4 iPadOS 16 Features That Will Have a Huge Impact on Your Productivity

Apple is finally turning your powerful tablet into more than just a big iPhone.

- By Michael Simon & Jason Cross

We've been saying it for years: The iPad is a phenomenally powerful and flexible piece of hardware that's being held back by iPadOS. In 2019, Apple officially split iOS and iPadOS, signaling that the tablet's software would start to grow in its own direction, and we've been waiting for that decision to bear fruit ever since. With iPadOS 16, we're getting the first real big step in that direction.

There are dozens of new features big and small, but these are the four biggest things that could change the way you use your iPad. Remember, the iPad also got many of the new features found in iOS such as editing iMessages, Live Text updates, iCloud Shared Photo Library, and so on. But these are the four features that will change the way you use your iPad.

1. STAGE MANAGER

iPad multitasking is kind of a mess. There's split view and slide over and resizable views (except when they're not), and you can't see the dock, except when you can... and it's all enabled with gestures that casual users can't seem to figure out.

iPadOS 16 doesn't fix this mess, but it does add a new mode that brings us closer to real multitasking on the iPad. It's called Stage Manager and it's only available on iPads with an A12X, A12Z, M1, or M2 processor (the latest iPad Air and recent iPad Pros).