Transcription
It's been a busy 12 months for the iPad, with Apple going all-in on new products, updating every single iPad version. It's safe to say that the iPad is the most popular tablet in the world, but it still amazes me how many tips and tricks there are for the iPad that most people have no idea about. So I'm going to share 10 tips like that in this video. Okay, let's get into it.
One of the best things about the iPad, in my opinion, is how much you can take advantage of the extra screen space. One of the ways that I like to do this is by adding widgets. But something I think a lot of people don't realize about widgets is that you can treat them a lot like apps. Just like you can create a folder of apps, you can create a folder of widgets. Except on the iPad and iPhone, it's called a widget stack. The only thing you need to make this work is to have multiple widgets of the same size on your screen. So here I've got three widgets, all the same size, on my home screen. To create the stack, I just long-press on one of the widgets until I can drag it around. Then hover over another widget and let go. You'll see that it gets added into a stack automatically. You'll know it's worked because little icons appear just to the right of the stack, showing you how many widgets are in there. I can repeat the process and add more if I want. And when I'm happy, I just press done. To scroll through the different widgets in the stack, you simply swipe up or down on the stack. And just like with app folders, if you change your mind and you want to remove a widget from the stack, you long-press on it until the menu appears, then choose edit stack. From here, you can reorder the widgets using drag and drop. Hit the minus button to remove any that you don't want, or long-press and drag the widgets out of the stack and drop it back on the home screen as its own widget again.
Here I am in the mail app, and by default, you'll see a few options in the menu bar at the top of an email. You can reply, reply all, forward, bin the email, or move it to a folder. But if you tap the menu button in the top right corner of the screen, you'll notice an option called customize toolbar. Tap on this, and now you can add or remove functions from that top menu based on how you prefer to use the mail app. To remove something, just drag it down from the toolbar into the list of available options below. If you want to add a new function, drag it up from the list and drop it into the toolbar. You can also rearrange the icons to set them up in whatever order makes the most sense for you. Some of the extra options you can add include marking an email as read or unread, moving it to junk, muting a sender, setting a reminder to deal with the email later, or flagging it. And if you change your mind or you just want to go back to the default setup, there's a reset button that you can tap to restore the standard toolbar layout.
If you have an iPad with either the Apple Pencil Generation 2 or the Apple Pencil Pro, and you ever struggle with text size, there's an accessibility feature that is definitely worth checking out. Head into settings, then tap accessibility. In the vision section, you'll see an option called hover text. Tap on that and toggle it on. The way that this feature works is pretty simple: using the hover capability of your compatible Apple Pencil. Meaning that when you hold the pencil just above the screen without actually touching it, you'll get a large text version of whatever you're hovering over. For example, if you're in the settings menu and hover over different parts of the screen, a large text box will pop up showing you exactly what you're looking at. Within the hover text settings, you can customize the display position, choosing whether the text appears at the top or bottom of the screen, or even in line with whatever you're hovering over. There's also an option to adjust the scrolling speed, which is useful if you're hovering over longer lines or paragraphs, because the text will automatically scroll, letting you read everything without moving the pencil around. You can also choose your preferred font and text size and use the color settings to change how the text box looks, making it easier to read based on your personal preferences. It's a really useful feature if you ever struggle with visibility. And the great thing is it works across your entire iPad. So if you've got a compatible iPad and Apple Pencil, it's definitely worth trying out.
That last tip was all about the Apple Pencil, an accessory designed specifically to make your iPad experience even better. And another accessory built for exactly the same reason is the Paperlike screen protector. Big thanks to Paperlike for sponsoring today's video. Now you probably already know why a screen protector is a good idea. The screen is arguably the most important part of your iPad, especially if you're spending good money on something like the new M3 iPad Air or the M4 iPad Pro. You want to keep that display in top condition, and that's where Paperlike comes in. What's great is that it protects your screen without dulling the colors or brightness. Photos still pop, colors stay vibrant, and thanks to Paperlike's nano dot technology, you get minimal glare too. Those tiny micro beads also give the screen a subtle texture that feels like writing or drawing on real paper. It even creates a slight vibration through the Apple Pencil so it's more natural and controlled. Perfect if you're someone who loves note-taking or sketching. And the best bit is that Paperlike offers a 100-day satisfaction guarantee. If you want to check it out along with their full range of accessories, you'll find the link down in the description of this video.
There are a couple of features that you can turn on or off in your dock, depending on how you like things set up. If you go to settings and choose home screen and app library from the left-hand side, you'll see a doc section with two options: Show app library in doc and show suggested and recent apps. If you have both of these switched on, you'll see two extra features appear in your doc. The first is the app library function, which shows as a little folder of apps in the bottom right. Tapping on this gives you quick access to your app library. Though keep in mind you can always get there by swiping all the way to the right. So you might decide that you don't need it sitting in your dock. Personally, I tend to turn this off. Next to that, you'll see any recently opened apps or suggested apps based on your usage. Again, I prefer to disable this for a cleaner dock. But there's also a really cool feature that you might not know about. If you go to one of your home screen pages, you can drag apps together to create a folder. Nothing new there, but you can actually drag that folder and drop it straight into your doc. This is unique to the iPhone and the iPad and gives you a handy way to group your most-used apps and keep them easily accessible.
If you swipe all the way to the right on your iPad, you'll find the app library. This is a set of automatically created folders that contain every app installed on your device. At the top, there's a search bar where you can either type the name of an app or scroll through a full alphabetized list of every app on your iPad. But what a lot of people don't realize is that you can manage your apps directly from this list. If you long-press on any app here, you'll see the option to delete it, making this one of the quickest ways to clear out apps that you no longer use. It's a good habit to check in here every now and then and remove anything that you don't need. And it works the same way inside the folders in your app library. If you spot an app that you don't want anymore, just long-press on it, and you'll get the same delete option right there.
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You can use drag and drop across much of the iPad ecosystem, and it's surprisingly useful once you get the hang of it. For example, let's say you're in the photos app and you want to move a group of images over to the files app. The quickest way to do this is to tap and hold on one of the images until it lifts off the screen, like you see in the example here. Then, with your finger still pressed down, tap on any other images that you want to move. You'll see that this creates a stack of images that you're now carrying around on the screen. With your original finger still holding that stack, swipe up to exit the Photos app. Then open the files app, and you're free to navigate around as usual to find exactly where you want to drop the images. You might go into iCloud Drive, tap the menu in the top right corner to create a new folder if you want. Tap into that folder, and then simply let go. All the images that you selected will drop straight into that location. What's great is that you're not limited to photos. You can also do this with text. So, for example, if you're in an email and you want to move a chunk of text into a note, just select the text, tap and hold until it lifts, then swipe out of mail and open the notes app. Drop the text straight into your note, and you're done. You can even do this with images straight from Safari. So if you're working on a note and find the perfect image, instead of saving it to your photo library first, just long-press on the image, drag it around the screen, open the notes app, and drop it straight in. It's a really quick way to move content around the iPad without constantly switching back and forth or saving things that you don't need to.
Following on from that last tip about drag and drop, this works brilliantly with links too. So let's say I'm in the middle of writing an email, and I realize there's a Safari article that I want to share. Yes, I could swipe out of mail, go to Safari, long-press the URL, copy it, and paste it into the email. But there is an easier way. I can use split screen with Mail and Safari side by side. From there, I just tap into Safari's address bar, long-press the URL, and drag it straight into the email. It drops in as a clickable link and saves a couple of steps. But it gets even better because this works all over Safari. For example, from the main Safari page, I can see my reading list and iCloud tabs showing pages that I've got open on other devices. If there's a link that I want to share, I can just long-press and drag it straight into my email. It even works with my favorites. Just drag a favorite directly from the bar into the email. And this drag and drop method isn't limited to mail. You can drop URLs into notes, reminders, or anywhere else that accepts text. Even links within an article work the same way. If I spot a link to another article while I'm reading, I just long-press and drag it into my email or wherever else I need it. Super simple and a really effective way to work between apps.
If you're listening to a podcast on your iPad and decide that you want to share it with someone, there are a couple of sharing options that you might not know about. When listening to the episode, just tap the menu button and choose share episode. At the top of the share menu, you'll see that you can either share the episode from the beginning, or you can tap where it says from start and change it to the exact point where the play head is currently sitting. This is perfect if you're listening and suddenly realize that the part that you're hearing is exactly what you want to share. But you can get even more specific if you use the transcript feature. On the main podcast episode page, tap the speech bubble icon at the bottom of the screen. This brings up the full transcript of the episode, and you can scroll through to find the exact moment that you want to share. Once you find it, long-press on the paragraph where you want the clip to start. One of the options that appears is share from, complete with the exact timestamp for that section. You can then share it however you like through mail, messages, or any other app. And when the person receives the link, the podcast will play from the exact moment that you selected.
One feature I talk about quite a bit in my iPhone videos is the ability to limit how much your battery charges, usually to 80%, though newer iPhones let you pick a specific percentage between 80 and 100. The idea is simple: Reducing the amount of time that your battery spends fully charged helps reduce wear over time. Apple has now brought this feature to some of the latest iPads. It first appeared on the iPad Pro M4 and iPad Air M2, but I've also confirmed it works on the latest iPad Mini. And so I'd expect it to be available on the M3 iPad Air and hopefully the latest iPad 2. If you want to check this on your device, go to settings, choose battery, and then tap battery health. You'll see an option called 80% limit. Unlike the iPhone where you can set a specific percentage, here it's 80% or nothing. Still, if you know that you don't use your iPad heavily each day, switching this on could be a good idea. Your iPad will stop charging at around 80%, which should help extend your battery's lifespan in the long run.
You can actually have multiple instances of the same app open on your iPad, which is great for multitasking. For example, here I'm in the mail app working on an email. But let's say there's another email that I need open at the same time, and it's buried further down in my inbox. Scrolling up and down to switch between them just isn't practical. So what I'd do is open the first email, then tap the three dots at the top of the screen. At the bottom, you'll see a preview of your inbox and a new window button next to it. Tap that. And now you've got two instances of mail open side by side. On this new window, I can scroll down, find the other email, and open it. To switch between them, I've got a couple of options. I can swipe left or right along the bottom of the screen to flick between them. Or if you prefer, just tap the three dots at the top. Again, this shows you previews of each open instance, and you can just tap to jump between them. You can even open a third instance if you need to. And it isn't just mail. This works with apps like Notes, Reminders, Safari, and plenty of others. It's a really useful way to multitask when you're working across multiple documents or messages.
So there you go: 10 tips for the iPad that I reckon most people don't know about. What do you think? How many of these were new to you? And are there any tips that you thought I should have included instead? Drop me a comment and let me know. And as ever, if you found this video useful, do please consider leaving me a like and subscribing to my channel for more content like this in the future. See you on the next video.