Remember when you first bought your iPad? You likely marveled at the sleek screen, the speed, and the portability. But for many of us, after the initial excitement wears off, the iPad becomes a glorified Netflix machine or a device strictly for scrolling through social media. While there is nothing wrong with relaxing, your iPad is capable of so much more. It is a productivity powerhouse waiting to be unleashed.
Apple has spent years refining iPadOS to bridge the gap between a tablet and a laptop. The secret to bridging that gap lies in multitasking. If you have ever found yourself constantly clicking the home button to switch between an email and a webpage, you are doing it the hard way. By mastering a few simple gestures and features, you can transform your workflow, making your iPad not just a consumption device, but a creation station.
Whether you are a student organizing notes, a professional managing a busy calendar, or just someone planning a family vacation, these multitasking hacks will change the way you use your device forever.
1. Master the Art of Split View
The most fundamental multitasking tool on the iPad is Split View. This feature allows you to have two apps open side-by-side. It sounds simple, but the real-world applications are endless. Imagine researching a recipe in Safari on the left side of your screen while typing out a shopping list in Reminders on the right. No more flipping back and forth; everything you need is right in front of you.
In the past, entering Split View required some nimble finger gymnastics, but Apple has made it incredibly intuitive with the Multitasking menu. Here is how to use it effectively:
- Open your first app (e.g., Safari).
- Look for the three small dots at the very top center of the screen. Tap them.
- Select the icon that looks like a split book (Split View). Your current app will slide aside to reveal your Home Screen.
- Tap the second app you want to open (e.g., Notes).
Once you are in Split View, you aren't stuck with a 50/50 split. You can drag the black divider bar in the middle of the screen to give one app more space than the other (a 70/30 split). This is perfect when you are watching a video tutorial on one side and following along in a drawing app on the other.
Pro Tip: need to swap sides? You don't need to close the apps. Just tap and hold the three dots at the top of one app and drag it to the other side of the screen. It helps when you are right-handed or left-handed and prefer your "primary" app on a specific side.
2. Slide Over: Your Floating Assistant
If Split View is for deep work, Slide Over is for quick interactions. Think of Slide Over as a floating window that sits on top of your main app. It is perfect for apps that you need to check briefly but don't need open constantly—like Messages, Music, or your Calculator.
Imagine you are reading a long article in full-screen mode. Suddenly, you get a text message. Instead of leaving the article, you can pull your Messages app into a Slide Over window, reply, and then swipe it away to get right back to reading.
To set this up:
- Open your main app.
- Tap the three dots at the top and choose the Slide Over option (the icon on the right).
- Select your second app. It will appear as a tall, floating window on the right side.
- To hide it, swipe the window off the right edge of the screen. To bring it back, swipe left from the right edge of the screen.
The magic of Slide Over is that you can have multiple apps stacked in that floating window. By swiping along the bottom bar of the Slide Over window, you can cycle through different apps—Calculator, Twitter, Spotify—without ever disturbing your main workspace.
3. The Magic of Drag and Drop
If there is one feature that makes the iPad feel truly magical, it is Drag and Drop. On a computer, you are used to copy-pasting with keyboard shortcuts. On the iPad, you can literally pick up data with your finger and move it to another app. This feels incredibly tactile and creates a seamless flow between applications.
Let’s say you are planning a trip. You have Safari open on one side with hotel photos, and an email to your spouse open on the other. Instead of saving the photo to your camera roll and then attaching it to the email, you can simply tap and hold the photo in Safari, wait for it to lift slightly, and drag it across the screen into the body of your email.
This works for text, too. You can highlight a paragraph in a document, tap and hold until it lifts, and drag that block of text into a Note. You can even use multi-touch to grab multiple items at once:
- Tap and hold one photo with one finger.
- While holding that photo, use another finger to tap three more photos. They will stack up under your first finger.
- Drag the entire stack into a different app and release.
Did you know? You can drag files directly from the Files app into an email or a messaging thread. It is the fastest way to share PDFs or documents without navigating through attachment menus.
4. Picture in Picture for Entertainment and Learning
We have all been there: you are watching a YouTube video or a movie, and you remember you need to send a quick email. In the old days, leaving the video app meant the video stopped. With Picture in Picture (PiP), the video keeps playing in a small, floating window while you navigate the rest of your iPad.
This is fantastic for entertainment, but it is also a legitimate productivity hack. If you are on a FaceTime call with a colleague, you can swipe home to open your Calendar or a shared document. Your colleague’s face will remain in a floating window so you can continue the conversation while looking at the relevant data.
To use this, start a video in a supported app (like Apple TV, Safari, or FaceTime) and simply swipe up to go home. The video will automatically shrink to a corner. You can pinch the window to make it larger or smaller, or drag it to any corner of the screen. If it is getting in the way, simply swipe it off to the side; the audio will keep playing, and a small arrow tab will remain visible so you can pull the video back out when you are ready.
5. Stage Manager: The Desktop Experience
For those of you with newer iPads (specifically those with M-series chips or the 2018/2020 iPad Pros), Apple introduced a feature called Stage Manager. This is the closest the iPad has ever come to a traditional desktop windowing system. If you often find the full-screen nature of the iPad too restricting, Stage Manager is the answer.
When you activate Stage Manager from the Control Center, your current app minimizes slightly, revealing a "dock" of recent apps on the left side and your main dock at the bottom. The major advantage here is overlapping windows. You aren't restricted to the strict two-column grid of Split View. You can resize windows freely and pile them on top of one another.
This allows you to create "workspaces." For example, you can group your Calendar, Mail, and Reminders into one cluster. When you click that cluster on the left, all three open in your preferred arrangement. Then, you can have a separate cluster for "Creative Work" with Lightroom and Pinterest. Switching between these mental modes becomes a single tap.
Note: Stage Manager also unlocks full external monitor support on M-series iPads. This means you can plug your iPad into a monitor and move windows between the iPad screen and the monitor, effectively turning your tablet into a dual-screen desktop setup.
Unlock the Potential
The iPad is often criticized for being "just a big iPhone," but that is usually because users treat it like one. By utilizing Split View, Slide Over, Drag and Drop, and Picture in Picture, you break free from the one-app-at-a-time limitation. You begin to move data at the speed of thought rather than the speed of app switching.
Start small. Try using Split View the next time you are cooking to keep the recipe and your music app open simultaneously. Once you get comfortable with the gestures, you will wonder how you ever used your iPad without them. Your device is powerful; it’s time your workflow caught up.