Three dots and a shelf

Multitasking on the iPad is very useful, but in the past, it has been somewhat confusing.  Apple improved this in iPadOS 15 by making two changes.  First, at the top of the screen, Apple added a new button with three dots.  Tap the three dots to activate multitasking.  Second, Apple added the new Shelf to the bottom of the screen, which appears when you launch an app to remind you of other windows associated with that same app.  These are both great improvements that make it easier to work with multiple windows and apps on an iPad.

The three dots

Open just about any app on an iPad running iPadOS 15 and you will see three dots at the top.  Apple calls the dots the multitasking button. 

When you tap the three dots, you will see the different multitasking modes:  full screen, Split View, or Slide Over.  The mode that the window is currently using is indicated by a gray circle around its corresponding icon.

If you tap the Split View or Slide Over buttons, the active window will move to the side so that you can select another app.  If you pressed the Split View button, the app you select will be placed side-by-side with the app that you were previously in. If you pressed the Slide Over button, the app you select will fill the screen, and the app that you were previously using will appear on the right side of the screen on top of the app you selected. 

Some apps, such as the Mail app, will show a fourth mode:  Center window.  That mode places a window in the center of your iPad screen on top of the other window in the app.

You don’t have to use the three dots to do multitasking on the iPad.  For example, the iPad continues to support the previous method:  open the Dock at the bottom of the screen and then drag an app from the Dock to the side of the app you are currently using for Split View mode, or drag an app from the Dock to the top of the app you are currently using for Slide Over mode.  But with the new three dots system, you can put an app in a multitasking mode even if it is not in the Dock.

The Shelf

For a while now, an iPad app could have multiple windows open.  For example, you might have one window of Safari open with three tabs, then another window of Safari open with only a single tab.  Or you might have different Microsoft Word documents open in different windows.  Before iPadOS 15, it could be difficult to know how many windows were open for an app.  You might tap the Microsoft Word icon in your Dock thinking that it was going to open a contract that you are drafting only to discover that Microsoft Word instead opened a different document, a brief that you are also drafting. 

In iPadOS 15, whenever you open an app that has more than one window open, a Shelf appears at the bottom of the screen with thumbnail images of the different windows associated with that app.  One of those windows will be the active window, but if that isn’t the window that you intended to use, you can tap one of the other thumbnail images in the Shelf.  And if the thumbnail images are too small for you to tell what each window is, you can just keep tapping on different thumbnail images until you find the one that you want. 

Once you start to act on the active window, the Shelf goes away. 

If you are working in an app and want to see the Shelf associated with that app again, there are many ways that you can bring back the Shelf.  First, you can exit the app (swipe up to go to your Home Screen) and start the app again.  Second, you can swipe up from the bottom of the screen — just a little — to bring up the Dock, then tap the icon for the active app and you will see the Shelf again.  Third, you can tap the three dots at the top of the screen — not only does that show you the multitasking modes at the top of the screen, but it also shows you the Shelf at the bottom of the screen if you are using an app that currently has two or more windows open.  Fourth, if you use an Apple external keyboard that has a Globe key on it, you can tap the Globe key and the down arrow key to activate the Shelf.  (Keyboards without a Globe key may be able to do this as well.  For example, on my older Apple Magic Keyboard, the FN key works like the Globe key.)

When you are already in an app and you use one of these methods to reactivate the Shelf, you will see another option at the end of the Shelf:  a blank thumbnail image with a plus sign on it.  Tap that one to create an additional window in the app. 

Conclusion

Anyone who uses a computer knows that the ability to switch between different windows, either in the same program or in different programs, allows you to be much more productive with the computer.  The same is true for the iPad.  Switching between different apps, or different windows within the same app, makes it much easier to do much more with an iPad.  And thanks to the three dots and the Shelf, iPadOS 15 makes it easier than ever to multitask on an iPad.