Moving cards by mouse, touch and keyboard

Moving a card from one list to the next is the heart of a kanban board. Laneboard offers three ways that all lead to the same result — and every move can be undone with Ctrl+Z.

With the mouse

Press on a card, drag it and let go over a list. A coloured line shows where the card will land; near the edges the board scrolls along. Lists move the same way by their grip handle (the six dots before the list name). A click without dragging still opens the card.

On a phone or tablet

Press and hold a card for a moment until it lifts, then drag it. A quick swipe without holding scrolls the board as usual, so you can still move around long boards with one finger.

With the keyboard

1. Move the focus to a card with Tab and press Space. The card lifts and gets an orange outline.
2. Arrow up and Arrow down move it within its list; Arrow left and Arrow right move it into the neighbouring list (in right-to-left languages the directions follow the layout). Home and End jump to the top or bottom.
3. Space or Enter drops the card. Escape puts it back where it was.

Screen readers hear each step in plain words: “Picked up card Search ignores accents. List Ready, position 1 of 2.” — then “List In progress, position 1 of 3.” — and after dropping “Card Search ignores accents moved to list In progress, position 1.” The whole move counts as a single step for undo, and the card history notes one move, not every arrow press.

Lists move the same way: focus the grip handle, press Space, use Arrow left and Arrow right, drop with Space. The list menu also has Move list left and Move list right.

If you prefer a dialog, open the card and choose Move…: pick the board, the list and the position from three lists. That is also the way to move a card to another board.

WIP limits

Kanban works best when a list does not fill up with half-finished work. Open a list’s ⋯ menu and choose WIP limit…. With a limit of 3, the list shows Cards: 2 of 3; with a fourth card it turns red and says Over the WIP limit in words. Laneboard does not block the move — it only makes the problem visible. A limit of 0 removes it.

Filters and moves

When filters hide some cards, the positions you see are the ones that count: a card dropped between two visible cards lands between them, and hidden cards keep their places. More about filters in Filters, table and calendar.

Shortcuts at a glance

Help → Keyboard shortcuts (or ?) lists all keys. Single-key shortcuts (N, /, 1–3, ?) can be switched off there if they get in the way of your screen reader or speech input.