Rumor: iPadOS 19 to become “more like macOS”

For newer readers, I’ve been using Apple products for 25 years, but last spring I switched to using an M4 iPad Pro as my primary computer, and I haven’t looked back. I’m a Mac admin by trade, so I still get my hands on Macs and macOS quite frequently, but all of my note-taking, emailing, calendaring, web browsing, script-writing, etc., is done on iPadOS. Ahead of last year’s WWDC, my main hope was that iPadOS would receive some needed productivity improvements. Those hopes were dashed by Apple Intelligence clearly taking the bulk of Apple’s software engineering resources.

Over the weekend, Mark Gurman dropped some tantalizing rumors about iPadOS 19, which will be announced this June at Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference. Since I don’t have a Bloomberg subscription, here’s the quote that MacRumors published:

"I'm told that this year's upgrade will focus on productivity, multitasking and app window management — with an eye on the device operating more like a Mac. It's been a long time coming, with iPad power users pleading with Apple to make the tablet more powerful."

I’m nervous about getting my hopes up, but it’s hard not to have them sky high after this report from the most influential journalist who publishes leaks from Apple.

Back in October, I actually emailed Apple’s head of software, Craig Federighi, and sent him my list of top desires for improvements to iPadOS. I have actually received a reply from an email to Craig in the past, but I knew I wasn’t going to get a reply to this one. But I hoped he would at least read it. Here’s what I asked for:

1) Memory Management - When switching between stages in Stage Manager, there’s always a brief pause where the apps in the stage I’m switching to have to be “revived” (for lack of a more technical term). This isn’t a deal-breaker, but I’d love Mac-like memory management where this wouldn’t be an issue.

2) Files App Improvements - I love how the Files app has grown over time, but I’d love for it to be more Mac-like in its feature set, and it’s also more prone to freezing or crashing than probably any other app I use.

3) External Display Improvements - Having true external display support was the single biggest barrier to me using an iPad as a work computer, and that’s mostly fixed with current external display support and Stage Manager. But there are still some things you can’t do on an external display that would be helpful, like rearranging Dock icons, deleting apps, and accessing Control Center.

4) External Keyboard Improvements - Whether on my Bluetooth keyboard or on the Magic Keyboard, keyboard shortcuts just stop working. This happens frequently, and I can’t find a pattern to what might be causing it.

I’m very hopeful that we may only be two months away from Apple granting some or all of those requests.

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