I’ve been struggling with something for a long time. You there, come sit down and listen to my tale. Please tell me I make sense. It’s about my dreams for the Mac and iPad. Wait, don’t walk away.
For a very long time, Apple has made iPads and also made MacBooks. Once upon a time, they were quite different. But even back in the early days, I dreamed of iPads working like Macs. Apple has gotten closer, by degrees. True, iPadOS is not MacOS, but they’re sharing more ideas and software than ever. Keyboards and trackpads can turn iPads into laptop-like work devices with multiple windows on-screen. Macs and iPads even share the same M-series chips.
And now there’s a new MacBook, called Neo, that runs on an iPhone-level chip and costs the same as the new iPad Air. Meanwhile, reliable reports say the first touchscreen MacBook is coming by the end of this year.
I feel vindicated by this news. I tell my wife as I pace around at home with a morning coffee, taking in the MacBook Neo news: This is it. They’re practically the same thing. Why can’t one become the other? Why can’t I turn an iPad, truly, into a Mac?
I’ve brought this up about once a year for, oh, the past decade and a half. It’s my mantra. I believe it in my soul. And when I asked my wife if that made sense, that clearly it needed to happen, she said: I think you’re getting a bit too het up about this.
I asked her: Wouldn’t you want an iPad you bought to be able to be a Mac if you needed it? She said no. She doesn’t care. She likes her iPad.
I took my passions upstairs. Thought some more. Paced around. Got my MacBook Air out to begin writing, even though half the time I also go to the nearby keyboarded iPad to write. And I thought, damn it, I’m right about this.
But maybe, just maybe, no one cares. And no one needs to care.
Tell me: Which is it? Ease my mind.
Is this like a cognitive illusion of tech? Is the dress gold or blue? Do you see a bunny or a duck? Are you a person who thinks it’s absurd that the Mac and iPad continue to be, at this point, willfully different, or is this a logical design choice, and you think I’m an idiot for wanting it any other way?
My argument for imminent iPad-Mac convergence
There’s a reason for my passion. It makes sense! While it’ll take a while for Macs to develop true touchscreen compatibility for apps, the expected touchscreen MacBook Pro later this year could begin to play with a few concepts. It’ll apparently be “touch light,” maybe more like a screen-based evolution of the Touch Bar. Apple’s wanted us to touch Macs for years, see? I’m not crazy.
Once that’s worked out, maybe the rest happens. A true touch-based Mac that could work with the iPad’s Pencil, too.
In the meantime, on the iPad side, there’s far less of a reason not to flip the switch to a Mac mode. iPads already work with Mac-like keyboards and trackpads that Apple willingly sells to us. They run on chips that are the same as those in Macs. You can clearly — clearly! — find a way to run MacOS on these devices.
But would the mode switch be something you toggle, like Stage Manager mode? A Mac Mode for Pros? Or apps that can just run seamlessly? Browser differences between Macs and iPads are my key sticking point. iPadOS browsers are better now but still not the same. So you enhance the browser or allow a new enhanced-optional mode. And then, I wouldn’t need to buy a Mac if I had an iPad. Maybe it could do both and save lots of people a bit of money.
Why would Apple do this? It sells devices. But it also sells services. Keeping you in the loop on all things on all OS forms would be the ultimate way to do that.
And finally, let’s talk glasses, AR glasses, or something like the future of Vision Pro. A way to extend screens anywhere. One unified Mac-iPad thing could work with glasses more seamlessly. Consolidate the laptop form and then extend into glasses and other peripherals. Yes?
The counterpoint (aka Scott, you’re wrong)
The $599 MacBook Neo, based on what I’ve seen online (I haven’t tried it yet in person), looks damn appealing. It’s extremely affordable for Apple. And it occurred to me that an entry-level MacBook Neo and an entry iPad together would cost about the same as a MacBook Air. Apple’s letting you have two for the price of one.
And is that the idea? Buy multiple devices, don’t stress, appreciate each device for what it is, don’t try to merge? I’ve heard plenty of people argue that iPads are best just being iPads and that they don’t actually like the more windows-filled modes in iPadOS 26 that feel more like Macs. You can toggle between styles, but maybe simpler is better? After all, the iPad does a good job of decluttering a lot of things in MacOS. It feels streamlined.
And as for my MacBook, I use it almost exclusively for browser-based work. Creative professionals may lean into advanced graphics on M Pro and Max chips on MacBook Pros that iPads don’t have, not even the iPad Pro models.
Maybe the divide makes sense. Maybe people just want what they want. Maybe they’re fine with having a device, or devices, that work for them. Maybe they don’t want the Swiss Army knife.
Why I still think I’m right
I like modular. I like flexibility. Look at the Nintendo Switch: It’s a handheld and a TV console. And why can’t the iPad be the same, a true flex device, at least in certain pro configurations, that could double as a Mac?
I think I’d like that a lot. I think I’d take that iPad Pro-slash-MacBook on every trip with me, to every tech event. I’d file every story from it. I’d watch every movie on it. That would be my little Computer That Does It All.
How many of you share that dream, that vision of the magic spot in the middle? Maybe not enough yet. Maybe no one, ever. I still think enough do. I still think Apple’s selling us two devices when, at least for some of us, it could sell us one.
I see you’re getting restless now. You want to leave this old man alone to rant on these things. He’s clearly getting too het up about this whole iPad and Mac thing. You want to get on with your life. Maybe go back to browsing on your iPad. Or Mac. Or phone. Or something else.
I’ll see you again in a year — and we’ll see if I’m right. Or, maybe, as I’ve come to accept, it doesn’t even matter if I am.
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