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How to stop Android from adding new apps to the home screen

Tired of deleting app icons from your home screen after installation on your Android device? Here's how to disable it.

Jason Cipriani Contributing Writer, ZDNet
Jason Cipriani is based out of beautiful Colorado and has been covering mobile technology news and reviewing the latest gadgets for the last six years. His work can also be found on sister site CNET in the How To section, as well as across several more online publications.
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Jason Cipriani

Have you ever noticed after installing an app on your Android device, the icon for that app is already on your home screen? Sure it can come in handy, but it also can be pretty annoying. Nicole Cozma showed us how to disable this annoying feature on Honeycomb tablets a while back, and now I'm going to show you how to disable it on other Android devices.

Disabling the auto-add widgets (or shortcuts) feature is easy.

  1. Launch the Google Play Store on your Android device.
  2. Tap on Menu and then Settings.
  3. Uncheck the box next to "auto-add widgets."

Easy enough. Now, you can install apps, be it from the Google Play Web site, or through the Play Store app on the device itself and not have to worry about your home screen(s) being cluttered up with your latest downloads.

Of course, if you decide you liked having this feature on, you can go back into Settings in the Play Store and turn it back on.