A faster way to rearrange notes on iPhone
Swipe to select one block. Sweep to gather a group. Drag to move it.
The last item in a checklist becomes the first thing you need to do. Three paragraphs belong together. A good opening is hiding halfway down the note.
We built three gestures in Phrase for these moments: swipe left to select a block, sweep with two fingers to select a group, and drag to reorder. They let you reshape a note while keeping its content intact.
Swipe left to select one block
A left swipe selects the block under your finger. The block follows the movement, settles back into place, and stays highlighted.
Swipe left to select “Pack a light jacket.” The item stays in the checklist.
The highlight stays after the gesture, making the scope of the next block operation visible.
Sweep with two fingers to select a group
For several adjacent blocks, use two fingers. The selection grows as you sweep across the page.
Three checklist items selected in one sweep. The neutral circles show touches received by the editor in the iOS Simulator.
We use the blocks' actual layout for the selection. A short checklist item and a tall paragraph can take up different amounts of space; the gesture follows the content beneath your fingers.
You can revise the group too. Begin on a selected block and sweep to remove blocks from the selection. There is no need to clear everything and start over.
Lifting your fingers leaves the group selected. You can check the group before making the next change.
Drag a thought to a better place
Moving a checklist item should preserve the item, including its text and type.
For this checklist, “Save the coastal route” might belong before “Charge the camera.” Dragging the item changes its position while preserving the checklist entry. After the drop, the note is ready to keep editing.
Select blocks when you mean blocks
We also support selecting a continuous text range across blocks. You can start inside one paragraph and finish inside another, then replace only the selected words.
Whole-block selection operates on a different scale. It selects a checklist item as an item or a heading as a heading. When you enter that mode, we leave text entry so an old caret does not suggest you are still editing one word.
Both kinds of selection are useful in the same writing session. Use text selection to tighten a sentence; use block selection and dragging to reorganize the note around it.
Try these gestures in Phrase for iPhone. The native editor story explains why we built the page to support both.
