Imagine that — being able to freely rearrange and resize the apps on your screen.
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Google is testing a new feature for Android tablets that will let you resize apps freely and arrange them on your screen at will, making it easier to juggle multiple tasks. The “desktop windowing” feature is now available as a developer preview, and for apps that support it, you could even have more than one instance open.
Currently, apps on Android tablets open in full-screen by default. When the new mode is enabled, each app will appear in a window with controls that allow you to reposition, maximize, or close the app. You’ll also see a taskbar at the bottom of your screen with your running apps.
It sounds a lot like the iPad’s Stage Manager feature that similarly lets you resize and move windows around your screen or pretty much any desktop operating system. Samsung has also offered its DeX experience for years, bringing desktop-like windows management to Android apps on Galaxy phones and tablets.
Once the feature is rolled out to everyone, you can turn it on by pressing and holding the window handle at the top of an app’s screen. If you have a keyboard attached, you can also use the shortcut meta key (Windows, Command, or Search) + Ctrl + Down to activate desktop mode. (You can exit the mode by closing all your active apps or by dragging a window and dragging it to the top of your screen.)
Google notes that apps locked to portrait orientation are still resizable, which might make things look a bit weird if certain apps aren’t optimized. However, Google plans to address this in a future update by scaling the UI of non-resizable apps while maintaining their aspect ratio.
For now, users can access the developer preview in the latest Android 15 QPR1 Beta 2 for Pixel Tablets. We still don’t know when the feature is rolling out to everyone — or if it will come to the Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold.
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