One thing I found out, looking at the cellular options under “Find A New Plan”, the only provider that shows up for me is AT&T. I’m guessing I don’t have strong enough signal here for T-Mobile to show up. If I go somewhere that does have T-Mobile coverage, will it show up as an option?
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iPad as a laptop replacement
- Thread starter Omar Comin' Yo
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No, and the listing said it was factory unlocked. But as I said, AT&T is pretty much the only service we get where I live. So maybe it’s just showing AT&T because that’s the only one with strong enough signal? I’ll have to look into how to check whether or not it’s factory unlocked or not. 👍🏻
PS. I looked it up, and iPad’s aren’t generally carrier locked in the US. So chances are it should definitely be unlocked. Though I did read that models sold by certain carriers might impose “visibility” limitations on other options in the “Find A New Plan” menu. So that could be what I’m running into.
PSS. I tried switching off location services, and it grayed out the “Find a new plan” option, so I’m guessing that it’s using my location to determine what networks have enough signal here. Since this is essentially a dead zone for any other service, it would make sense that AT&T would be the only option that would appear.
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One other cool option I found for cellular which I may consider is Roamless. They have great prices on prepaid data plans, and the nice thing is the data never expires, and you can just pay a little at a time to add more data to your plan when you want. 👍🏻. I think it also utilizes towers from multiple networks, so less deadzones then if you went with AT&T for example. Overall it looks pretty interesting, I want to look further into it. 👍🏻
With the multitasking, files app, and background task changes in iPadOS 26, I'm genuinely considering selling my MacBook Air and getting an M4 iPad Pro 13". I'd lose some screen real estate going from 15" to 13" but the flexibility of the iPad to use it as a laptop replacement and as a tablet is VERY tempting. I have an M4 Mac mini for my desktop and that does all the heavyweight lifting for serious computing tasks so the iPad will not be used for mission critical purposes, just for working outside of my home office and then for movies/shows/games. Aside from the screen size, the only other thing I'd miss is the seemingly endless battery life of the Air but I think I'd be able to live with that.
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Literally what I’ve done (my 15” MBA has gone back today) - the 13” M4 iPad Pro isn’t struggling at all and I’m enjoying the fact that I can take it off the Magic Keyboard and use it as a standard iPad; and then reconnect when I need to reply to emails/messages etc
When I’m better I’ll be able to sit at my desk more and use my M4 Mac Mini etc; but for now, the iPad Pro is doing a sterling job and I’m glad I went for it
That's great feedback, thanks! Are you on the 26 beta or are you using the current release version of iPadOS? I know the current release version doesn't work for me as a laptop replacement in the ways I need. I plan on loading the 26 beta on my 11" M2 Pro just to see if the changes will work for my use cases. If it does, then I'll do the swap.
Wow! This is just really cool stuff. Anybody wants to see what the iPad Pro can do with 26.....look no further.
For now I’m on the current iPadOS - IIRC if I try to upload the Beta here in the UK, it’s still 18 and not 26. Don’t you need to enrol in the Developer program to access it (and pay for that privilege etc)?
For now the iPad does what I need of it (Mail, MS Word, PDFs, Chrome & Safari etc) - but it will be better with OS26 when it’s out
You can sign up for an Apple Developers account for free and start using 26 now. I am using it on my M1 iPad Pro 11, and imo it's the best iPad OS so far....by far!!!
From the Apple Developer website... https://developer.apple.com/register/
"Sign in using your Apple Account and accept the Apple Developer Agreement to register for free."
That’s awesome! One note about the developer beta, Apple made developer betas available to free developer accounts at the beginning of the iPadOS 17 cycle, so it is free to install if you create a free developer account. Though I will caution, developer betas are typically less stable, so you may run into some bugs. For me though, it’s been pretty stable. 👍🏻
I've installed the 26 beta and it looks promising! I’m on an 11” M2 so I’m not getting all the benefits of multitasking on a larger screen but i can see the potential. I’ll play around with it more and see if I come to any conclusions.
Cheers for that - got there in the end (hadn’t seen there’s a drop down re the Beta versions etc)
Typing this on iPadOS 26 now 👌🏼
Interesting. Do you feel claustrophobic using it with an external display at all?
awesome! I think this encapsulates a lot of Apple's thinking with 26 in a weird way and this is very promising
Spent all day on my iPad Pro with iPadOS 26 and very impressed so far
The typing is a bit laggy via my Magic Keyboard; but only a bit so not too bothered by it
But the ability to split screen; having the traffic lights at the top etc I’m finding very useful
I haven’t explored it all yet; I’ll do that in time, but so far, it feels very good
The typing is a bit laggy via my Magic Keyboard; but only a bit so not too bothered by it
But the ability to split screen; having the traffic lights at the top etc I’m finding very useful
I haven’t explored it all yet; I’ll do that in time, but so far, it feels very good
Out of curiosity, if you don’t mind me asking, is it a problem of missing apps? Or some apps that don’t have the features you want? Or something else?
Most of what I do is actually through Safari, and not having a proper desktop mode that all sites respect (I know I can request desktop mode but some sites will persistently show mobile) means I can’t rely on just an iPad unfortunately, and not knowing which sites will be a problem means I have to have a MacBook Air as a fallback.
Oh, okay. I don’t know why some web developers force the page to render in the mobile version. It doesn’t make much sense. Hopefully web developers will improve on that front. Perhaps iPadOS 26 pushes web developers to improve this, and maybe we’ll see improvements there later on in the iPadOS 26 cycle. Either way, developers should get on board and allow iPad to render desktop views of their sites. 👍🏻.
Looking forward to the first public beta for iPad OS26. I usually don't install beta's, but I will this time. I will be installing on my 13" iPad Air M2. I've been regretting getting the 13" instead of the 11" and am hoping the expanded functionality will make me happier with my choice. I know I could install the dev beta now, but I think I'll just wait for the first public so it will be a little more polished. Really curious to see if it can be a viable laptop replacement for my usage.
If you know of any alternative browsers that can reliably force desktop mode, I’ll give it a try
So full disclosure, I have not tested this myself, but I came across this when looking into it, it gets good reviews, and figured it may be worth trying to see if it resolves the issues you’re encountering. 👍🏻
Desktop Browser • Zoomable
Zoomable is a browser that provides a full desktop web experience. It simulates a large and resizable screen and shows the desktop version of websites, so you can stay away from those bad mobile web experiences. • Zoom freely between 1x and 3x. • Seamless transitions between portrait and...
apps.apple.com
I’ll try it and report back!So full disclosure, I have not tested this myself, but I came across this when looking into it, it gets good reviews, and figured it may be worth trying to see if it resolves the issues you’re encountering. 👍🏻
Desktop Browser • Zoomable
Zoomable is a browser that provides a full desktop web experience. It simulates a large and resizable screen and shows the desktop version of websites, so you can stay away from those bad mobile web experiences. • Zoom freely between 1x and 3x. • Seamless transitions between portrait and...