Thursday, June 2, 2022 1:45 pm8 Comments

• News

Apple will announce significant changes to its iPadOS operating system for iPads next week at its annual WWDC that will make iPads more like MacBooks and less like iPhones, Bloomberg News reports Thursday citing “people with knowledge of the matter.”

Mark Gurman for Bloomberg News:

The iPad’s next major software update, iPadOS 16, will have a redesigned multitasking interface that makes it easier to see what apps are open and switch between tasks, said the people, who asked not to be identified because the changes aren’t yet public. It also will let users resize app windows and offer new ways for users to handle multiple apps at once.

The iPad accounts for nearly 9% of annual Apple’s sales, and that percentage has inched up in recent years. But professional users of the device have clamored for an interface that feels more like a laptop experience. The iPad’s hardware, which now includes the same M1 chip as some of Apple’s laptops, has grown increasingly powerful, and in some ways the software hasn’t kept up.

Currently, iPad users can either run apps in a full-screen view like on an iPhone or run two apps side by side. The company also lets users add a scaled-down version of a third app by sliding it over from the side. The changes will expand upon that interface.

MacDailyNews Take: This is, of course, a great idea:

Imagine an “iOS Pro” mode.

Turn on iOS Pro on your iPad Pro
1. Tap Settings > General, and make sure iOS Pro is turned on.
2. There is no step two.

Hey, we can dream, can’t we?

— MacDailyNews, December 29, 2015

As we wrote on Tuesday:

If windowing (finally) comes to iPad with iPadOS 16, Apple will be smartly cannibalizing itself, to some extent, as some computer buyers will opt for iPads instead of MacBooks solely due to that (massive upgrade in) capability.

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