Android 11 Code Reveals Support for Double-Tap Gestures on the Phone’s Back Panel

• Developers have discovered a new feature within Android 11 that allows users to double-tap the phone’s back panel to access other features.
• It is further revealed that users will be able to customize this feature for other tasks like silencing alarms/phone calls or launching the camera app.
• This feature will reportedly be limited to the Pixel lineup.

It seems like Google is expanding beyond the standard functions with the new Android 11 software. After revealing that the company will bring improved motion sense gestures to the Pixel 4 with Android 11, XDA Developers has now discovered hidden code within the Android 11 Developer Preview that points at a new gesture codenamed “Columbus”.

This will reportedly allow users to double-tap the back of the phone to pause/play music, snooze alarms, silencing calls, or perform other tasks. However, the report mentions that this feature may be limited to Pixel smartphones when it is unveiled in its entirety later this fall.

Since it’s still pretty early in the day, it’s hard to tell if this feature will make the cut. But we don’t see any credible reason for a feature like this to be left out of the final release. What’s most exciting about this new feature is the inclusion of something known as “Performing a user selected action” which hints at the ability to customize what a double-tap gesture on the back panel can do. You can use this to quickly launch the camera app, for example.

Non-Pixel devices don’t need to lose hope as of yet given that this feature works on essential smartphone hardware like gyroscope and accelerometer. So perhaps Google will make this widely available within Android 11, allowing every Android manufacturer to utilize the feature.

What do you make of the new double-tap function?

Source: XDA Developers