iOS 13’s iPad features: tabs in apps, same app Split View, Apple Pencil enhancements & more

2019’s iOS 13 update will bring a handful of productivity-boosting, iPad-only features such as an updated Files app, unspecified enhancements for Apple Pencil and other perks.

Code-named “Yukon” and due in the fall of next year, iOS 13 will have “a big iPad-focused feature upgrade” as well, said Bloomberg reported Mark Gurman in a tweet this past weekend.

The iPad-specific updates are said to include:

  • An updated Files app
  • Tabs in apps like on macOS
  • Same app in side-by-side Split View multitasking mode
  • Unspecified Apple Pencil stuff

I’m very much looking to macOS’s Tabs Everywhere feature on my iPad.

As a heavy user of tabbed browsing on my iPad Pro in apps like Safari and Chrome, I’e had no issues with the size of the tab area. I can comfortably scroll through open Safari tabs with a swipe, rearrange my open tabs and more. That said, bringing tabs to document-based apps like Pages or Pixelmator would undoubtedly elevate our productivity.

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Same for the ability to run the same app in iOS’s side-by-side Split View multitasking mode, which is long overdue. We can currently open two Safari windows side by side, but that’s it—no other apps currently support this capability.

iOS 11 brought several iPad features, including a Mac-like Dock, system-wide drag and drop support, an overhauled app switcher and Control Center, a revamped QuickType keyboard, plus Instant Markup, Instant Notes and other Apple Pencil enhancements.

Gurman previously detailed some of the features coming to this year’s iOS 12 upgrade. The reported learned from his entrenched sources that Apple would be delaying some of the bigger features until 2019 in order to focus on software stability and performance.

Next year will reportedly bring unspecified notable visual changes to the mobile operating system, including a thorough Home screen redesign. However, according to Gurman’s latest tweet, a refreshed Home screen is said to be “iPad focused.”

Does that mean iPhone users will remain stuck with the same old icon grid? Not at all. Asked whether iPhone will get any springboard redesign love at all, Gurman responded affirmatively.

Last but not least, a change that would permit user-created documents to live outside of their creator apps is something that’s also being worked on, according to Gurman, suggesting Apple might finally feel like exposing more of iOS’s underlying file system to the end user.

Thoughts?