PiP doesn't work.

Thanks for posting, and for coming back with what you found. Good to know the forced PiP button gets you there in the meantime.

The behavior you hit first is one we're already tracking: leaving an app toward the home screen closes it instead of letting it fall back into Picture-in-Picture. The thread collecting it is Picture-in-Picture fails when returning to home screen (In Review). Upvoting it is the best way to get notified when its status changes.

Your details would add something there: your form says this doesn't happen with other launchers, on a Pixel 9 Pro XL running Android 17. Posting that and Hulu in that thread helps us see how wide the pattern goes.

It turns out the forced PiP button does work (never had to use that before - always just swiped to “close” Hulu and it would automatically minimize if it was playing).