Easily search, drag and drop from the new canvas insert pane

Part of our vision for PowerApps includes a diverse and useful component ecosystem for building apps. With the coming preview in canvas apps of the Power Apps component framework, and of canvas components, we are starting to realize this vision. We expect the number of components to increase dramatically over the next year between the components that Microsoft provides, ones available from the community, from your company, and more. To support the scalability of more numerous and powerful components, we are happy to introduce the insert pane.

The insert pane is the new way to add components to your app. You can find it by selecting the plus icon in the sidebar. We have added search to help you find and discover components. No more hunting through menus, just type and search for what you are looking for. We have introduced categories to the insert pane to help group similar components. The insert pane has a Popular category that includes the components that are most used in apps.

You can now drag your components into the canvas from the insert pane. Part of the benefit of the drag and drop is the ability to drop the components inside galleries or data cards. Also notice that when you drop the component, you are able to place it exactly where you want. The ability to select a component to have it inserted to your selection on the canvas still works as expected.

A known gap with the current experience is that the full list of icons is not currently in the pane but will be added shortly. We have also left the insert tab with its current capabilities in place because of how central it is to the app building experience, and because of how much help content relies on this interaction. Changing how people insert components is a big step, and so we will continue to evaluate usage and listen to feedback.

As always, we want to hear from you. Please share your feedback on your experience with the insert pane in the comments below or on the PowerApps community forums with #Insertpane.

Happy building.

Emma Cooper, @PowerEmmz