iPadOS 26 Developer Beta 4
It’s like a weight has been lifted from the soul of the iPad. It remains a very nice device to use in full-screen mode with all the simplicity attendant to that mode, or via a single tap it can turn into a multi-window, multitasking device that’s appropriate for the Mac-class hardware underpinning today’s iPads. The iPad no longer feels like it’s trying to live up to the promise of being the Future of Computing; with iPadOS 26, it’s more comfortable being itself.
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On the iPad, it’s a real jumble. Some stuff looks cool, while other stuff is unreadable. For the most part, the new design didn’t hinder my use of iPadOS 26, and given those shifting sands I’m going to withhold my most withering design criticisms for a later time. But, yeah… Apple either needs to figure this thing out, and fast, or it should just frost all the glass for release and keep working on it in the background until it finds a more usable solution.
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iPadOS 26 will be remembered as the update where Apple declared bankruptcy on all its previous attempts to do windowing and multitasking on the iPad, and released an entirely new windowing system that has been unabashedly inspired by the Mac.[…] I admit to forgetting more than once that I was using iPadOS when it was attached to my Studio Display. […] It’s really a flexible set of controls that works well whether you’re using a keyboard and trackpad or your fingers. […] And if you don’t want to use windowing on your iPad? Well, the feature is turned on and off with a single button in Control Center.
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The improvements to Files, support for background recording, and the new background tasks Live Activities are somewhat small changes on their own, but assembled together they create an iPad that just feels more ready for professional productivity tasks.
Previously:
- appleOS 26 Public Betas
- iPadOS 26 Developer Beta 3
- Menu Bar Madness in macOS 26 and iPadOS 26
- iPadOS Windows Mess Up Data Saving
- Assorted Notes on Liquid Glass
- iPadOS 26 Audio and Video Capture
- Apple’s Spin on AI and iPadOS Multitasking
- iPadOS 26 Announced
Update (2025-07-28): Rui Carmo:
Seriously, I don’t know what Apple was thinking, but this is a regression in usability that I haven’t seen since the early days of iOS.
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Everything feels much slower (and this is an M1 Pro)
Even trying to turn off animations didn’t help (“reduce motion” doesn’t do anything for window animation delays, and turning on cross-fades really shows that Apple has the animations set too slow)
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It’s not really about Liquid Glass, but more about the blatant and gratuitous waste of screen real estate across the board. And I am really afraid that this is going to be the new normal, especially since I’m seeing similar things in macOS Tahoe– and if there is one thing that I like in macOS, it is that it has had (until Sonoma, at least, where title bars got too fat for comfort) a decent balance between aesthetics and efficient use of screen real estate.
However, as someone who’s used an iPad as my main computer for almost 14 years, I can’t join the chorus of unbridled enthusiasm for iPadOS 26’s embrace of Mac conventions such as floating, overlapping windows and a menu bar at the top of the screen. Apple may well be making the right decision to please the largest pool of people who want to get work done on its tablet. But it’s also moving decisively away from some of the philosophies that attracted me to the platform in the first place, and I’m trepidatious about where that might lead.
To that end, my key takeaway and thought is sort of a funny one: my god, Apple has made a Mac Jr.
That sounds derisive. And it sort of is! I don’t hate the experience by any means, but it seems sort of funny what Apple has done to iPadOS to avoid letting the iPad boot macOS. It’s now this pretty weird hybrid operating system that feels like it exists between iOS and macOS. It’s still a bit more iOS than macOS, but it’s pretty close to the halfway point with iPadOS 26…
iPad may already be fifteen years old, but iPadOS 26 feels like the first day of the rest of its life — in a way no previous software update has been. A Rubicon has been crossed.
The iPad multitasking is one of the few things in the new appleOSes that I’m really excited about, this looks so good!
See also: Juli Clover.
Update (2025-07-29): Craig Grannell:
iPadOS 26 no longer crossfades switching between full-screen apps. Instead, it zooms. I’ve sent feedback, but, y’know, this was the original vestibular accessibility sin, way back in iOS 7. Does no one test these things?
Update (2025-08-01): Federico Viticci (Mastodon):
Actually using iPadOS 26, however, has far exceeded my expectations – which pushed me to completely rethink my desk setup (again) and the apps I use around the iPad Pro and iPadOS 26.
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After a month spent using iPadOS 26, I can say this: while this update doesn’t turn iPadOS into macOS and there continue to be notable advantages to the Mac platform, iPadOS 26 is a monumental release for the iPad that finally shows a vision for what a new breed of modular desktop operating system should be. iPadOS 26 succeeds in the challenging task of preserving the iPad’s intuitive nature while unlocking tremendous functionality for advanced users, who are no longer penalized for attempting to use an iPad as a laptop replacement. In fact, thanks to iPadOS 26, I think the laptop analogy isn’t even that apt anymore. The new iPadOS transforms the device into the hybrid, modular type of computer I’ve long wanted to see Apple formally embrace.
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The reality is that despite its dozens of improvements, iPadOS 26 is not a miracle update that suddenly turns iPadOS into a 1:1 match for macOS. The reason is simple: while Apple can control the operating system and change it however they like, they cannot control the third-party app ecosystem and magically ensure that all the apps you can use on a Mac are now available on iPad as well.
I didn’t realize how much I rely on the menu bar in iPadOS 26 until I tried using an iPad using an older version of the OS again 😨 It’s like the entire functionality of the app has been stripped away and stashed in nooks and crannies.
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> And if you don’t want to use windowing on your iPad? Well, the feature is turned on and off with a single button in Control Center.
Now, if only they had something like that in macOS to turn off what version 26 brings.
