Using the iPad Pro as a laptop replacement

Before the pandemic, I spent almost a third of the year travelling. That meant trying many different solutions for staying in touch and productive when I was away from my office. And since the iPad’s release in 2010, I’ve been trying to use it as a substitute for a laptop. One colleague, watching me use my iPad at a media event, described it as ‘mesmerising’.

For the last year I tried to use my 12.9 iPad Pro as a laptop when I travel (I have a Mac Studio at home). And it was almost good enough. But there were moments of frustration that had me reaching for my 2010 MacBook Air. These aren’t really failures in the iPad Pro’s design. It’s really a reflection that iPadOS and macOS are built to solve different problems and they approach similar tasks is quite different ways.

Managing files

I don’t really spend a lot of time managing my files. But I do like to be organised. I also work between a number of different applications and cloud platforms. And that means I need to be able to easily share information.

I work with both Google Docs and Microsoft 365 with different clients. With iPadOS working across both is a pain because of the lack of a proper file system. The Files app is OK but it treats Google Drive and OneDrive as totally separate file stores and makes it challenging to easily move files between the two.

Apps aren’t universal

Although iPadOS is a mature platform that is now well and truly viable for content creation, there are macOS apps I rely on that don’t have an iPadOS equivalent. For example, my preferred app for podcast and video editing is Descript. There’s no iPadOS version so I can’t edit stuff on the go. And while there are other editing apps that work perfectly on iPadOS, Descript has nifty collaboration features that my clients rely on as well.

I also find that tools like Google Docs don’t work quite the same way as their desktop equivalents. I end up looking for options that either aren’t available or are buried. That’s not Apple’s fault. But it impacts my productivity.

There are numerous other differences that just get in the way of me getting things done.

Broken windows

Apple has taken huge steps forward with iPadOS’ multitasking and window management capability. I’m a big fan of Stage Manager on both the 12.9-inch iPad Pro and my desktop Mac. While Split View, introduced in iOS 9, started the move to using multiple apps at once iPadOS 16 lets you open multiple windows, resize them and move them around.

But window management is still too limited. Apple limits the degree to which window sizes can be manipulated. Even though I think Stage Manager and the other changes introduced in iPad 16 are a vast improvement, I’d like to see something like Spaces, the macOS virtual desktop. That would make multitasking and window management far simpler.

I ended up buying an M1 MacBook Air during the sales late last year. I use an 11-inch iPad Pro every day for reading, note-taking, email, calendar and other tasks. But the iPad Pro is overkill for those tasks. I suspect that I’d get by just fine with an iPad Air or even an iPad mini given how I use it.