Chrome might be pre-installed as usual on Android, but that doesn’t stop it from being one of the best browsers for mobile (and desktop) use. Over time, lots of new features have been introduced to Chrome’s Android version and one that could be added soon is the ability to copy images directly to your device clipboard.
We’ve seen Google carry out a range of UI refreshes towards the end of 2019, including a new screenshots editor, updated share sheet and more on top. A few new commitments in the Chrome Gerrit suggest that Google Chrome for Android may gain the ability to copy images to your clipboard to make image sharing even easier (via XDA Developers).
If you’ve ever wanted to share a Chrome image, you’ll know it can be a bit fiddly on the mobile at times. Sharing a direct link isn’t always the neatest option at the moment, plus it can be annoying, since you have to share an image right there and then use the sharing sheet.
Being able to copy an image directly from Chrome to your clipboard on Android means you should be able to share it at your own leisure through multiple apps as long as you don’t clear your clipboard. Which ensures that every time you don’t have to deal with the share sheet.
XDA notes that this commit is not currently accessible to non-Googlers, but the commit definition and code indicates that Chrome will obtain an optional context menu option to add the image copy feature to Android and bring parity to your desktop version.
In reality, it’s unclear what it will look like, because we can’t access the UI review link But we’d expect to add a new option to the mini-menu when, for example, long-pressing an image inside Google Image Search. For this feature, it’s pretty likely you’ll get a “copy image” action. It is also worth noting that once this latest commit is merged, by going to chrome:/flags#context-copy-image in your mobile browser, you’ll be able to toggle the Chrome flag.
