iPadOS 26 finally did the thing power users asked for: real windows that behave like windows. On a desk, with a keyboard and trackpad, it feels modern and fast. External displays make sense. File work is less fiddly. Even small quality-of-life tweaks like a quick swipe for the clock in fullscreen help.
But the same update took something away from the people who used iPad as a tablet first. Slide Over is gone. Quick split is harder. For touch-only users, especially on smaller screens or for students who don’t want a $300 keyboard case, multitasking now feels slower and more fragile.
Both reactions are true. The iPad became a better laptop – and a worse tablet.
The broken contract
For years, Apple pitched iPad as a touch-first device that could flex up with accessories. iPadOS 26 flips that expectation. The default experience now clearly favors keyboard and pointer input, and touch users can’t get back to their old muscle memory even if they pick “classic” multitasking. That feels like a broken contract: the device you already own was changed out from under you, and the fastest tool in your workflow – Slide Over – vanished.
This isn’t about being anti-progress. It’s about regression for a core use case. The people asking for Slide Over back are not fighting windows; they’re fighting the loss of a brilliant, low-friction peek-at-an-app gesture that made tablet multitasking uniquely good.
Windows are great – when you drive with a wheel
The new windowing works because pointer precision makes window management cheap. Touch makes it expensive. Resizing and arranging layered panes with your finger is fine occasionally, but if you do it all day, the overhead piles up. That’s why longtime iPad users call 26 “finnicky” on touch and “liberating” on keyboard. Both are right – and both are telling Apple something useful: the iPad has two valid identities.
Let iPad be two things
Apple doesn’t need to choose between a mini Mac and a big iPhone. It can ship both experiences and let users pick.
- A Touch Mode that restores Slide Over and the old split-screen gestures, keeps windowing optional, and ensures pop-over apps stay above the primary app until dismissed.
- A Desk Mode that defaults to full windowing, favors keyboard shortcuts and pointer affordances, and assumes external display use.
Make the choice at setup. Let us toggle it later in Control Center. Detect accessories and suggest switching on the fly. If a keyboard and trackpad are attached, Desk Mode is probably the right call. Pull them off and go to the couch, Touch Mode should take over.
Bring back the iPad’s best idea
Slide Over wasn’t just a feature – it was the iPad’s multitasking superpower. It let you “peek” at an app without breaking context. That maps perfectly to touch. Bring it back in 26.1 as a first-class option in both modes.
Even better, generalize it:
- Peek Window: a temporary, always-on-top micro window you can invoke with a swipe or corner pull. It floats until you flick it away or pin it.
- Pin to Front: a single tap that keeps a small window above your main app, so it doesn’t vanish the second you scroll your document.
- One-swipe Split: a fast edge gesture to throw your current app into a 50-50 split with the most recent app, no hunting through switchers.
These are touch-native ideas that complement, not fight, the new windowed model.
Don’t tax students for ergonomics
A lot of the frustration is budget reality. If the best version of iPad now assumes a $250-$350 keyboard case, you’ve changed the price of admission. Students and casual users shouldn’t have to pay a hardware tax just to keep the experience fluid. Touch Mode and Slide Over give them back speed without accessories.
Developers need a simple target
Yes, third-party apps must update. Apple can help by exposing clear, mode-aware layout rules:
- Input-aware defaults: apps open in sensible sizes based on Touch vs Desk Mode.
- Persistent z-order hints: allow developers to opt in small utility panes that stay front-most when appropriate.
- Menu bar adoption path: keep the pull-down app menu for keyboard users, but ensure every command remains reachable by obvious touch targets.
Make it easy, and developers will follow.
What Apple can fix quickly
- Restore Slide Over as an option in Settings and Control Center.
- Add a Peek Window gesture and Pin to Front behavior.
- Reintroduce a one-swipe split gesture for touch users.
- Ship a Mode switcher: Touch Mode and Desk Mode, with smart prompts when accessories connect.
- Publish mode-aware UI guidance so apps behave predictably on day one.
Disclaimer: The story “iPadOS 26 hurts touch-only users — here’s why” first appeared on The Mac Observer and is syndicated via Digpu & NewsTex.