One of the core components of Android apps is “activities.”
Without activities, you’d always be opening the app to the same main screen.
Activities make it possible to take shortcuts to different parts of the app.
Justin Duino / How-To Geek
That’s what we can leverage to create shortcuts to a bunch of different places inside of apps.
There are a couple of ways you’re able to do this.
We’ll show you a very simple method and a slightly more involved, but more powerful method.
For example,YouTubehas a shortcut to the “Subscriptions” tab, andSpotifyhas shortcuts to your recent activity.
you could actually touch and hold the shortcut, then drag it to the home screen.
First, downloadActivity Launcherand bring up the app.
You’ll have to wait a second for all the activities for your apps to load up.
Here’s the list of all the apps and services installed on your unit.
When you select one, you’ll see a list of all the activities associated with it.
For example, I noticed this activity in theBing appmentions “VoiceActivity.”
When launched, it goes straight to voice input withBing Chat AI.
It’s not all just for apps, either.
There are many areas of Android itself listed here.
The “prefs” app is a particularly useful one to look into.
For example, the
activity goes straight to the Display options.
Now, to make these shortcuts easier to use, we can add them to the home screen.
Find an activity and tap the three-dot menu icon, then select “Create Shortcut.”
You’ll probably want to rename the shortcut and change the app icon, if you’re so inclined.
But now you’ve got quick access to something that normally would require several steps to get to!
As you’ve noticed, there are a lot of activities to dig through.
Most of them aren’t terribly useful, but you may just find some handy time-saving shortcuts.
This is one of the coolest things about Android.
Whether you have aGoogle Pixelor aSamsung Galaxy, there’s a lot of funhidden stuff to play with.
Related:10 Things you’re able to Do in Android’s Developer Options
