people have been looking for a way to
make the iPad a laptop replacement and
now that we have Mouse and trackpad
support there's just one thing holding
them back the apps and I'm going to tell
you how you can make your iPad feel more
like a laptop that has before iPad OS
13.4 brought mouse and trackpad support
to the iPad bringing the laptop
replacement reality a little closer
Apple also introduced the iPad magic
keyboard for iPad pro with the built-in
trackpad as well as worked with Logitech
to create the combo touch for less
expensive iPads now that we essentially
have a laptop form factor for iPad we
need to look at why the apps make this
feel like less of a laptop when I think
of my most used apps they all kind of
boil down to YouTube or video social
networking shopping account management
and utilities if you are like most
people you probably figured that if
there was an app available for the iPad
on the App Store you would probably get
a better experience with the app versus
using the web page and before iPad OS
you may have been right but iPad OS
brought desktop class browsing to the
iPad which means we are now served at
computer version in Safari instead of a
blown up mobile version for your phone
this means websites that may have acted
weird or were more difficult to use on
the iPad compared to the app are now
fully functional sites Mouse and
trackpad support from iPad OS 13.4 have
now been fully baked into Safari by
Apple compared to the third-party apps
you are using let's take a look at
YouTube as an example some things have
been fixed in the iPad app and you can
now scrub through the timeline with the
trackpad but it's more limited in Safari
you can hover over the timeline and get
a preview before clicking to watch that
portion using Safari you can also use a
remapped Escape key to exit full screen
video and if you are a YouTube premium
subscriber you can get picture and
picture video and have a floating window
with a video playing and continue to
work on something else
and yes picture picture works on Netflix
too when we look at social apps on
Safari like Twitter or next door you can
get a fuller layout of the page with
much better use of the space and if you
use a safari content blocker less ads
shopping apps like Best Buy and Amazon
are better in Safari when it comes to
opening multiple when
you can compare items view lists or you
can select text wherever you want unlike
in the native apps apps like Verizon
Walgreens and others don't need to be
sitting on my device potentially sharing
my location data for no good reason when
they had little to no advantage over
using the websites then there's also
some apps that don't even have the same
amount of features in the application as
they do on the website for example I use
canva to make thumbnails and title cards
which has more limited options in the
app like making animations with Safari I
am not limited in how I modify objects
or what types of objects I can create
other benefits to using Safari over
native apps could be reducing
notifications if you have apps on your
phone to ability to zoom into a website
with a trackpad pinch saving bookmarks
to specific items reader view for
simpler formatting and removing ads less
background updates for maps and probably
better battery life yes there will
always be native apps that you will need
to have on the iPad just like a laptop
like for photo editing making videos
games and things like smart home devices
that were only built around apps now
there will undoubtedly also still be
websites here and there that still may
not work as well on iPad but my
suggestion is that you start looking at
apps that do have well-known web
interfaces and see how they compare to
the native app you are using I think
you'll be surprised by how well they
work one negative to using Safari over
the apps is that you may have to log in
more frequently to the web sites than
you would in the app I find this to be
much less of an issue using a physical
keyboard on the iPad but even less so
using a password manager like keychain
or LastPass and having face ID or touch
ID enable another negative is offline
access to certain things like videos or
files so you may need to plan for times
when you are unable to be connected so
if you are looking for ways to replace
your laptop with an iPad look no further
than Safari Safari has a consistent user
experience across sites gets Apple's
latest input updates and can even
provide more features than you would get
from a native app as for myself using
the iPad with the trackpad and iPad OS
has completely changed how I use my iPad
and turned it into a real laptop
replacement for almost everything I do
if you look at your laptop usage right
now you will probably realize you spend
more time in the browser than anything
else and that is the key to making your
iPad feel more like a laptop than ever
before hey thanks for watching
if
you found this helpful hit the thumbs up
and subscribe buttons below if you have
other suggestions to making your iPad
feel more like a laptop let me know in
the comments you can follow me on
Twitter add Jerry Schultz for video
updates and I'll see you next time