iPadOS 26 is going to change the iPhone forever

0:00 So, one of the absolute best features of iPad OS 26, aside from all the new windowing systems and the file management system, has to be the list of supported devices. I of course installed it on my main M4 iPad Pro first and played with it for a while, but then I wanted to install it on my iPad Mini to see what that experience was like. And overall, it's been absolutely amazing. And I have some thoughts not only about what it means for the iPad lineup and the iPad Mini, but also what it could mean for iOS and iPhones moving forward. Let's talk about it. But now, before we continue talking about the iPad Mini and iPad OS, definitely consider subscribing to the channel because it helps motivate us to make more videos like this and keep you guys up to date. But now, let's talk all things iPad OS 26 on this beloved iPad Mini. So, let's quickly talk about the role of the iPad Mini in the iPad lineup because it seems to be

0:45 the most iPad of the iPads that you get to see. You have the M4 iPad Pro, which to me is more so a computer replacement because you pair with the Magic Keyboard. You have the M4 chip in there, the 13-in display, tandem OLED. Then you have things like the lesser iPad A16, which is more for students, the 10.9 in display. But for the iPad or the essence of the iPad to be fully lived out, I believe it's an iPad Mini. It's small, it's pocketable. It has the A17 Pro chip, so it's powerful enough to run probably the latest and greatest from an application, software, and backend standpoint. It has all the bells and whistles that you would want out of an iPad. And the thing about the iPad is that it's supposed to be used as a tablet first and foremost. And the iPad Mini doesn't have any pin connectors or any easy way or simple way directly from Apple to have a Bluetooth keyboard on

1:31 there to make it more computer-like, quote unquote. So, the iPad Mini has always been the closest in terms of experience to the iPhone. And especially in today's world where the iPhone Pro Max is 6.9 in and looking to get even bigger and then the iPad Mini is 8.3 in in terms of display size, they're getting closer and closer to being the same size and the same experience. But one is just running iOS and then the other one's running iPad OS. And then iPad OS 26 has really changed how people are going to be viewing the iPad mini and how it could be used with the windowing system which I think could be a foreshadow into what's going to happen moving forward with iOS, iPad OS, and maybe even Mac OS kind of converging into one and then also maybe a new feature coming to iOS in the future. But now I want to talk about iPad OS 26 first on the iPad mini and talk about what that experience is like because

2:17 like I said a lot of the features that you're getting from iPad OS 26 on the iPad Pro are there on the iPad mini. But first a quick word from our sponsor Paperlike. Shout out to them for always supporting the channel and making these videos possible. I've been using Paperlike products since 2018. Ever since I pulled out my 2018 iPad Pro, within the first few days, I put a paper-like screen protector on there because I knew that was the best decision to not only protect my display, but also give me the best overall iPad experience the way that was intended to be used. So, if you've ever felt like writing or drawing on the iPad was just a tad too slippery because of that glossy display, this completely fixes that. Paperlike is the original paper field screen protector, and it actually feels like writing on real paper. That's thanks to the nano technology, the tiny micro beads that are built into the screen that give you just enough

3:03 resistance and more control and precision without messing with the screen clarity. This is perfect for creators, students, entrepreneurs, or anyone who's using an iPad to get stuff done. I use it for note-taking, sketching, planning, and it just makes the iPad feel complete. And for those of you that are saying that you can now get a nanoexture display on your iPad Pro, firstly, you need to get the one TB version, which is almost $2,000, and spend an extra $100 on that one. But still, the feel is completely different compared to Paperlike, which actually gives you that resistive feel and not just that anti-glare technology that's on the nanoexture display. And then lastly, their customer service is second to none with people responding to you immediately if something goes wrong. And they give you a 100-day money back guarantee if for any reason you do want to send it back. So whether you just got your first iPad or you've been an iPad user like myself for years, getting a Paperlike screen protector is always the first thing that I do when getting a new

3:49 iPad because I know it's going to protect my display, give me a better visual experience because it gets rid of all that glare. And lastly, it actually feels amazing when handwriting on there with the Apple Pencil. But thank you so much for Paperlife for partnering up with 9 to5 Mac. Now, back to iPad OS 26. Okay, so what did the iPad Mini get? Of course, the iPad mini got that liquid glass redesign, but all the different iOS, iPad OS, and Mac OS devices got that same overhaul in that same look. So, I'm not going to kind of go over them too much, but just know that liquid glass is everywhere. It's in your settings. It's in your home screen. It's in your themed icons. It's all over the system management and it is getting better and better as these betas go on. Again, we are in public beta version two on this iPad Mini. So, there's still room for improvement. We have about a month or so before Apple finally releases this to the public. But

4:34 overall, I'm a fan of the liquid glass design. But now, the things that did change on iPad OS and that surprised me that we got on the iPad Mini is the new windowing system. I've gone over the windowing system on my M4 iPad Pro. And with that one, because it is a 13-in display, and because it has the Magic Keyboard and it has the M4 chip, it just feels a lot more reasonable. It feels like it's supposed to be on there. It feels like it's something that could be used as a computer replacement for a lot of people now because you have things that look a lot more like Mac OS. You have your traffic like window management. So, your red, yellow, and green to enlarge, minimize, and close out. You can multitask with up to 12 different applications at once. You can have multiple views of that application. You can resize to infinite different sizes and forms and shapes. Again, you have your different quad box, your split view, your your triple box as well. So,

5:20 from a multitasking and window management standpoint, it made a lot of sense on a larger display. But now, bring that over to the iPad mini on an 8.3 in display. And while albeit in some situations, it can get a little bit crammed, it's actually very useful in a still touch interface. Apple did find ways to yes make iPad OS a little bit more Mac-like, but still keeping the full essence of the iPad being a touch interface. So, for instance, when you get closer to the actual maybe traffic light management buttons, especially if you have the Apple Pencil Pro and you have hover, it'll enlarge itself a little bit, but if you're just using your finger, there's kind of a larger radius touch point cuz these circles are very small. You kind of tap in that general area, it enlarges all the different controls and your finger is still small enough to be able to manage everything. Resizing the windows is very

6:05 fluid and very easy. There's cool little flick gestures and flick motions to be able to to go into these split view modes and the quadbox mode. So, it still feels very familiar and very easy to use even in that small form factor. So, multitasking in general has improved immensely on the iPad mini. Again, the only real multitasking I used on the iPad mini before was more so the split view where I would have maybe some text messages or maybe something that I'm viewing on the side. It was more so kind of a throwound weekend machine. But now, it is a lot more productive. And then you pair that with an external display. Well, albeit it is going to mirror your display. you're not going to get the full extended monitor support like you do on M powered machines like the M3 iPad Air, the M4 iPad Pro. Still being able to mirror the display still gives you a sense of almost like a Dexlike mode, which I think is going to be an inference or a foreshadow into what

6:51 we're going to think about in the future. And then another big change has to be the file management as well on here, but again, very similar to iPad OS 26 on the M4 iPad Pro. It's just easier to navigate the file management system, easier to sort, easier to move columns around. You can now add certain files and file types and file folders to your doc for easier access, which is what I like to do to make it very easy to access my iCloud. So overall, things just got a lot easier in the files app. And you of course being able to then also manage those files based on color and icons and tags. All great additions. So now what could this mean for the future of iOS and the future of iPhones? The first one is going to be that it is okay to multitask on a smaller display. One of the biggest things that is a detriment to iOS and Apple and the iPhone in general is that Apple has

7:37 refused to allow for real multitasking on the iPhone. Even if they wanted to make it just for the larger 16 Pro Max or the larger 16 Plus, I would be okay with that if you can have maybe a top and a bottom view. I get not being able to do maybe a quad box or being able to have multiple apps running at the same time on the iPhone because the experience probably wouldn't be great on such a small screen. But even the ability to multitask on a top half and a bottom half, which you can easily do on iPad OS 26 on your iPad mini on 8.3 in displays, I think is something that people would welcome. Overall, I've actually been using the Galaxy Zfold for a little while now, and I didn't think that I would like the multitasking that comes with the ZFold, both on the front screen, but more so on the internal screen. But I use that a lot. I use three different applications and multiple niche use cases. and and I have a video going over that in my review,

8:23 which I'll link down below, of how I've been using multitasking as a quote unquote smartphone power user, which I didn't even think was going to be a thing for me. But I do use two and three apps at the same time that kind of move and manipulate data and see things on one application to then input it on another one. And that's almost impossible on the iPhone right now. It's very tedious. You have to swipe between different applications. You have to remember what you're copying and pasting. You can't really see what's going on. Sometimes you have to go into multitasking, peek over to the application, then go back to type in whatever you need to type in. So just multitasking, the experience on iOS just isn't good. And what iPad OS 26 is showing us on the iPad mini is that you can easily do that on the iPad mini and bring it over to iOS, which I think is something that could be done in the future very, very soon. Again, I'm not talking about having eight applications running on iOS at once. I'm talking

9:09 about having two stacked over each other that you can resize and also pull data from each other to see what's going on on each of them, which would make multitasking much easier on the iPhone. And in today's world where the iPhone is a lot of people's main computer, I think that should be a no-brainer moving forward. And the second thing I want to bring up is going to be some sort of Mac OS light version coming to iOS at sometime soon. Like I mentioned, if you plug in your iPad Mini with iPad OS 26, it will mirror the iPad Mini display, but you can easily connect a Bluetooth keyboard, easily connect a Bluetooth mouse, get the new mouse cursor that shows up on iPad OS 26, and then just use your iPad on a much larger display that makes it feel Mac OS like because like I said, the windows can now man be managed a lot easier. They can be moved around a lot simpler. Your doc is much more customizable. You have your task menu on the top depending on which

9:56 applications you're using. And you can use things like the Apple Magic Trackpad in combination with the Magic Mouse and a keyboard and get a full kind of desktop-like experience now with iPad OS 26 on your iPad Mini. And then also, again, I keep talking about the Fold 7, but I've recently played with the Fold 7. I've been using it for about a month now, and Dex mode is awesome. You just plug in your Samsung Fold 7. It populates an entire external display and you turn into a kind of like a Chrome OS-l like experience, but it is desktop class and it makes it just much easier to use your Fold 7 as a computer which could be brought over to something like an iPhone 17 Pro Max. I mean, I don't see why Apple couldn't do this. You have the USBC port, which is going to be Thunderbolt level. You're going to have the latest A19 Pro chipset, which is going to be as powerful as like an M2 or

10:42 M3 chipset. So, being able to do some light editing, some light work, some light emailing, communication, Slack, Microsoft Teams, Safari, web browsing, watching YouTube videos, like why couldn't you bring that over to the iPhone? I get it. It could a few things, but for the most part, I think it would be kind of a niche product that some people would just really take advantage of and maybe create some awesome cool desk setups where your iPhone is your everything. you go from home to your work to your office to and all you have to do is plug in the USBC cable and then an entire kind of desk setup gets populated with your iPhone being the center of it all. So that's what I think iPad OS 26 on the iPad mini is showing us. It's showing us a future where we could have multitasking directly on the iPhone. But we could also have a kind of Mac OS light experience when you plug your iPhone in. There are third party

11:27 applications that have tried to do this and I've seen them kind of work and they work decently well, but nothing is going to compare to Apple doing this as a first party gesture. So hopefully the iPad mini and the success of iPad OS 26 and the window management multitasking of it all and just the sheer power that you get out of such a small device could foreshadow what we're going to see in the future with iOS 26. But let me know with a comment down below what you guys think. Again, iPad OS 26 runs great on the iPad mini. I thought it was going to be a little bit gimmicky, but it is not whatsoever. So if you're in the market for an iPad Mini, right now they're $3.99 on Amazon. I'll link that down below, which is an absurd price. And also, I'm just curious to see what iOS 26 does in the future once we start to get more iterations of it moving forward. But that'll do it everybody. Let me know what you think with a comment down below. Would you use a Mac OS light version coming out of your

12:14 iPhone? Do you see situations where you could multitask on your iPhone where you just can't right now or you wish you had to like dual multitasking of two different applications side by side? Always curious to know what you guys are thinking. But that'll do it. If you made it to the end, leave a dolphin. And if you want to watch more videos like this one, like maybe what's coming with the new Apple Watch Ultra 3, definitely check out one of these videos right here. And big shout out to Paper Life for continuing to partner up with 9to5 Mac and sponsoring the channel. Peace, everyone. [Music]