# Android Hover Support

**URL:** <https://forum.obsidian.md/t/android-hover-support/112778>\
**Category:** Devs: Plugins & API\
**Tags:** ui-ux, android, mobile\
**Created:** [March 28, 2026, 6:43pm UTC](https://forum.obsidian.md/t/android-hover-support/112778 "2026-03-28T18:43:48Z")\
**Posts on this page:** 3\
**Page:** 1

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**Author:** ![underclocked](https://forum.obsidian.md/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/u/ee7513/32.png) [@underclocked](https://forum.obsidian.md/u/underclocked)\
**Post date:** [March 28, 2026, 6:43pm UTC](https://forum.obsidian.md/t/android-hover-support/112778/1 "2026-03-28T18:43:48Z")

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Tablets can use mice and stylii (styluses? styli?) ! It would be super nice if we could indicate affordances with reactive hover effects like we can on desktop. Modern web browsers already support this - I’m not totally familiar with the full web stack under the hood of Obsidian but I imagine most of the work of supporting this has already been taken care of upstream!

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**Author:** ![WonnyKim](https://forum.obsidian.md/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/w/97f17d/32.png) [@WonnyKim](https://forum.obsidian.md/u/WonnyKim)\
**Post date:** [July 17, 2026, 1:19am UTC](https://forum.obsidian.md/t/android-hover-support/112778/2 "2026-07-17T01:19:52Z")

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Android exposes stylus air-hover through MotionEvent.ACTION\_HOVER\_ENTER,  
ACTION\_HOVER\_MOVE, and ACTION\_HOVER\_EXIT, with TOOL\_TYPE\_STYLUS and  
AXIS\_DISTANCE.

On Obsidian Android, mouse hover reaches the plugin WebView, but stylus air-hover  
does not: the plugin receives pointerType “pen” only when the stylus touches the  
screen. This prevents community plugins from showing a pre-contact stylus cursor.

Could Obsidian’s Android WebView host expose native stylus hover to plugins,  
for example through a CustomEvent or plugin API carrying x/y, toolType, and  
distance? This would enable hover cursors, brush previews, and pen-aware UI  
without affecting touch input.

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**Author:** ![Plageme](https://forum.obsidian.md/letter_avatar_proxy/v4/letter/p/3bc359/32.png) [@Plageme](https://forum.obsidian.md/u/Plageme)\
**Post date:** [October 30, 2026, 12:16pm UTC](https://forum.obsidian.md/t/android-hover-support/112778/3 "2026-10-30T12:16:59Z")

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Same here on a Samsung Galaxy Tab with S Pen (Air command off). On Patrick H. Lauke’s “pen-tracker” test page in Chrome, stylus hover arrives as `pointermove` with `pointerType: "pen"`, `pressure: 0`, and `buttons` goes from 0 to 1 when the side button is pressed. Inside Obsidian, logging every pointer, mouse and touch event on `window` in the capture phase shows nothing at all until the pen touches the glass. Obsidian’s own ribbon icons don’t highlight on stylus hover either.

One more consequence: the S Pen side button can’t be read while hovering. The only trace in Obsidian is a single `contextmenu` event with no `pointerType` and no release event, so handwriting plugins can’t offer “press the button to open a menu / hold it to erase” the way native apps do.

If the Android container let `ACTION_HOVER_*` / generic motion events reach the WebView (as Chrome does), the standard Pointer Events would just work: no new plugin API needed.