Great, take a step further. The future is docking your phone, probably ultimately wirelessly, and have a keyboard, mouse and multi monitor, why not a solid voice interface at the same time?
What Apple has done with these mobile processors is insane. The M-series MacBooks were the first laptop I ever owned that felt like a Desktop, no compromise to go mobile.
Sure, you'll have to make a bunch of thermal/size compromises for the phone form factor but given wall power as a daily driver it is far more than enough for email, teams, web browsing, even development.
starik36 · 1h ago
Windows Phone had this very feature back in the day. You just connected the phone to the PC via USB, and magically, you had a desktop environment.
jljljl · 1h ago
The ability to switch modes is going to be important. I'm on the latest iPadOS beta, and when I'm using it to do work across multiple apps the new macOS like window management is amazing. When I'm just trying to read a book, watch a movie, or do some other focused activity, it's mostly annoying.
Hamuko · 45m ago
It doesn't have a toggle in the quick switch in Control Center like Stage Manager on current iPadOS?
vunderba · 58m ago
I was always under the impression that the reason they seemingly crippled the iPad Pros from functioning as full-fledged computers was to prevent it from cannibalizing MacBook sales.
That's why the latest iPads, with their M4 processors, always felt like overkill for what you could realistically use the device for. I've got an old iPad Pro 10.5 that's 8 years old at this point, and it still works perfectly for my use cases (drawing tablet with Procreate, GarageBand, watching YouTube, etc.).
Daedren · 42m ago
They were never crippled, there were just no apps making use of that performance at that point, their vision's still the same as it is today IMO. Now there's a lot of pretty good apps for video editing, CAD, etc.
Of course we computer enthusiasts feel the iPad is still restricted in a lot of ways, but a lot of younger consumers genuinely want the iPad experience, which is why I presume this new feature can be toggled on and off, and why we're probably never getting macOS on an iPad.
garyclarke27 · 1h ago
Steve Jobs duly listed browsing the web, dealing with email, watching videos, listening to music, playing games, reading ebooks, and enjoying photos. Coincidentally, those were the exact things the iPad was really good at.
Agreed * Except Music * I have loved having many iPads, but the speakers have always been terrible and they point the wrong way - about time this was fixed.
wrs · 1h ago
I only ever activate the iPad multitasking features by accident, and then I don’t know how to get out of Split View or hidden Safari windows or whatever other weird thing I’ve triggered. So I’m looking forward to this mode switch that goes back to 2012. I have a fully tricked out MacBook for work, I don’t need to work on my iPad. I’m totally happy in an armchair like Steve.
neilalexander · 1h ago
The windowed mode is indeed optional and can be turned off in the Settings or Control Center.
What Apple has done with these mobile processors is insane. The M-series MacBooks were the first laptop I ever owned that felt like a Desktop, no compromise to go mobile.
Sure, you'll have to make a bunch of thermal/size compromises for the phone form factor but given wall power as a daily driver it is far more than enough for email, teams, web browsing, even development.
That's why the latest iPads, with their M4 processors, always felt like overkill for what you could realistically use the device for. I've got an old iPad Pro 10.5 that's 8 years old at this point, and it still works perfectly for my use cases (drawing tablet with Procreate, GarageBand, watching YouTube, etc.).
Of course we computer enthusiasts feel the iPad is still restricted in a lot of ways, but a lot of younger consumers genuinely want the iPad experience, which is why I presume this new feature can be toggled on and off, and why we're probably never getting macOS on an iPad.