Replacing images in Indesign CC 2019 using drag and drop

[shannonw89885629]

I just updated my indesign app and now I can't drag and drop images into a frame like i previously could... Now every time I drag and drop an image, it creates a brand new frame. Is there a setting I'm missing that I need to change? Or is this feature been completely abandoned?

Please help!

[Laubender]

Hi Shannon,

just tested drag & drop to an empty frame or to a frame where an image already resides.

No problems found. Working as before. I am on WIndows 10 with InDesign CC 2019 German.

What's your operating system?

What kind of image files are you trying to drop to your layout?

Hm. Perhaps the frame where you like to drop the image to is locked?

Regards,
Uwe

[chiba1975]

I'm having the same problem since I upgraded to Mojave (10.14.1) late last week. I'm using the latest version of InDesign CC.

I've always copied photo comps directly from a site like iStock and pasted them into frames until clients approve them. Once approved by the client, I purchase and download stock photos and convert them into 300 dpi, CMYK .jpgs in Photoshop. I then drag the final .jpg images from a Finder window directly into InDesign, where they would replace the comp images.

Now, instead of replacing the comp images, a brand new frame is created when I try to drag in the final photos. The photo frames are not locked. I can still import images using the Place function, but prefer the drag and drop method from Finder because it's faster.

[CKandy · Accepted solution]

I was having the same problem with illustrator 2019. It turns out i has a locked layer selected. Make sure to unlock the layer or choose one that is unlocked then drag and drop all the images you want! Cheers!

[amadeupl]

I was having the same issue, the problem was in the layers.

I had more than one layer. The existing box image was on the layer #2 below/under the extra layers. So when I drop the image, it was trying to place the image on the top layer #1. 

I've locked the layer #1 and now it works. 

[Carlita Cleo]

I'm having the same issue with the drag and drop feature which seems to be completely disabled. I don't have any layers in my document. In the past, I could hover over and image and it would automatically place an image. The drag and drop feature also remember the scaled content. I have indesign 2021.  Any help would be appreciated. Very frustrating having to manually place, fit, and update links. 

Thanks!

[Mike Witherell]

If you don't have layers, then check to see that there is a big empty textframe on top, or maybe you should double-check what page or master page you are on.

[AutoGuru_AU]

Hi! 

I had this issue as well but not with locked layers. Instead it was with a box from a master page that was layered higher than the object I wanted to drag and drop the image into.

My example was that I had a box, that I applied no fill but a stroke to create a border on the page. I placed it on the layer that was the highest (on top of everything else) so that boxes I made that were coming from outside of the page would be underneath the border. This master was applied to all pages. That was the problem, so here is a way to work around/ fix it. 

1. Go to your layers panel
2. Find the highest layer where your box is making the border 
3. Drag that whole layer below the layer with the frames you wanted to apply an image to. 
4. Apply all images to the frames
5. Then bring yoru border layer back to the top once finished. 

[Christophe Hanne]

I had the same issue for months and just  found the reason:
I had a big "DRAFT" in filigran, filling my entire page in my page templates. And it was on the top layer. 
So I just moved the layer containing this text to the lower level... and now, it works everytime again !