iPadOS26.1: your opinion on this update.

[FeliApple]

The Feedback is more genuine once you’ve actually spent time to use the OS imo. Basing your opinion on other people without trying the OS itself doesn’t make me believe them especially if there already has been a fix for it.

The fix will never come. It will improve but it won’t match the original version. The current implementation of Split View is worse. Battery life is better than 26.0 yet seven times worse in animation battery consumption than iOS 18 (it was 13 times worse with 26.0).

I can’t try it if Apple doesn’t allow me to downgrade. But I can watch videos and read threads to have an informed opinion on the design.

I can’t exactly know how much is the battery life difference, that one is tougher. But I’m not killing my device just to prove I’m right on MacRumors, sorry.

Many people reported that they saw a 15-20% drop with the 16 series. They shared screenshots. Battery comparison tests showed a similar (yet slightly smaller) difference, with the caveat that they weren’t testing the animations, just playing content on-screen. So more or less add the animation drain and you get a 15-20% like people reported.

I don’t have access to another 16 Plus to test it fully and I’m not updating mine.

There were several reports on the A16 iPad, even iPadOS 26.1 doesn’t fix everything. It is an improvement apparently, especially in terms of battery life.

But it will never match iOS 18. Animations are too heavy. Hopefully iPadOS 26.2 keeps improving performance (which is quite poor on 26.0) and battery life (which has been severely affected).

 

[Mrbiggestman]

The fix will never come. It will improve but it won’t match the original version. The current implementation of Split View is worse. Battery life is better than 26.0 yet seven times worse in animation battery consumption than iOS 18 (it was 13 times worse with 26.0).

Bug fixes and better gesture navigation at to me I’m optimistic. The battery life is about average, its only when I update my OS version or use betas then battery life can decrease quicker.

I can’t try it if Apple doesn’t allow me to downgrade. But I can watch videos and read threads to have an informed opinion on the design.

Yeah true but your just not going to capture the full picture of what is better and what is worse when your using it, not when somebody else uses it.

I can’t exactly know how much is the battery life difference, that one is tougher. But I’m not killing my device just to prove I’m right on MacRumors, sorry.

Many people reported that they saw a 15-20% drop with the 16 series. They shared screenshots. Battery comparison tests showed a similar (yet slightly smaller) difference, with the caveat that they weren’t testing the animations, just playing content on-screen. So more or less add the animation drain and you get a 15-20% like people reported.

I don’t have access to another 16 Plus to test it fully and I’m not updating mine.

I can’t really speak for iPhone as I haven’t really used any modern iphone as a daily driver.

There were several reports on the A16 iPad, even iPadOS 26.1 doesn’t fix everything. It is an improvement apparently, especially in terms of battery life.

But it will never match iOS 18. Animations are too heavy. Hopefully iPadOS 26.2 keeps improving performance (which is quite poor on 26.0) and battery life (which has been severely affected).

Most issues were fixed in iPadOS 26.1 on my A16. But because I only used the full release for only a day (iPadOS 26.2 beta 1 released next day), I can only go off my RC experience and how good that was.

 

[transmaster]

For the first time I am noticing short reported battery life. My iPad M4 Pro 13” 1TB does not move around much. I have it set to charge to 80% and it stays plugged into a charger/Mac Studio. I had unplugged it to use in a different area and it seem to discharge much faster than before iPadOS 26. I know the battery percentage is in the software, and not necessarily reflected in the actual battery state but there is no way I can put one of my test instruments on the battery to see what is actually going on.

 

[Mrbiggestman]

For the first time I am noticing short reported battery life. My iPad M4 Pro 13” 1TB does not move around much. I have it set to charge to 80% and it stays plugged into a charger/Mac Studio. I had unplugged it to use in a different area and it seem to discharge much faster than before iPadOS 26. I know the battery percentage is in the software, and not necessarily reflected in the actual battery state but there is no way I can put one of my test instruments on the battery to see what is actually going on.

How short is the battery life now compared to when you last took it off charge.

 

[transmaster]

How short is the battery life now compared to when you last took it off charge.

A couple of hours at least this is something I did not pay much attention to. I use the iPad bed side for audible books, and podcasts, at the radio station it controls my radios and such. I noticed it bedside. I would nod off at 80%, and wake up a couple of hours later and it is at about 60%, It did not go down so fast before. Perhaps to 70%, with the Anker Chargers it is plugged into bedside once plugged back in it recharges quickly

 

[transmaster]

I need to get a handle on this. Is there an App that actually tracks battery discharge rates?

 

[Mrbiggestman]

A couple of hours at least this is something I did not pay much attention to. I use the iPad bed side for audible books, and podcasts, at the radio station it controls my radios and such. I noticed it bedside. I would nod off at 80%, and wake up a couple of hours later and it is at about 60%, It did not go down so fast before. Perhaps to 70%, with the Anker Chargers it is plugged into bedside once plugged back in it recharges quickly

you can always check in the battery settings and check the battery discharge of each app for each app.

 

[Mrbiggestman]

I need to get a handle on this. Is there an App that actually tracks battery discharge rates?

there isn’t an app that tracks wattage or voltage specifically but battery settings can certain help gauge abnormalities. in battery drain.

 

[Act3]

My air m3 on 26.1 is still a mess when scrolling, even from home screen to the apps page. Hard to describe, but not smooth at all. Much more noticeable than my iPhone and that is with limit frame rate turn on my phone to compare without pro motion.

 

[ifxf]

you can always check in the battery settings and check the battery discharge of each app for each app.

Apple doesn’t tell you if one of its background services is consuming abnormal amounts of power or if the OS is the culprit.

 

[zhenya]

iPad Pro M4 on 26.1. At a conference all day today with the iPad as my note taking and reference device using Goodnotes and the Pencil, tethering to my phone. 5 hours 14min of screen on time, battery still at 53%.

 

[transmaster]

Apple doesn’t tell you if one of its background services is consuming abnormal amounts of power or if the OS is the culprit.

Exactly, this has been an issue for years. I have Anker Power Bank batteries and a couple of Anker solar Solix charging batteries. So I am not worried about running out of power. The difference now is that the iPad Pro is the first iPad I have had since the long-retired 2013 iPad Air. I never perceived a problem with my iPhones.

 

[FeliApple]

iPad Pro M4 on 26.1. At a conference all day today with the iPad as my note taking and reference device using Goodnotes and the Pencil, tethering to my phone. 5 hours 14min of screen on time, battery still at 53%.

This actually sounds great. I don’t know how high was brightness, but tethering + two apps + Apple Pencil usage (which is heavy) and around 10 hours of SOT sounds good.

I use an iPad Air 5 running iPadOS 15. Low brightness, Pages and Notability (NOT together, one app only), with the 2nd-gen Apple Pencil and fully efficient settings has given me about 4 hours to 75%, but this is basically maximally efficient, one app only, and four major versions earlier.

As discussed elsewhere, iOS has become more bloated, especially on iPadOS 26.

 

[Mrbiggestman]

iPad Pro M4 on 26.1. At a conference all day today with the iPad as my note taking and reference device using Goodnotes and the Pencil, tethering to my phone. 5 hours 14min of screen on time, battery still at 53%.

I do a lot of heavy static multitasking on my ipad A16 in which I get around 10-15 hours SOT on one charge.

 

[stephen1108]

Safari on iPadOS 26.1 has been a **** show on my iPad Pro M5.

I set the iPad up as new when I got it, and Safari has two very annoying bugs that only resolve itself after a restart.

Bug #1: Safari will sometimes lock up the rest of the device, leaving you unable to do anything but use Safari. It randomly happens, and when it does, you can’t go home, you can’t quit the app, can’t invoke the app switcher, and control center does nothing. If you use Siri, she’ll listen to what you’re saying, but won’t actually process it or do anything. Locking the iPad is possible, but when you unlock it, you’re stuck right back in Safari. The only way around this is to restart the device.

Bug #2: Safari forces everything to open in a new tab, even when you aren’t holding command on the keyboard. This one also happens at random. For example, I’ll select a link from my Favorites bar, and it’ll open every link in a new tab. It will also do this for any link opened on a webpage. Again, the only way to resolve it is by restarting the whole device.

Safari will also just not load pages half of the time, requiring me to kill the app and try it out again.

Just a completely buggy and unrefined experience, and it’s a shame because Safari is probably my most used app on the iPad. Didn’t have any of these issues on 26.0.1 or my M4 iPad Pro.

 

[Mrbiggestman]

Safari on iPadOS 26.1 has been a **** show on my iPad Pro M5.

I set the iPad up as new when I got it, and Safari has two very annoying bugs that only resolve itself after a restart.

Bug #1: Safari will sometimes lock up the rest of the device, leaving you unable to do anything but use Safari. It randomly happens, and when it does, you can’t go home, you can’t quit the app, can’t invoke the app switcher, and control center does nothing. If you use Siri, she’ll listen to what you’re saying, but won’t actually process it or do anything. Locking the iPad is possible, but when you unlock it, you’re stuck right back in Safari. The only way around this is to restart the device.

Bug #2: Safari forces everything to open in a new tab, even when you aren’t holding command on the keyboard. This one also happens at random. For example, I’ll select a link from my Favorites bar, and it’ll open every link in a new tab. It will also do this for any link opened on a webpage. Again, the only way to resolve it is by restarting the whole device.

Safari will also just not load pages half of the time, requiring me to kill the app and try it out again.

Just a completely buggy and unrefined experience, and it’s a shame because Safari is probably my most used app on the iPad. Didn’t have any of these issues on 26.0.1 or my M4 iPad Pro.

bug 1: Have you tried using the traffic light icons to exit out of the app or use the drop down menu bar to hide the app. If you can move the locked up safari window. try to move the app window to the bottom to force the window into the dock.

bug 2: idk about cause i would kind of want a page to open in a new tab and not replace my previous tab in which I may need. I mean you can alway copy and paste the favourite tab link and put it in a tab that you don’t need anymore.

 

[fricotin]

Is there any way to lock the dock ???

 

[papbot]

Bug #2: Safari forces everything to open in a new tab, even when you aren’t holding command on the keyboard. This one also happens at random. For example, I’ll select a link from my Favorites bar, and it’ll open every link in a new tab. It will also do this for any link opened on a webpage. Again, the only way to resolve it is by restarting the whole device.

I’ve been reporting this issue everywhere I can and have gotten no response, thought it was just a “me” issue. Feedback assistant shows no similar reports. It first occurred with 26.1 on my iPad Pro and continues in 26.2. However, you don’t need to restart the device, just force quit Safari and it will go back to the correct behavior, temporarily.

 

[Mrbiggestman]

Is there any way to lock the dock ???

no

 

[stephen1108]

bug 1: Have you tried using the traffic light icons to exit out of the app or use the drop down menu bar to hide the app. If you can move the locked up safari window. try to move the app window to the bottom to force the window into the dock.

bug 2: idk about cause i would kind of want a page to open in a new tab and not replace my previous tab in which I may need. I mean you can alway copy and paste the favourite tab link and put it in a tab that you don’t need anymore.

Bug #1: I’ve tried this, nothing works in that regard. Literally the only thing I’ve found that works is restarting the device. It completely locks any other function or app from running. I’ve noticed this only happens when the device is full screen Safari.

Bug #2: I love opening things in new tabs also, but if I opened a new tab, select a favorite expecting it to load in that new tab, just for it to open in another tab is quite diabolical lol.

I’ve been reporting this issue everywhere I can and have gotten no response, thought it was just a “me” issue. Feedback assistant shows no similar reports. It first occurred with 26.1 on my iPad Pro and continues in 26.2. However, you don’t need to restart the device, just force quit Safari and it will go back to the correct behavior, temporarily.

Wow! Hopefully they resolve it expeditiously. Funny enough, I’ve force quit Safari and the behavior still continues. 😕

 

[papbot]

Wow! Hopefully they resolve it expeditiously. Funny enough, I’ve force quit Safari and the behavior still continues.

It’s temporary, very temporary. I just did it about 20 minutes ago, then just now tapped on one of my bookmarks folders and all 25 bookmarks within it launched in to 25 new tabs. This is extremely aggravating. For me it started with the first beta of 26.1, and continues in this second beta of 26.2. Usually force quitting Safari gives me a couple of hours without this happening much, but looks like I’m going to restart my ipad right now. I also get the issue when tapping on a link on a web page expecting that link to open in place of the page I’m on, and, instead, it opens in another tab as if I’d used the cmd key to have it open in the background. Just as you’ve noted