The OS Origins
This is the year that the Operating System on the iPad switch from iOS to iPad OS.
What is 2019
This feature allows you to run two apps side-by-side in a split view, with a divider you can drag to resize them.
What is Split View?
This custom emoji-creation tool, powered by Apple Intelligence, lets you build entirely new characters from a text prompt.
What is Genmoji?
This accessory, first launched with the iPad Pro, allows for pressure-sensitive drawing and is a staple for iPadOS artists.
What is the Apple Pencil?
Before the Flat Design of iOS 7, iPad apps often looked like real-world objects, such as a leather-bound book; a style known as this.
What is Skeuomorphism?
This iPadOS version, released in 2019, was the first to allow users to use a mouse or trackpad with their tablet.
What is iPadOS 13
Introduced in iPadOS 16, this windowing system allows users to resize windows and see their recent apps in a list on the left.
What is Stage Manager?
Released in iPadOS 18, this handwriting feature in the Notes app uses AI to smooth out your scribbles and make them more legible.
What is Smart Script?
This keyboard accessory features a built-in trackpad and a "floating" cantilever design for the iPad Pro and Air.
What is the Magic Keyboard?
In iOS 9, this was the first feature that allowed iPad users to watch a video in a small, floating window while using another app.
What is Picture in Picture?
Before the software was split into "iPadOS," this 2010 device was the first to run the large-screen version of iPhone OS 3.2.
What is the original iPad (1st Generation)?
To quickly switch between apps or see all open windows, users perform this gesture: swiping up from the bottom and holding.
What is the App Switcher?
This dedicated app for creative collaboration and brainstorming was first introduced in iPadOS 16.2.
What is Freeform?
This feature, introduced in iPadOS 15.4, allows you to use a single mouse and keyboard across both your Mac and your iPad.
What is Universal Control?
This specific "System" was the original name of the iPad's OS before it became iOS 4.
What is iPhone OS?
This major "view" was introduced in iPadOS 13, allowing users to pin widgets to the left side of the Home Screen for the first time.
What is Today View?
PadOS 26 introduced this Mac-like design overhaul that features translucent, glass-like interface elements.
What is Liquid Glass?
In iPadOS 26, this legacy app from the iPhone finally made its official debut on the iPad, featuring "Call Screening" and "Hold Assist."
What is the Phone app?
Since iPadOS 16, M-series iPads can use this feature to extend their workspace to a separate monitor rather than just mirroring it.
What is External Display Support?
This 2017 feature (iOS 11) finally brought a "Mac-like" bar to the bottom of the iPad screen for pinning favorite and recent apps.
What is the Dock?
In the early days of iPadOS, this feature allowed you to keep a second app in a narrow, floating window that could be swiped away and back.
What is Slide Over?
This "Shelf" feature, added to help with multitasking, shows all the open windows of a single app at the bottom of the screen when you open it.
What is App Shelf?
This specific AI suite allows users to "Clean Up" photos by removing unwanted background objects with a single tap.
What is Apple Intelligence (or specifically, the Clean Up tool)?
This specific sensor, found on the iPad Pro, is used by iPadOS to create 3D maps of rooms and enhance Augmented Reality (AR) experiences.
What is LiDAR?
For many years, this specific app was missing from the iPad, leading to a decade-long meme, until it finally arrived in iPadOS 16.
What is the Weather app? (Note: The Calculator app was also missing until iPadOS 18).