As a Surface Book 2 15in user I would LOVE that. Honestly I would even be as crazy as to spend that kind money for such a big iPad with just the current iPadOS.... The MacOS mode, yeah, it's just a dream... The MacOS mode for Apple will rather be bring a Mac too and use it with Universal control, or use the iPad as a screen with sidecar... Or just remote into your Mac... Except that that does not always work well if you don't have a good connection... Where I go on holiday in summer I have 5Mb down and not even half a Mb up.... Remote desktop is painful to say the least... I wish Apple made a tiny "Mac Nano" the size of an apple TV or even smaller that I could bring with me and control with the iPad as Mac mode instead of a full MacBook....
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All iPads What could or should Apple do to iPad to increase revenue?
- Thread starter MisterK
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That’s their EXISTING strategy because the software is not yet there to make use of the hardware. That continues to change as developers complete their transition to Apple Silicon. I’d be surprised if Apple’s existing strategy is their long term strategy. Not sure they care a great deal about cannibalizing Mac sales. Wasn’t it Steve Jobs who said that if you don’t cannibalize your own products, someone else will? Plus, I’m not sure how much they care about Mac sales. It’s a meaningful portion of the pie, sure. But, their goal has never been for Mac to be a market share leader. All they ultimately care about as a company is bringing people into their ecosystem through compelling hardware/services.
To me, it’s clear that Apple at some point will make iPadOS and MacOS nearly indistinguishable. Why else would they spend so much time on features like Universal Control? Every iteration of iPadOS/MacOS merge the two closer and closer together. And their iPad Pro hardware is now priced at a point on the higher end where it’s comparable if not more expensive than similarly spec‘ed MacBooks. So the question then becomes: if they made iPadOS more capable, would it bring so many more people into the iPad fold that cannibalizing Mac sales would be a non-issue? I think that’s very possible.
So, again, I could totally see a situation where iPads with >=8GB RAM (read: iPad Pros) inch closer to full MacBook replacements. That’s the only way their current pricing and storage structure makes sense. Who really needs 2TB of storage space or 16GB of RAM in an iPad. Why even offer it unless they’ve got bigger plans for iPad?
I respectfully disagree. For me this is just wishful thinking by iPad enthusiasts... There is a big difference between 2 devices interacting as much as possible (or in the case of Sidecar, one being an accessory to the other), where you still need to have both, and the OSs merging, where you can do without the Mac.
And what Jobs said does not apply here, since there is no real competition for iPad pro (Samsung Tab S line and Surface devices are barely a competition and that's not changing). The real competitor to a MacOS-ish iPad pro is the MacBook and Macs in general. And Apple has pretty big plans for the Mac... iPad pro is a niche product with high margins and Apple is totally fine with it. The 16GB RAM (1TB) has been selling pretty well according to this forum (posts and polls) and I even know a couple of people who bought the 2TB model. Not many but that is a niche within a niche and Apple is happy to take over $2000 from those people...
These people buying totally maxed out iPad pros
Wow
Talk about buying a Ferrari to drive in traffic
Wow
Talk about buying a Ferrari to drive in traffic
Wait, I’m *not* saying that I believe Apple will release MacOS for iPads. Apple has been pretty clear that MacOS is not a touch-centric interface. Just shoehorning MacOS into an iPad would be a subpar experience. But to me it’s pretty clear that we’re headed towards a future where MacOS and iPadOS are virtually indistinguishable. The iOS-iflying of MacOS has been pretty blatant in the past few years.
Here’s another way of looking at it: what’s the ideal hypothetical world when it comes to how we interact with devices? A world in which it doesn’t matter what device you’re using. A world in which content rules and you can switch seamlessly from device to device without worrying about the version of your hardware or software. Clearly, they’ve been trying to reduce the friction in the transition between MacOS and iPadOS. At the end of the day, Apple doesn’t care whether you buy an iPad or a Mac. They care that you’re in their walled garden. Sure, it’s nice in the interim that people are buying both an iPad and a Mac, but that’s not the end game.
The next steps then are to build out iPadOS’s features. A more capable Files app, more robust external monitor support, etc. And, probably most of all, continued encouragement for developers to release universal apps that scale appropriately across all iPadOS and MacOS devices.
I think they need to spend less effort/resources on the hardware of iPads (which as of 2021 with the M1 and miniLED display and the return to the slab chassis is great) and spend more time getting premiere apps and games on the platform. More stuff like Divinity Original Sin 2 and boardgame apps like Concordia, Istanbul, and Castles of Burgundy. That's the stuff that will bring in more users and keep users like me, not just ever-faster hardware.
Again, we can agree to disagree... I was not saying MacOS on iPad but precisely what you were saying, make them almost identical, not going to happen. the iOS-ifying you mention has no implications for iPadOS. Apple made IOS apps available on Mac, not the opposite. And the opposite is not going to happen anytime soon, unfortunately... It's nice to dream, but again that's not Apple strategy.
Their end game is indeed to sell you as many hardware members of the ecosystem as possible, not just services...
A more file-centric File app? Sure. Proper monitor support (=desktop mode)? Possible. That would still be within the fine balance I was mentioning yesterday...
Full Final Cut / Logic on iPad? Unlikely at the moment, unless they find a subscription model that could turn it into recurring income that's worth the risk. Universal apps on iPad? NO WAY. They are MacOS only. You want to port a Mac app to iPad? You are welcome to redesign it for touch and put it on the App Store with a 30% cut.
Will they make it easier for Mac Store Apps? Maybe.... But given the 30% cut, Mac Store is kind of a desert land like the old Windows store when it comes to pro apps, most developers have no intention of leaving 30% of their revenues to Apple, so even those really willing to have their app on the iOS app store will still for the most part keep the Mac one out of the Mac Apps store and make a separate one for iPad...
Make consumers earn more so they can afford an iPhone, Mac, iPad, AirPods, Watch, TV, App Store, Apple cleaning cloth.
For most people the iPhone is their sole internet/computer device. Their next gadget would be a laptop whether it be Windows or Mac.
iPad sales has been going up while the over all tablet market stagnated. Windows and Android tablet have been in decline even when priced below the iPad.
Correct me if I am wrong but to my understanding the iPad makes up ~80% of all tablets shipped in 2021.
The SKU that makes up almost all of it would be the $329 2021 iPad 64GB.
iPad Pro make up ~1% of all tablets sold.
For most people the iPhone is their sole internet/computer device. Their next gadget would be a laptop whether it be Windows or Mac.
iPad sales has been going up while the over all tablet market stagnated. Windows and Android tablet have been in decline even when priced below the iPad.
Correct me if I am wrong but to my understanding the iPad makes up ~80% of all tablets shipped in 2021.
The SKU that makes up almost all of it would be the $329 2021 iPad 64GB.
iPad Pro make up ~1% of all tablets sold.
No, basically all you data are wrong. Not even counting Windows tablets, Apple has around 35-40% of market share (fluctuating every quarter up and down, no such thing as Android steadily declining and iPads steadily increasing), with the rest being Android (if you count Windows these percentages shrink but Windows is around 10% of the market).
I am talking wordwide, not US. But even there, we are far from the percentage you mention. The only thing it might refer to is profits, but that's a very different thing, due to much higher margins.
The base iPad (all configurations) make slightly over 50% of iPad sales on average, iPad Pro (all sizes) around 20% with 25% being iPad air and mini.
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I see both points between you and @Infinitewisdom. Which, both... I agree.
But I think at the end of the day... whether it's hardware or buying into their subscriptions, that's a win for Apple. I don't have an iPhone nor Mac, but I do have an iPad along with app subscriptions through the App Store (which Apple takes their 15/30% cut). I have a subscription through Apple One as well.
But I think @Infinitewisdom is looking far beyond what we could see, because Apple building an ecosystem where macOS and iPadOS could look indistinguishable seems ambitious. But given the introduction to Universal Control and the M1 chip in the iPad Pro... Apple vision might lead to this. However, I do agree that Apple end goal is for consumers to buy their hardware from an iPhone to an Apple Watch that syncs to it, then the Mac for use of Univeral Control/Sidecar with the iPad.
Heck, as soon as I looked at videos of the Universal Control being used by content creators... I thought to myself it would be nice to have a Mac again (will not buy). And that's the power of Apple strategy to buy their hardware. But on the topic of making Mac apps not available on iOS, Pages and Numbers were first debuted on the Mac. Then there's Xcode equivalent Swift Playground.
Granted, it doesn't have full capabilities as Xcode... but it's a start in the right direction.
Until 2018 I only had iPads too (since the 2013 iPad air), even though over the past couple of years I have bought enough Apple devices to have a full ecosystem, as you can see below (even though my main phone is still a Samsung and I mainly work on Windows).
iPadOS will never be anywhere close to MacOS for the reasons I mentioned. Apple will never allow apps out of the Apple store and most developers are not going to take a 30% cut and spend the extra money to redesign and then maintain their app on iPad to earn less there.... And even those apps based on subscriptions, like Microsoft Office, only offer cut down versions of their desktop apps.
Universal Control and Sidecar are a totally different strategy (which will no doubt continue and improve) and far from clues towards iPadOS and MacOS becoming equivalent or even close. And cut down versions of Apple Mac software for iPad have always existed so I wouldn't read too much into Swift Playground either....
Sometimes you want a Ferrari!
In all honesty I love the power of the Pro. I can LiDAR scan 100m^2 plus without any crashes or memory limitations and only the battery as a barrier.
The power and resources are also nice when processing large RAW imagery and editing 4K video. Such an all-inclusive assertion about overbuying is flat-out wrong.
I think he was referring to the 2TB storage mainly. Those who buy them generally like to to have plenty of files on the iPad.... I tented to go for very large storage options (got a 1TB 2018) but since most of my large files are on onedrive and given how poorly IOS onedrive has been keeping files offline, I have kind of given up on that in part.... (still I would not go with less than 256GB).
Not quite 2TB but I really appreciate having 1TB. Right now, I'm at 650GB used. It's nice being able to keep some Disney flicks and favorite movies local for road trips, unexpected power outage (usually due to weather) and internet downtime (happens more often than I'd like with Charter Spectrum).
Before, 500GB was just good enough for my favorite manga and comics plus a few series on the active reading list (and the requisite 20% OP/free space so device keeps running smoothly).
Oh well, not the first time I've spent $700 on 1TB storage. Early adopter on 960GB-1TB SSDs since I've been waiting to switch the laptop from mechanical HDD to SSD for what seems like forever. Hard drives + movement/vibrations just don't mix.
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I absolutely like to have local movies when I travel and not just a couple but most of my multi terabyte collection (cause just a couple of movies can fit in any iPad...). And on holidays and trip internet connection is sometimes too poor for streaming / plex. I was even considering buying a Mac with 4 or 8TB to have everything with me locally, but given the exorbitant price I have found another solution. I bought a 4TB portable extreme SSD on Black Friday for $360 and dumped my movies on it. I formatted it in NTFS so that my iPads pro can read from it without the risk associated with exfat and my Macs and Windows laptops can also use no problem. Still, the day I buy a new iPad pro in a few years I plan to get 16GB RAM so I'll get whatever minimum storage (probably 1TB) will come with it...
As for internal SSDs, yeah I have put SSDs in all my laptops (including old ones) since 2013, and my first TB one was as Samsung EVO bought back in 2016 on sale for $267 (great price when 1TB was over $300 everywhere, now they are easily under $100) and on CyberMonday this year I got an (admittedly "lower quality") 4TB QVO SSD for slightly less than that (around $250)
Same. Well, not most of my collection but at least enough to have a bunch of options.
When I travel overseas, I bring a laptop running Plex plus nano router and 2-4TB 2.5" HDDs (whichever was max at the time of travel). The laptop serves as the streaming source for the entire family as well as client/player for the TV. Internet/streaming can be very unreliable in the places I travel to and I often get sick and stuck in the hotel or hospital for a few days so locally stored entertainment is a must.
Very nice deal on the 4TB QVO. Would've jumped on that, too. Alas, best price I've seen was ~$350. For QLC, no thanks. My 4TB 860 EVO only cost me $380 and that has both better sustained performance and write endurance.
The desktops I started switching to SSD around 2010/11. 128GB/256GB OS SSD + local 20TB NAS for storage was OK for the desktops but I needed to have stuff local on the laptop and an external portable HDD won't cut it. I've had external drives get unplugged and fall off my lap while using. Hence, I got my first couple of 1TB SSDs back in 2013 as soon as they hit the market. Typical pricing was $0.50/GB at the time but there was a price premium for 1TB.
The plex setup is pretty nice but where I go in addition to very poor internet, walls are very thick and you really need local playback if you want to move around (inside or outside) and still keep on watching, not very Plex-friendly places. Honestly the Sandisk extreme is so light and reliable I can have have it hanging from the iPad the whole time instead of copying the file to the internal storage...
Yeah the deal on the QVO was too good to pass, got it on Amazon. But the Sandisk was also a great deal, I had been eyeing that thing for months, it was released a year ago at like $800 and had been all summer slightly below $600 so when I saw it under at $360 I couldn't pass.
And yes, top size SSDs sell at a premium, but I have realized that a 4 TB SSD is so much more convenient than having to carry 4 1TB SSDs... And for laptops it's not like you have a choice, want a 4TB mechanical HDD to store files? If a thick 15mm one does not fit, you are out of luck. Want a 8TB one? It does not even exist, it's SSD only...
The QVO allowed me to repurpose a decent 2015 laptop I got for free from a friend because it had a broken screen into a second plex server + a 24h/7 remote desktop server for my iPads (aspect ratio set to 4:3)
Make the entry level iPad and iPad Air even better, and not gimp them to make the Pro models relevant. iPad and the iPad Air sell the most units, so this is where they need to focus a lot more attention in terms of features/specs in order to increase their iPad revenue. The Pro models are niche devices that should be upgraded to Mac OS to really take advantage of the M chips that power them.
Not happening. Apple is interested in profits. The pro and the air have much higher margins than the base iPad. I wouldn't be surprised if the profits were overall higher than those of the base iPads, despite the smaller number of units sold. That's not how economics (and capitalism) works. Making the air like the pro is basically lowering the price of the pro. And putting MacOS on the pro is having people buying less MacBooks.
Your right regarding profits of course, but in terms of the context of this thread, the more iPad sales means more people buying Apple services, which in turn means even more money for Apple. Thats why im highlighting the entry level ipad, air and also Mini as they sell significantly more units to the average consumer than the Pro models. Make the Pro even better, then the models beneath it will also be better.
By this logic, Apple should also sell $200 iPhones and iPads so that many more people would buy their products. Not their strategy. Services cannot make up for hardware margins and cannot be increased at will, if you look at Apple revenue streams, services is a fraction of iPhone hardware sales, and there is only so much they can increase that stream by selling more (cheap or not cheap) hardware.
The mini sells much less than the Pros, like not even a third.
Improve the base iPad and make the air redundant, make the air pro and make the pro redundant.
Make the pro even better? Hardware wise, there is not much they can do other than making a new larger model at this point. That won't change the rest of the line... At this point the only thing they can do with the other models is add accessories like they are rumored to do with magsafe....
The software improvements needed for the pro will be very conservative in order not to hurt the Mac revenue stream, so that they can still sell you both devices.
Again it's always the same short blanket issue both inside the iPad line and outside it: pull it over your neck and your feet get cold, cover your feet and your neck gets cold.
What Apple currently lack are 'gateway' products. A lot of iPod owners brought a Mac off the back of their experience with the hardware (and the frustrations of iTunes on Windows...) and they went from $50 to $300. Jobs knew the value of having cheaper products you can sell as aspirational devices to teenagers, students etc.
I am not for one second saying we need a $50 iPhone but how hard would it be for Apple to release a $99 iPod Touch revamp with a year of Apple Arcade thrown in as something to buy for your children? Or just someone who wants something to listen to their MP3 collection and not perpetually rent things via a subscription?
There are gaps in the market for a $50 streaming stick with the Apple TV interface, A cheaper $50 Homepod Nano and even a $99 Apple Watch-like device for fitness tracking that works with Apple Fitness+. Apple could easily base all this on older tech to increase margins and use them as gateway products and spread the web from existing users.
Honestly at this point the main gateway is the used market. Tons of students, including children, buy used iPhone, including for $50 and MacBooks for a couple of hundreds. Apple (partially) supporting iPhones that old is a way to let that gateway open. I guess iPod touch is covered by that as well... The ideas of a streaming stick, a Homepod Nano and a fitness tracker are all nice and I hope Apple will do something, but I think they are afraid of cannibalizing the "regular products". Just a couple of posts higher I was saying how much I would like a Mac Nano (a Mac as big as an Apple TV or even smaller, with M1 and up to 16GB RAM starting at $400 for the 8GB version)
My question is this: With the M1 IPPs now, how hard truly would it be to be able to dual boot both iPadOS and MacOS? I am no computer engineer by any means, but they essentially have the same exact internals. I don't think this would be a huge thing.
These machines would truly be an incredible device, with the ability to get serious work done and also be your go-to for media consumption and light work able to be done on iPadOS.
I know for a fact that I would be THE first one in line for something like this. There are definitely things to consider here but realistically, how amazing would that device be? The ultimate Apple ecosystem experience. You could download things from your macOS Desktop, and open them via iCloud on iPadOS on the same exact device.
Has anyone brought this up before? This is what I have been waiting on. I primarily use iPadOS 75% of the time, but for the 25% of the time I need a desktop, it would be there. Apple may require peripherals like a magic keyboard for macOS to be running since they refuse touch input to be integrated (I don't necessarily blame them) but this would absolutely check every box I could ask for in any device. Portability, real work environment, and the ultimate media consumption machine. I would use the living h*ll out of it.
Anyone else? Thoughts? I realize this would cannibalize Macs, but my lord this could be the perfect use case for 90% of people who need a computer. This could revolutionize computers in everyway.
These machines would truly be an incredible device, with the ability to get serious work done and also be your go-to for media consumption and light work able to be done on iPadOS.
I know for a fact that I would be THE first one in line for something like this. There are definitely things to consider here but realistically, how amazing would that device be? The ultimate Apple ecosystem experience. You could download things from your macOS Desktop, and open them via iCloud on iPadOS on the same exact device.
Has anyone brought this up before? This is what I have been waiting on. I primarily use iPadOS 75% of the time, but for the 25% of the time I need a desktop, it would be there. Apple may require peripherals like a magic keyboard for macOS to be running since they refuse touch input to be integrated (I don't necessarily blame them) but this would absolutely check every box I could ask for in any device. Portability, real work environment, and the ultimate media consumption machine. I would use the living h*ll out of it.
Anyone else? Thoughts? I realize this would cannibalize Macs, but my lord this could be the perfect use case for 90% of people who need a computer. This could revolutionize computers in everyway.