Touch shortcuts and gestures

Last updated on Jun 5, 2024

Learn more about touch shortcuts and gestures to save time while you work with Photoshop on your iPad.

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Work with touch shortcuts

Use the touch shortcuts to quickly access the alternate actions of a selected tool in Photoshop on your iPad. You can tap and drag the touch shortcut to move it across your canvas. For each selected tool, the touch shortcut offers upto two alternate actions. Keep the touch shortcut pressed down the entire time you want to use the alternate behavior of a selected tool. A blue indicator appears on the upper right side of the canvas to notify you about the activated state of the touch shortcut.

For example, while using the Brush tool you can activate the primary touch shortcut to access the Eraser version of your Brush, and activate the secondary touch shortcut to switch to the Eyedropper tool.

Touch shortcut in primary state — Using the Primary Touch Shortcut to activate the Eraser version of the Brush tool.

Using primary touch shortcut: Tap and hold the center of the touch shortcut with your other hand to activate the primary action of the selected tool.

Touch shortcut in secondary state — Using the Secondary Touch Shortcut to activate the Eyedropper tool with the Brush tool selected.

Using secondary touch shortcut: Tap and slide to the outer edge of the touch shortcut with your other hand to activate the secondary action of the selected tool.

The Brush tool is just one of the many tools you can use with the Touch shortcut. To access a list of tools that work with touch shortcuts in Photoshop on your iPad from within the app, navigate to Help () > View touch shortcuts, or see the table below:

Tool	Primary Touch Shortcut	Secondary Touch Shortcut
Move	Move on the X/Y axis	Duplicate
Scale	Scale unproportionally	Scale from center
Rotate	Snap to 15 degrees	None
Lasso	Add to or Subtract from selection	None
Quick select	Add to or Subtract from selection	None
Rectangular marquee	Select with a fixed ratio	Select from the center with a fixed ratio
Elliptical marquee	Select with circle	Select from the center with a circle
Brush	Eraser	Eyedropper
Clone stamp	Set source	None
Crop	Crop proportionally	Crop proportionally from the center
Tap Layer	Enter multi-select mode	None
Tap Layer Group	Enter multi-select mode	None

Use gestures

Quickly perform helpful common actions using gestures to interact with the touch-based user interface of Photoshop on the iPad. To access a list of touch gestures that you can use in Photoshop on your iPad from within the app, navigate to Help () > View gestures, or see the table below:

Illustration	Gesture	Action
	2 finger tap	Undo
	3 finger tap	Redo
	Hold and drag the grabber at the top of the floating tool panel to move it around the canvas	Move tool options
	Double-tap or long-press icons that have triangles on the bottom right to reveal more tool options	Reveal more options
	2 finger drag to pan	Pan canvas
	Double-tap	View at 100%