Android 14 is about to gain a very useful multitasking feature

Multitasking on our phones is tricky compared to our computers. With PCs, using your mouse to drag and drop files from one location to another is easy and intuitive. On our phones it’s a different story.

The good news is that come Android 14, Google will be introducing a new way to multitask. This was discovered by Nail Sadykov, editor of the Google News Telegram channel, in the latest beta of Android 14. Basically what this feature does is that users can select files, images, or text, hold onto it, and then drag and drop it into another app.

Looks like Android 14 will finally let you use system navigation while you're dragging & drop items.

That is, you can take a photo or text from one app, open another app and drop it there.
(Previously, this was only possible in split screen.)

*Just like on iOS* pic.twitter.com/bolwp3aE6E

— Наиль Садыков (@Nail_Sadykov) May 18, 2023

So for example if you wanted to copy text in a website and paste it into a note app, you can just select the text, drag it and pull up the multitasking window, and then drag it to the app you want to drop it in. Prior to this, Android would basically ignore any gestures while you were holding onto a file, image or text.

If this sounds familiar, it is because it is something that Apple had previously introduced in iOS 16, so now it looks like Android users will be able to enjoy the same conveniences as well. Android 14 is scheduled to be released later in the year so it might be a while before we are able to use it ourselves, assuming Google doesn’t change or even shelve the feature before then.

Source: Android Police