When Apple unveiled macOS Monterey and iPadOS 15 last June at its Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC), one of the premiere features was Universal Control. This promised to let you seamlessly control a Mac and an iPad (or even a Mac and another Mac) with a single keyboard and mouse. This was the new-for-Fall-2021 feature I was most excited about as someone who typically has both a Mac and an iPad on my desk. Alas, Monterey and iPadOS 15 landed last Fall, but with no Universal Control. Even in the beta channel we never got this feature until a few weeks ago. But it’s finally here, and it’s shockingly good.
To get started, first make sure you have macOS 12.3 installed on your Mac, and iPadOS 15.4 installed on your iPad. Then on your Mac go to System Preferences > Displays and click on the Universal Control button. This will bring up the dialog that you see in my screenshot above. The first checkbox just enables Universal Control. As it explains there, once Universal Control is running, you can just move your mouse from your Mac over to your iPad and back again just as seamlessly as moving your cursor between multiple connected monitors. The second checkbox lets you connect to a nearby Mac or iPad by literally moving your mouse cursor toward it and pushing against the edge of the screen. That then generates a little animation on the device you’re connecting to where it looks and feels as if you’re breaking through some sort of membrane as you move your mouse over to the other device. It’s a playful way to visually communicate that you’ve paired the two. Lastly, the third checkbox lets you reconnect to a previously connected Mac or iPad automatically. I recommend having all of them enabled.
As you can see from the screenshot, even though this feature is now officially part of macOS and iPadOS, Apple still considers it a beta, but it works remarkably well. In anticipation of this feature coming, I switched from an iPad Pro with Magic Keyboard to an iPad Air with no keyboard knowing I’d soon be able to do this. It was the right call for me. I no longer need to move my hands from one mouse/keyboard over to a different one. When you move your mouse over to the iPad, the keyboard automatically follows it. If you copy text or an image on one device, you can move your mouse over to the second and paste it. You can drag and drop a file from one device to the other. It’s nearly flawless.
I can see why Apple still considers it a beta though. There are still a few issues to work out. For example, I use GroupMe for a couple of groups I’m a part of, and something about GroupMe breaks the Universal Control pairing. I’ll move my mouse over to the iPad, launch GroupMe, and start typing a message. At some point in the middle of that the connection will break. I’ve only seen that happen in that one app though, and it’s always felt like a poorly-written iOS app to me.
Still, small issues aside, this feature is even better than I imagined it could be, and I’ve come to use it daily. If you have a Mac and an iPad, it’s at least worth playing with to see if you can find a use for it. It’s the kind of feature that really feels like magic. The kind of feature that makes Apple, Apple.
Does the web version of GroupMe exhibit the same behavior? That's what I use on my MacBook.