AndroGuru
Google Chrome for Android is all set to jump on board the ‘picture-in-picture’ (PiP) bandwagon. PIP happens to be a special type of multi-window mode which is mainly used for video playback.
It allows one to watch a video in a small window that is pinned to a corner of the screen while the user can navigate between apps or browse content on the main screen.
The PIP window mostly appears in the top part of the screen. You can hold and drag the PiP window to any other location of your choice.
Techdows has worked around a way to turn on picture-in-picture Web API for Android in the most recent Google Chrome Canary (developer) build. All this has been discovered although Google has not officially announced the feature for its browser’s Android version.
You can turn it on by following the steps below, according to source:
- In latest Canary, visit chrome://flags
- You must then search for “Picture” for “Picture in Picture Web API for Android” flag, select “Enabled”
- Relaunch Chrome browser.
The Picture-in-Picture mode lets users resize an app over other apps to enhance the multitasking experience. This mode was first introduced as one of Android Oreo’s feature sets following which many Android apps took up the new PiP mode and incorporated them.
On April 22nd 2019, Firefox which is Chrome’s major rival added the PiP mode to its Nightly (beta) build thus helping users to get the multitasking experience.
Plex which happens to be a popular home media server app received official PiP support at the end of May. YouTube however has locked its Android app’s PiP mode behind a paywall in Canada.
It may be noted that Google Chrome Canary builds are not to be used by general public since they are only experimental and not very stable. Additionally, it is also indicated that the new PiP feature does not currently work.
