Koolest 2.5.1

Better

• App names in Koolest's language. When Koolest's language isn't the TV's, apps are named from their own translations. Apps built into the TV carry every language; apps from Google Play usually only have the TV's own, so they keep that name.
• Your names for inputs. A name given to an input in the TV's input settings now shows on its tile. Plain ports use the language's digits, such as "HDMI ۲" in Persian.
• Persian uses Persian letters only, with no hamza: "خانه‌ی پیش‌فرض", "دکمه‌ی خانه", "تایید".

Koolest 2.5.0

New

• French and Persian. Settings → Look → Language: the TV's language, English, Français or فارسی. Persian reads right to left: the whole home screen, menu and settings mirror, with Persian digits throughout.
• Works on more TVs. The Home button now covers whichever home screen the TV ships, not only Google TV's, so Android TV, Xiaomi, Philips and other brands are covered too. Phone apps installed on the TV now show in the apps row.

Better

• Default home tells the truth. It says Yes only when Home really opens Koolest. Where the TV's own launcher always comes first (Google TV, Android TV), it says so and takes you to Home button instead. On Android 8 and 9 it opens Android's home chooser.
• Starts on your apps. Opening Koolest, and the first press on the remote, land on the first app instead of a top bar button.
• Screensaver weather fits its card in every language.

Fixes

• Back keeps closing settings, All apps and rearranging on Android 16.
• The daily update check no longer jumps settings to the Updates row.
• Opening an app or show that was just uninstalled, or a settings page the TV doesn't have, no longer closes Koolest.
• Settings values no longer run into their names.

Koolest 2.4.0

New

• Now playing in the top bar. While music plays, the round cover, title and artist sit at the start of the top bar, like a Live Activity in the Dynamic Island. Settings → Home screen → Now playing.
• Persian (Shamsi) date in the top bar, beside the other date or instead of it. Settings → Home screen → Top bar date.
• Reorder rows. Settings → Home screen → Rows: pick a row to show or hide it, or move it up or down.
• Screensaver timing. Settings → Screensaver → Starts after (1 to 30 min) and TV sleeps after (30 min to 4 h, or never).
• Both calendars in one tile on the screensaver, as well as a tile each. Settings → Screensaver → Dates.

Better

• The glass shows what's really behind it. The top bar and menu show the screen behind them, lined up exactly; the open menu shows the home screen under it, dimmed like the rest, and keeps up as it changes. The bars are much clearer than before.
• Items fade as they slide under the menu, instead of showing through it.

Fixes

• The background picture no longer stretches and jumps when moving between items with pictures of different shapes.
• The light sweep on a focused item finishes smoothly instead of stopping short.

Koolest 2.3.0

Liquid Glass

The same layout, in the iOS 26 / tvOS 26 material.

• Real glass. The top bar and the menu show what's behind them, blurred and slightly magnified as through a lens, under a light-drawn rim and a soft inner edge.
• Settings is a floating glass card. It grows out of its button, and the home screen blurs and recedes behind it (Android 12 and newer).
• Focus catches the light. A focused poster or card gets a sweep of light across it, as on Apple TV. Skipped when animations are turned off.

Light mode

• A soft white instead of paper white, so it doesn't glare in a dark room.
• Glass panes float on soft shadows, so they read on the light screen.
• Opening the menu dims the screen slightly instead of washing it out.
• The focus lift casts a soft grey shadow instead of a black one.

Koolest 2.2.0

A new screensaver

• Glass clock and calendars. A big clock (with AM/PM on a 12-hour TV) and Calendar-style tiles for the Gregorian date, the Persian (Shamsi) date, or both: Settings → Screensaver → Dates.
• Weather on glass. The weather now, with feels like and today's high and low, then a stack that turns like StandBy: the next hours, five days, and humidity, wind, rain, UV, air quality and the next sunrise or sunset. ▲ ▼ on the remote flip it.
• Now Playing. While music plays, a card with the cover, title, artist and progress. Turn it on in Settings → Screensaver → Music (it needs notification access, which Koolest sets up through the TV's network debugging).
• 21 paintings, up from 7: Bierstadt, Moran, Cole, Gifford, Kensett, Bradford and Kuindzhi join Church, Shishkin, Cropsey and Heade. Updating keeps the ones you have and downloads only the new ones.

Fixes

• Unsplash photos suit the theme. Koolest skips blurry, flat photos, and ones too bright for dark mode or too dark for light mode.
• The screensaver setting is recognised however Android stores it.

Koolest TV Launcher 2.1.1

A safety fix for 2.1's setup buttons. It updates over 2.1 from Koolest settings, or install Koolest.apk below.

• Keep Home working and Only launcher now only connect when the TV says debugging is on. With debugging off, they go straight to the steps for turning it on.
• Koolest stops if the other end of the debugging connection sends something it shouldn't, instead of trying to read it.

As before, you can turn debugging off once setup is done; the changes stay.

Koolest TV Launcher 2.1.0

Set up from the remote. Koolest 2.1 does the adb steps for you, no computer needed. It updates over 2.0 from Koolest settings, or install Koolest.apk below.

Settings → This TV

• Keep Home working gives Koolest the permissions that keep the Home button on Koolest after a reboot, an update or a console session. Before, this took two adb commands from a computer.
• Only launcher turns off Google TV's home screen (and the setup screen that would take over Home), so Koolest is the only launcher. Switch it off to bring Google TV back. Nothing is uninstalled.

Both go through the TV's own network debugging. The first time, Koolest shows how to turn on Developer options and USB debugging, then the TV asks to allow debugging: tick Always allow and choose Allow. You can turn debugging off again afterwards; the changes stay.

With Only launcher on, holding Home no longer opens the Google TV dashboard, and its quick-settings panel and profiles go away with it. The full Android Settings app still works.

Koolest TV Launcher 2.0.0

A new look. Koolest 2.0 brings a glass design in the style of iOS and visionOS. It updates over 1.4 from Koolest settings, or install Koolest.apk below.

Home screen

• The menu floats in a frosted-glass capsule and opens into a glass card. Search and Home, your apps, and All apps sit in three groups, and app icons are larger with a fine edge so dark ones stay visible.
• Weather, clock and the network and settings buttons share one capsule on a single line, with a round focus that fits inside it.
• A row starts over from its first item each time you come back to it.
• Fixed: the first card in a row could show the wallpaper instead of its picture.
• Weather icons are in colour, and a console shows up with its name as soon as the TV recognises it.

All apps: a large title, and sorting from an iOS-style segmented control.

Wallpaper: choose Unsplash photos in Settings → Look for a new photo on the Photo changes schedule. Photos come from Unsplash via Lorem Picsum, and the last one stays up when you're offline.

Koolest TV Launcher 1.4

New package name. 1.4 installs as dev.koolest, a separate app from 1.3 (dev.plume). Install it, set it up, then uninstall the old one.

Home screen

• Rows: Continue watching, Apps, Consoles & inputs, 30nama, YouTube, Spotify, then one row for each app that publishes to the TV's home screen (Netflix, Tubi, Apple TV, Twitch…). Turn any row off in Settings → Home screen → Rows.
• Continue watching shows every app that reports progress, including 30nama, with the apps you use most first. Browsers' open tabs are left out.
• The focused card no longer touches its neighbours. Back goes to the start of the row, then to the menu. Left from the top buttons opens the menu.
• Clock and weather sit in a readable bar, with a weather icon, "feels like" and the date.
• Much smoother: janky frames dropped from 86% to 8% on a TCL Google TV. Pictures load as you get near them, with the app's banner when a picture can't be loaded, and the background art is sharp and cross-fades.
• Every console and device on HDMI gets its own mark on its brand colour.

Settings: short names with icons, and app icons on app lists.

Home button on Google TV
Koolest now turns its Home button service back on after reboots, updates and the TV closing it in the background. Run these once over adb:

adb shell pm grant dev.koolest android.permission.WRITE_SECURE_SETTINGS
adb shell appops set dev.koolest APP_AUTO_START allow   # TCL TVs

Koolest TV Launcher 1.3

First release as Koolest TV Launcher: the 30nama TV layout, content rows for YouTube, 30nama and Spotify, console tiles with their own marks, a taskbar menu, sortable All apps and grouped settings.