In iOS 15, Apple’s expanded support for drag-and-drop features across apps on the iPhone app so you can move selected files, images, and pieces of text from one place to another.
Cross-app drag and drop features have actually been possible on the iPad since 2017, but Apple has now extended this functionality to the iPhone with iOS 15. Apart from apps, multi-finger actions also work with screenshots. The steps below will show you how it works.
- As usual, take a screenshot by pressing the Side button and Volume Up button at the same time.
- Tap and hold the screenshot thumbnail in the lower left corner of the screen and wait a few moments for the white frame to disappear.
- With the other finger, touch the app where you want to use the screenshot. In our example, we’ll open the Photos app, but you can open files, messages, emails, notes, or anything else.
- Move to the area where you want to use the screenshot. A specific album will be created and titled “iOS 15 Screenshots”.
- Move the screenshot to the area you want, then slide your finger to drop it in the right place. In our example, the screenshot is immediately saved in the specified location.
In the above example you can see two screenshots dragged. These are simply the “meta” results of taking a screenshot while taking a screenshot (thumbnails of the previous screenshot remain in the next image). But it also serves to emphasise that drag & drop supports selecting multiple elements by tapping with another finger.
Note that dragging and dropping causes duplicating rather than moving content, so screenshots will still be automatically saved on your camera. But in iOS 15 you can directly make a copy of the image and do something more specific with it, e.g., save to a newly created album, which is useful if your workflow involves a lot of screenshots.
The first public beta version of iOS 15 is now available, the official version will appear in September for all compatible iPhones.
