How to Use Edge Drop Feature to Transfer Files Across Devices?

Microsoft Edge has lot of features to make your routine tasks easier. Especially, new features are being added to the sidebar so that it can be easily accessible when you are browsing. With the addition of Bing AI chat to the Edge sidebar, now that you also have a Drop feature to transfer files and notes across devices. In this article, let us see how to use Edge Drop feature to transfer files and notes.   

What You Need?

Here are the things you need to use Edge Drop feature.

• Updated Edge desktop or mobile app with version 110 or later.
• Logged in with Microsoft account and enabled sync.
• Have OneDrive account.

1. Dropping Files and Text from Edge iPhone App

Here I will explain with iPhone Edge app to transfer files to Windows PC. The process remains same for the Android app and you can use Drop in Mac Edge version also.

• Open Edge mobile app and tap on the three dots in ovel at the bottom center.

• Scroll down on the pop-up and tap on “Drop” option.

• If this is your first-time use, you will see a welcome message like below and tap on “Start” button.

• Type your text notes in the box and tap on the arrow to send it.

• For sending files, tap on the + icon showing before the text box.
• You will see three options – Document, Picture, and Camera. Document will open Files app; Picture will open Photos and Camera will allow you to snap a picture.

• Use one of these options to transfer your file.

You can anytime tap on the three dots on top right corner of each message and copy or delete the sent text. For sent files, you will see open and delete options.

2. Checking Dropped Files and Text in Windows Edge App

Follow the below instructions to check the dropped files and text in Windows or Mac Edge.

• Open Edge and go to edge://settings page.
• Navigate to “Sidebar” section and enable “Show sidebar” option as shown in the below picture.

• Now, you will see a sidebar at the right edge of the browser and click on the + icon.
• Scroll down and enable “Drop” option from the list of available apps under “Manage” section.

• Now, click on the “Drop” icon from the sidebar where you will see the dropped files from iPhone app.

3. Drop Not Available in Edge Settings

If you do not find the “Drop” option available in Edge Sidebar, then make sure you have updated the browser to version 110 or later. You can do this by going to edge://settings/help shortcut URL in the address bar.

If you are not seeing the Drop option even after updating Edge, then probably you might not get the update from Microsoft yet. In that case, go to edge://flags URL and type “drop” in the search box. Find “Edge Drop” flag and click “Default” button. Select “Enable” option from the list to activate the feature.

Relaunch the browser and now you will see the Drop option in Edge Sidebar. Similarly, you can enable the #edge-drop flag in mobile apps as well. In addition, you can also enable “Enable Drop’s custom notification” flag to get the notification when receiving files/notes through Drop.

4. Where to Access Dropped Files

Whenever a note or file is sent through Drop, you will see a notification in Windows like below. However, that will not be of much help to view the content.

Edge stores all documents and images sent through Drop feature in your OneDrive account. Go to your OneDrive folder located in this path – C:\Users\<Username>\OneDrive\. Find “Microsoft Edge Drop Files” folder and open it. There you can find all transferred files through Drop across all your devices. The files include documents and images but not the text notes you have sent.