If two or more packages use the echo area for informational messages then often they fight each other, overwriting each other's messages. For example, in lisp mode eldoc is automatically enabled in my emacs 26.2 If I also turn on a paren mode which shows in the message area the matching part of a paren outside of the screen then eldoc often overwrites this message with its own documentation message. Other systems solve this by stacking messages on top of each other: https://www.howtogeek.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/11/ximg_54669cfe004ae.jpg.pagespeed.gp+jp+jw+pj+js+rj+rp+rw+ri+cp+md.ic.iDwLFdLQh5.jpg Maybe the echo area could be smarter and stack messages on top of each other if they come from diferent sources and they are close to each other in time. So in case of the above example, if a message comes from eldoc and parens at the same time in quick succession then the echo area could show both of them in two lines. And if the same source is sending multiple messsages or there is enough delay between two messages from different sources (e.g. 1-2 seconds) then it would work as today using only a single line.