If you wish to see much more information but, on the net, you’ll be able to click on the gear-shaped icon in Drive’s upper-right nook and choose “Settings” — then change the choice for “Density” from “Comfy” to “Compact.” That’ll remove a bunch of the white area constructed into Drive by default and allow you to see far more data at a time on no matter dimension display screen you’re utilizing.
Google Drive downside #8: The buried file blues
All of us have these perpetually vital information — paperwork, photographs, and different resource-like gadgets we pull up on a regular basis. And all the time having to seek for stated VIP information to seek out ’em isn’t precisely enjoyable or productive.
Drive doesn’t have any option to pin information to the highest of an inventory, however it does have some useful instruments for treating sure gadgets as excessive precedence and making ’em particularly simple to seek out and entry. First, you’ll be able to star any file (and even a whole folder) by hovering your mouse over its line and clicking the star define that seems alongside its rightmost edge, on the Drive web site — or by utilizing the Ctrl-Alt-S (or Cmd-Alt-S, on a Mac) keyboard shortcut. Within the Drive cell app, you’ll faucet the three-dot menu icon alongside the merchandise after which choose the “Add to starred” choice within the menu that pops up.
Nonetheless you go about doing it, that motion will trigger the merchandise in query to look in a particular starred part you could then get to by clicking the “Starred” choice in the principle left-of-screen menu or by bookmarking this direct hyperlink for the desktop — or by tapping the “Starred” tab inside the principle bottom-of-screen menu within the Drive cell app.
You may also create your individual customized shortcuts for information or folders in order that they successfully seem in a number of locations — if, say, you’ve an vital merchandise that’s buried just a few folders deep in your Drive and need it to be extra simply accessible. By making a shortcut for it, you possibly can make it out there from the principle “My Drive” checklist whereas technically nonetheless leaving it in its correctly organized dwelling. Good-click on any file or folder and choose “Arrange” after which “Add shortcut” to get began with that from a pc — or use the Ctrl-Alt-R (or Cmd-Alt-R, on a Mac) keyboard shortcut. You’ll be able to faucet that three-dot menu icon subsequent to any merchandise to seek out the identical choice on cell.
In case you’re utilizing Android, you may also add a direct shortcut to any file or folder proper onto your cellphone’s dwelling display screen for one-touch entry with out even having to open the app. Faucet the three-dot menu icon alongside the merchandise you need, then scroll down and search for the “Add to House display screen” choice to present it a whirl.
Whew — that pesky ol’ cloud is bound beginning to really feel a heck of lot lighter, isn’t it?
This text was initially printed in December 2020 and most not too long ago up to date in August 2025.
