What is this new popup every time I open Safari and iMessage?

[911jason]

Why is Safari and iMessage popping up these things every single time I open the apps? I checked settings for both Safari and iMessage and don’t see an obvious toggle that would control this behavior. I think I’m on iPadOS 15.5 beta 3 (it’s build #19f5062g).

 

[Puonti]

It's called the App Shelf. It can be manually triggered by tapping the three dots at the top center of the screen. It appears automatically whenever you open an app where you have multiple windows open, as demonstrated by your screenshot.

To my knowledge there is no specific option available to disable the App Shelf or multi-window support (which would also negate the need for the App Shelf).

You can however stop the App Shelf from appearing automatically by closing all but one of the app's windows, and using tabs instead (in the case of Safari). Looking at your screenshot, you could close the "philo.com" and "Start page" windows (you can' close the currently active one, as indicated by the white border).

To close a window from the App Shelf, simply flick it upwards. You can also close windows from the multitasking view the same way.

 

[911jason]

Wow. I feel like such an idiot. Thank you!

 

[bmac89]

When opening an app with multiple windows does it still behave like this in the latest iPadOS 15 (or 16 beta)? I.e. Does the app shelf appear every single time you open an app with multiple windows open? I’m not on 15 yet but that seems like it could get very frustrating.

Without trying iPadOS 15, my understanding was that if you opened an app it would simply open the last used window, and only show the app shelf if you press on the multitasking menu (...) or invoke the dock from within the app and press on the app icon to bring up the app shelf (previously this brought up the old ‘show all windows’ / app expose which looks the same as the app switcher).

Can anyone confirm how it behaves in the latest iPadOS 15 (or 16 beta)?

My understanding is that the app shelf replaces a lot of the functions of ‘show all windows’ (app expose) but is it possible to still access this under certain circumstances? For example if I swipe up to go to the app switcher and then press on an app icon on the dock? Or does this just reopen the app and app shelf?

Also if you long press on an app icon does it have ‘show all windows’ option and does this take you to the old app expose view? I imagine with lots of Safari windows open (for example) that it would sometimes be easier to go to the larger app expose then scroll through the app shelf.

Many thanks!