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Craig Federighi Explains Why Apple Won't Merge iPad and Mac: 'We Don't Want to Build Sporks'
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What you want is Apple to make a convertible Mac and try to optimized MacOS for touch (hopefully better than Microsoft did with Windows). That would be better for you than an iPad running MacOS esclusively. You don't care about iPadOS as a tablet OS.
I don't think that's what most people wanting MacOS on iPad want. They do care about the tablet experience, and they want the best of both worlds. Many are just not technical enough to know how to achieve that.
The only reasonable way to achieve that is the same way you get Windows on Macs with Apple Silicon, with virtualization.
many don't need an iPad to run like a Mac ...but we do need better pencil support/access across devices and apps.
- Continuity Sketch access is often in different menus across () apps, or non-existent. It's ridiculous to have to "hunt for a menu item"—The whole point of the development of the menu bar was to consolidate uniformity of the UI!
- All three; Continuity Sketch, Sidecar, Universal Access access/features need to be consolidated into "it just works"
- Bring Scribble to macOS
A corporation doesn’t want to build something that would reduce its profits. Is that really surprising? In the process, they keep making both products better to entice you to buy both. Again, is that really surprising?
If you don’t like their offerings, move to another company’s. Or build your own.
If you don’t like their offerings, move to another company’s. Or build your own.
I have owned many surface devices (Surface 2, pro 2, 3, pro 3, go2, book 2, book3, pro 11), and the pro 11 is clearly the best at kind of being a tablet because of ARM (and the new pro 12" is even better at that). But it's a compromise, it's usable, but annoying at times. Using file explorer with touch is a pain, double tapping on a file hardly ever works to open it. Web browsing is fine, but not working with files. I love my go 2, and with ARM it would be a very decent tablet, but still clearly behind an iPad.
With a virtualized MacOS inside an iPad you can have best of both words. But it's not in Apple's interest.
I have Windows 11 on ARM virtualized on my iPad pro M1 2TB, but I need to leave it on iPadOS 15 because Apple removed hypervisor (which allows virtualization) from iPadOS 16.
And it works great side by side with iPadOS.
Will I keep it forever? No. Because at some point iPadOS 15 will become unusable and I want my iPad too.
What Federighi actually wants to say:
"We don't want to cannibalize our macbook sales"
"We don't want to cannibalize our macbook sales"
I think there's a lot more that would need to be enabled besides an iPad being updated to toggle between a tablet UI and a desktop UI. If it were that straightforward, Windows 8 would not have been the disaster it were.
There also seems to be some confusion between switching of UIs, and switching of operating systems (like running windows in bootcamp in the past). I will say the latter is actually a lot more cumbersome than some people give it credit for. I initially ran windows 7 on my iMac for PC games, but the process of toggling was so cumbersome that I gave up after all while.
For one, apps would need to be updated to support both iPadOS (optimised for a touchscreen) and macOS (optimised for keyboard and mouse). I am not sure how feasible it is for an to toggle between the iPad version (eg: office or iWork's) and the macOS version. Nor would you want to be stuck with the iOS version of said app (and its enlarged UI)
Second, what does it mean for apps with no desktop equivalent (such as the google drive apps)? Or apps like Terminal or activity monitor in macOS that aren't available for the iPad?
Right now, people seem to be handwaving away all the complexities of managing two different operating systems on a device (they think switching to macOS on an iPad is as straightforward as turning stage manager on and off). I suspect the actual process will neither be as fluid nor as intuitive in real life, and that's where all the speedbumps will start popping up.
I‘m talking about a device launched in 2003, 7 years before the first iPad. Today, 22 years later, CPU‘s are no longer the bottleneck. Neither is battery. I also love my Air. But if I could simply detach the screen and have that seamlessly morph into an iPad, I would love it even more!
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Because their trackpads are ****.
Mac does scrolling with trackpads just like scrolling on touchscreens - same feel, same precision, same responsiveness. And it’s actually easier because you don’t have to raise your hand. For example: I never scroll by touchscreen when my M4 iPad is on its Magic Keyboard with trackpad.
So, while I get why scrolling is nice on touchscreen devices, Macs solve this issue without it.
As many have said, they don't want to lose their 30%.
I think there's a Steam deck approach that's viable here. As default it runs a touch friendly interfaced optimised for a small screen but if I need to I can boot into the desktop at any time, especially useful when I want to use it with a keyboard/mouse & screen.
I don't see how the current iPad approach of building it so it behaves more like a Mac is better than that. It surely means more development time and cost to ship features for both platforms, even with SwiftUI.
I think there's a Steam deck approach that's viable here. As default it runs a touch friendly interfaced optimised for a small screen but if I need to I can boot into the desktop at any time, especially useful when I want to use it with a keyboard/mouse & screen.
I don't see how the current iPad approach of building it so it behaves more like a Mac is better than that. It surely means more development time and cost to ship features for both platforms, even with SwiftUI.
No offence, but you are wrong. But the issue is not you, it's people here trying to come up with fancy solutions without knowing how feasible they are.
Let me give an example of something very real.
I run full Windows on ARM virtualized on a M1 iPad pro with 16GB RAM.
You need 2 things, some form of jailbraking to allow the full UTM to run on iPad (Apple only allows a dumbed down version on the store called UTM SE) and to be on anything lower than iPadOS 16.3 (Apple removed hypervisor on iPadOS 16.3 precisely to avoid this)
Then you have Windows (in my case), Linux or whatever ARM system running in a virtual machine, just like on a Mac. It runs like any app, you need to do NOTHING to use it. No restart, no special tricks, just open the app and have your OS there. If you go back to iPadOS the app takes barely any resources (I have done tests and benchmark to prove it).
And for people saying it takes 100GB etc. that's wrong, too. It's only takes the space actually used. If you allocate 100GB to Windows it won't take 100GB. It will only take the actual space used on iPad (dynamic allocation).
And again it won't take any CPU resources if Windows is idle. You can benchmark your iPad at full speed while keeping Windows open.
It's a simple solution, contrary to all the fancy theories here.
I am not familiar with some of the terms you are using, so I am going to assume the process is similar to running windows in parallels on a Mac. I tried searching for this on YouTube, but the closest is to use Screens to access your Mac remotely (I suppose that's one way to run windows in a window via stage manager). 😛
Yes, UTM works just like Parallels, and you can use it on MacOS too, for free, without paying Parallels' prices... It just doesn't not have coherence mode, it's a separate window for the virtualized OS.
Remote desktop is a different thing. It's great and I use it daily, but no Interned or poor Internet and you are left without your desktop OS... A virtual machine will work without Internet.
Craig's right. Sporks are useful items that still suck compared to truly purpose-built spoons and forks. Thousands of years of human history and anthropology are not wrong on this, otherwise the spork would have fully supplanted spoons and forks in its relatively brief life. At least sporks are allowed on planes.
I am sitting in front of a Windows 11 machine with a touchscreen as I write this comment. Normally I lean back a little in my chair, making the touchscreen slightly out of my reach. That's okay because my vision is still pretty good. I leaned over my external keyboard and mouse to touch a window on the touchscreen and it didn't immediately respond, like it was surprised I attempted it. Then it started responding and functioning normally. I think that's what Craig's referring to in terms of touch-first response on the iPad vs. the Mac. My main complaint with touch on Windows devices going back to Windows 8 is that the multitouch implementation isn't as responsive as the iPad. Similarly, most Windows machines have inferior touchpads to Macs, but thanks to third parties Windows has more substantial mouse support than Macs.
I get why there's a very vocal minority who wants a sleek, portable device that runs iPad, Mac, any other OS via virtualization, etc. It's just weird that this same group almost never thinks about the compromises therein. They absolutely exist, and Apple is definitely testing these ideas out, sometimes in public. I'm using iPad OS 26 on an iPad 8 with a 10.2" screen. Too small. Frankly I don't think the 4-up tiled workflow works well without a 13" screen, too much chrome and not enough visible content. To each their own.
I am sitting in front of a Windows 11 machine with a touchscreen as I write this comment. Normally I lean back a little in my chair, making the touchscreen slightly out of my reach. That's okay because my vision is still pretty good. I leaned over my external keyboard and mouse to touch a window on the touchscreen and it didn't immediately respond, like it was surprised I attempted it. Then it started responding and functioning normally. I think that's what Craig's referring to in terms of touch-first response on the iPad vs. the Mac. My main complaint with touch on Windows devices going back to Windows 8 is that the multitouch implementation isn't as responsive as the iPad. Similarly, most Windows machines have inferior touchpads to Macs, but thanks to third parties Windows has more substantial mouse support than Macs.
I get why there's a very vocal minority who wants a sleek, portable device that runs iPad, Mac, any other OS via virtualization, etc. It's just weird that this same group almost never thinks about the compromises therein. They absolutely exist, and Apple is definitely testing these ideas out, sometimes in public. I'm using iPad OS 26 on an iPad 8 with a 10.2" screen. Too small. Frankly I don't think the 4-up tiled workflow works well without a 13" screen, too much chrome and not enough visible content. To each their own.
If I wanted to use Windows, I’d buy a PC.
Just want to separate my personal desires from the larger userbase which you may or may not be representing accurately.
I agree (and said as much in the part of my post you didn’t quote
)
I think a “spork” is hardly a good analogy.
Without merging the OSes iPad will always be limited in app selection and therefore we’ll always need a Mac as well. #marketing #profit
Without merging the OSes iPad will always be limited in app selection and therefore we’ll always need a Mac as well. #marketing #profit
I don't want a Mac. What I want is what a Chromebook can do.
A 2 in 1 or convertible has desktop mode and tablet mode.
Either way, the Chrome browser is the same as what you get with Mac, Windows or Linux.
What I want is a single device to suit my needs.
A Chromebook can do that.
A single product for the cost of the Mac mini.
An iPad with a real desktop/laptop Safari browser is really all I want.
I wonder......
......If Apple released a new Boot Camp option for the M series iPads.............
able to run ..........
Windows on ARM
or
MacOS
or
iPad OS................
as they already have plenty of horsepower and would run any of them smoothly and without issue...................... It would be ideal from a usability/flexibility/portability perspective and very attractive for a huge number of users.........
BUT
One single reason that it will never happen...... M series iPad sales would probably skyrocket and MacBook Air sales would likely tank..........
......If Apple released a new Boot Camp option for the M series iPads.............
able to run ..........
Windows on ARM
or
MacOS
or
iPad OS................
as they already have plenty of horsepower and would run any of them smoothly and without issue...................... It would be ideal from a usability/flexibility/portability perspective and very attractive for a huge number of users.........
BUT
One single reason that it will never happen...... M series iPad sales would probably skyrocket and MacBook Air sales would likely tank..........
I doubt this just based on sales in the Windows space. The convertible form factor was pretty popular 10 years ago as Windows OEMs struggled to combat the iPad and MacBook Air. Lately those same OEMs - even Microsoft itself - have been paring down their offerings, knowing that convertibles or 2-in-1's are clearly a niche of a niche. A Mac/iPad version would be even moreso. Maybe it would work. I don't think there's a big enough business case for a company that measures success in terms of multi-millions of unit sales. (ex: iPhone mini)
So!
I'm no expert, but if someone wants a Mac, they will get one.
Not everyone even wants a tablet.
I'm an exception, that's all I want and the iPad is the best.
Don't really want to replace my old desktop and don't want a laptop.
A Chromebook still hits the most checkboxes.
Then get a Chromebook.
Meanwhile, people who want a Mac can get a Mac and people who want an iPad can get an iPad and not have a watered down experience on either device.
Having choices is great. Making an iPad/Mac into a Chromebook reduces choice.
I think you miss the point... The ability to run Windows was never the objective even in the old Boot Camp but its there now again essentially for free.....
The sales success or failure of Windows convertibles is a terrible comparison.. Windows was never a touch focused OS platform. And convertibles were not the enticement to buy a windows device. Power combined with portability of the device always was.
iPad OS is a proven touch based OS. A multifunction device for both Apple OS platforms is both enticing and makes perfect usability sense. People who focus on the artificial division in hardware miss the issue entirely. iPad and MacBook Air hardware from a performance perspective essentially merged several years ago with the advent of M series iPads. restricting OS availability is no longer a useability issue but purely a business one.
While my reasoning is anecdotal and not based on any "survey" I for one would love my M series iPad to run MacOS. I would ditch my MacBook Air immediately. I would propose many others would feel the same way. Is there a case for people to want both machines? Of course there is but choice/flexibility/useability is the issue here.
The game has changed and will continue to change..... Old assumptions and ways of working don't make sense anymore... Apple surely knows this and are trying to find a path forward.
I see your argument. The iPad is a proven touch-based OS. You know what isn't? Mac OS. My point is that Apple has to justify rolling out the touch support, which is not native to the Mac just as it wasn't in Windows. It isn't as simple as grafting iPadOS/iOS touch elements onto the Mac and letting them rip. One of the biggest problems I faced when using touch in Windows was visual scaling of elements: text, buttons, graphics. To this day Windows has a problem with this, partly because they cling onto Full HD (1920x1080) resolution with a death grip instead of retina-style displays and resolution independence. And don't get me started on how clunky the portrait-landscape switch mechanism is. So you say okay, that's Microsoft. Apple has it figured out. What I'm saying is, maybe they don't. It's tougher than it looks. They provided a hint with the traffic signal buttons for resizing in 26. It's nowhere near perfect and I had some trouble with it when using my fingers. It's much easier when using a mouse/trackpad cursor because of the precision involved. For Apple to invest what will be considerable resources to make that work on a Mac when from a market standpoint they have practically 99% of their use cases covered with both platforms is, well, a tough sell.