Watching a video and working on something else sounds possible these days thanks to the picture-in-picture mode feature. Mozilla Firefox offers this feature for users to enjoy the convenience of doing two things at the same time. It allows you to pop videos out of their webpages and float on another tab so you can continue working on other tabs while the video plays on.
How The Picture-in-Picture Works
Picture-in-picture offers easy navigation between tabs without compromising video watching. Once enabled, it will play videos in a small overlay using a detached video player. Users can move the player around the screen or adjust its size. You can even change tabs even without interfering with the video playing.
The interface offers a play/pause toggle button. You can also restore the video back ot its location. If you want to close the interface, you can click the close button. It will return to the original tab and it will also stopped where it paused when closing the player.
A video placeholder also appears on the page when your video is on picture-in-picture mode. It says, “This video is playing in Picture-in-Picture mode.”
There are no controls in the volume or the quality of the video. However, you can easily make these changes from the original webpage of the video. Keep in mind also that changes on its orginal location will affect the floating player. When you reload or open a new page, the video will automatically close.
Activate Picture-in-Picture Mode
You can enable the Picture-in-Picture mode in Firefox browser Settings.
- Look for the three lines on top of your browser and click on the menu button.
- Choose Preferences. On the list, look for Browsing section.
- Look for “Enable picture-in-picture video controls” and check it if it is unchecked. This will enable your picture-in-picture mode.
- To disable it, simply follow the process and uncheck the option.
How to Access Picture-in-Picture
Once enabled, there are different ways on how you can use your picture-in-picture mode.
Via Toggle
When you hover your mouse cursor over your videos, a toggle button will appear. It is a small blue rectangle with the text “Picture-in-picture”. Click on the toggle button and it will then overlay your video to a different player.
Unfortunately, not all web videos display a toggle button. Depending on the size and play length of the video, you may or may not see a toggle. It will also not appear when the video is in full screen.
Via Context Menu
You can also open a context menu to access the picture-in-picture. Just right-click on the web video and a context menu will appear. Then, look for the Picture-in-picture option on the list and click to turn it on. You can also access the context menu by double right-clicking or holding Shift when right-clicking.
Take note that some websites do not support the context menu and you cannot see it when you right-click the video. When your video is also on full screen, the picture-in-picture option will not be available on your context menu. You have to exit the full screen first before going back to the context menu.
Final Thoughts
Using the picture-in-picture in Firefox will offer you a more efficient use of your time. Enable it now so you can do more with your browser than just watching videos.
Have you tried it? Tell us in the comments below.