, the Android Management API documents kioskCustomLauncherEnabled, which "replaces the home screen with a launcher that locks down the device to the apps installed via the applications setting". That is the documented way to take the home screen away from this package on a dedicated device, and it does not involve disabling it. If this package also provides the recents and gesture components on a given build, as the evidence above suggests, disabling it could affect those as well as the home screen; the result could not be established here. Treat it with caution and make sure another home app is in place before considering it.

• Launcher3 AndroidManifest.xml (main launcher activity, HOME category) - Android source →
• Launcher3 Quickstep AndroidManifest.xml (TouchInteractionService, RecentsActivity) - Android source →
• Framework config.xml (config_recentsComponentName) - Android platform source →
• dev/rro/target_package.py (overlay target package map) - LineageOS scripts →
• enterprises.policies (kioskCustomLauncherEnabled) - Android Management API reference →
• Package provenance for com.google.android.apps.nexuslauncher - Android System App Database →

• Signed by Google's own signing key (the same key Google uses across devices), so it is a Google-provided preinstall that updates independently of the system image, though 2 different Google signing keys appear across the fleet. This certificate spans 4 device makes - the hallmark of a globally distributed Google key.
• Its largest observed manifest declares 73 permissions: 5 runtime (user-granted), 35 signature or system-level, 9 install-time and 24 vendor or uncatalogued.
• APK size ranges from 9.7 MB to 18.0 MB across the reporting device profiles, so the build differs substantially between them.
• Never reported as user-facing, so it runs as a background or system component rather than an app the user opens.