TL;DR
- Microsoft appears to be testing a “Drag Tray” feature in the latest Windows 11 Insider Preview.
- Drag Tray makes sharing files easier by letting you drag and drop to available sharing options.
- This feature doesn’t appear in the update release notes.
Sharing files on Windows isn’t all that difficult, but it could be simpler. In that department, the desktop OS could learn a thing or two from Android. A newly discovered feature in the Windows 11 Insider Preview suggests Microsoft may have taken some inspiration from smartphones to do just that.
Microsoft appears to be testing a “Drag Tray” feature in the latest Windows 11 Insider Preview (build 22635.4805). This feature was first discovered by X (formerly Twitter) user phantomofearth, who shared a video showing off how Drag Tray works.
Microsoft is experimenting with a new file sharing UI in Windows 11: the “Drag Tray”. When dragging a file, the tray shows up at the top of the screen with a drag here to share hint and lists a few apps. Has a more options button to open the share sheet. (hidden, Beta 22635.4805) pic.twitter.com/LXpkTwKZu2
It appears users will be able to click on a file and drag it to the top of the screen. Once the file is near the top, a tray will drop down with the different sharing options that are available. You can then hover the file over one of the options, like Phone Link, to share the file.
This feature would make file sharing on Windows 11 much simpler. In fact, it’s not far off from how Android handles sharing, where you tap on a file and a menu pops up with all of your sharing options. It’s possible that Microsoft could be trying to bring its OS experience closer to mobile. Such a step could be helpful for younger users who have likely been exposed to a mobile OS before a desktop OS.
Something interesting about this feature is that it is not mentioned in the release notes. So it’s unknown if or when Drag Tray may added to the stable channel. If you’re currently in the Insider Preview, however, you can test it out. According to phantomofearth, you’ll need to run ViVeTool, type “/enable /id:45624564,53397005,” and reboot your computer.
