An iPad works great as single app-at-a time machine that helps provide focus for whatever you’re working on. When you do need to work with multiple apps, iPadOS provides a few different ways to multitask. However, the way iPadOS handles multitasking can be confusing to both seasoned and new iPad users alike.

Touch based operating systems provide a more simplified multitasking paradigm compared to a laptop OS like Windows or MacOS. With anything that’s new or different, you have to take some time to learn how it works. So let’s walk through the multitasking options on iPadOS.

The Multitasking Menu

In iPadOS 15, Apple addressed the reported difficultly of iPad multitasking by adding a Multitasking Menu to every window in the operating system. This is represented as three dots at the center of the top of app window. Tapping on it reveals the different multitasking options that an application supports. The options you see here can change depending on the app and whether or not you’re using Stage Manager, but the options you’ll most frequently see are:

• Full Screen – Brings the current application back into full screen mode
• Split View – Divides the screen in half and lets you select another application to reside on the other half of the screen
• Slide Over – Sends the current application to the Slide Over Stack.
• Close – Closes the current app

If one of or all of these options are missing, then its likely the developer has chosen not to support iPadOS multitasking. This is more common with games, but the Settings app remains a weird outlier here as well.

Split View (Supported by All iPads)

Split View is the most straightforward of iPadOS’s multi tasking options. As the name implies, Split View gives you the ability to run two apps side by side on your iPad’s display.

While you can do this in portrait orientation, it is most effective when done in landscape. In portrait, the second app shows as a smaller vertical sliver, which is less than ideal. It’s basically like having another SlideOver app next to your main app.

How To Access Split View:

From the Dock

• Swipe up from the bottom of the display to bring up the Dock, if it isn’t visible
  
• Drag an app from the Dock to either the left or right side of the screen. If the currently open app supports Split View, it will resize to fill the other half of the screen.
  

From the Multitasking Menu

• Tap on the multitasking menu
  
• Select “Split View”
  
• Select the other app you want to open in Split View. It will fill the space on the other half of the display
  

From Spotlight

If you have an external keyboard attached, you’re able to access the built-in Spotlight search system with the Command-Space keyboard shortcut, and drag the app from the Spotlight results, either with your finger or with a mouse, to your Split View.

From The App Switcher

If you enter the App Switcher by swiping up from the bottom of the display and pausing, you’ll see the standard App Switcher view with all of your recent applications. You are able to pair compatible apps by dragging one on top of the other.

You can, of course, manage your app pairings from this view as well. You can swipe up to remove an app from its pairing.

Slide Over (Supported by All iPads)

The Slide Over feature gives you access to a stack of apps in a small floating window that slides over the current app(s). The Slide Over name is in reference to the fact that you slide in from the side of the screen to access the application. The trick to making this useful is to make sure you the apps you want are already in the Slide Over stack (more on this later). Here’s the different ways to get apps into Slide Over:

Starting with at least one app open

From The Dock

• Swipe up from the bottom of the screen to reveal the Dock
  
• Slide the app up and to either the left side or right edge of the screen. The Slide Over stack can exist on either side of the iPad screen.
  
• When you want to dismiss the slide over stack, just swipe it towards the left or right edge of the screen. To bring it back, swipe in from that side.

From the multitasking menu

• Tap on the multitasking menu (three dots) and tap the Slide Over option (the option only shows if the app is Slide Over compatible). If you only have one app open when you move it into Slide Over, you’ll need other select another foreground app, since the Slide Over stack can’t exist without an app to be on top of.
  

From the App Switcher

When you access the App Switcher, by sliding up from the bottom of the display and pausing slightly, you’ll see the slide over stack on the right. You can just tap on the Slide Over app to bring it into view.

Accessing the Slide Over Stack

When you move an app into Slide Over, it actually gets moved onto a stack of Slide Over Apps. When you have a Slide Over app open, swipe up from the bottom of that app, and you’ll see a list of apps in slide over. And this list is scrollable, so can you can access more than the apps you see.

Similar to modern iPhones (without home buttons), you can also slide along the home indicator at the bottom of the Slide Over stack to quickly switch between your Slide Over apps. If you’re using a trackpad, you can swipe along the home indicator with three fingers to do the same thing.

Stage Manager (Supported on M-Series iPads and iPad Pro with A12X or A12Z chip)

While all iPads use a form of Apple Silicon, devices with a M-Series (M1, M2, M4) chip get access to a feature called Stage Manager. Stage Manager gives you the ability to have up to four apps in a workspace in floating windows. It brings a more laptop-like windowing model to iPadOS.

Eligible iPads include:

• M1 and M2 iPad Air
• M1, M2, and M4 iPad Pros
• A12X and A12Z iPad Pros (no external display support)

Why only four windows, you ask? Good question, no one knows. I think it’s because windows on iPadOS are kinda big out of necessity, as this is a touch based operating system. Even on the 13 inch iPads they take up a lot of space.

Stage Manager also seems to be designed around the goal of making sure you don’t lose track of your windows. When a new window is added to the Stage, the previous foreground app gently recedes into the background, but makes sure to remain visible.

Enabling Stage Manager:

From Control Center

The easiest way to toggle Stage Manager is from Control Center. You may need to enable this control in Settings. Its icon looks like a rectangle with three smaller squares on the left.

From Settings

If you really want to, you can Settings -> Multitasking & Gestures -> And enable Stage Manager here.

How does it work? 

Once you turn on Stage Manager, when you open an app, it opens in a window instead of full screen. If you tap on another app icon, it will open in its own workspace, in a window. If you want those two apps be in the same workspace, you can drag a window from the recent apps list into your workspace.

Apps you open in a workspace remain live and are not backgrounded. With normal multitasking, when you switch apps, your previous app will get suspended in the background.

Stage Manager gives you a new recent apps list along the left side of the screen. As you drag a window next to it, the list will disappear, if you want to reclaim that space. If you rather turn it off altogether you can go into Settings -> Multitasking & Gestures tap on Stage Manager and toggle off Recent Apps.

You can also toggle the Recent Apps List and the Dock while you’re in Stage Manager by long pressing the Stage Manager Control Center icon.

How do you build your Stage/workspace?

From The Dock

Drag an app from the Dock into your current workspace. The current foreground app will reposition itself.

Spotlight

If you have a keyboard attached, you also have the option to use Spotlight, accessed via command-space. If you pull up an app, you can click and hold or drag with your finger to being that app into your workspace.

Four App Limit

In Stage Manager, you can only have four apps open in a Stage at a time. The fifth app you add pushes one of your current apps to the Recent Apps list. This seemingly arbitrary limitation feels like its trying to serve the goal of preventing the user from cluttering their workspaces and losing track of windows.

If you use Stage Manager with an external display, you can have an additional four apps running on the display, bringing the grand total of simultaneously running apps to eight.

Multi-window (Supported on All iPads)

Apps in iPadOS can have multiple windows. You can even have windows from the same app next to each other, or in the same workspace. How do you open another window for an app?

Well.

It depends.

Some apps offer multiple ways to open another window. For example, in Safari, the easiest way to open a new window is to simply drag a tab out of one window into Split View or Slide Over

With some apps, like in Apple Mail, you can bring up a context menu that lets you open a new window by either tapping and holding a message, or right clicking if you have a mouse or trackpad attached.

But there’s actually have a third option. And that’s…

The Shelf

The Shelf is a horizontal list of app windows that shows up along the bottom of the display when you enter an app. You can also access the Shelf by tapping on the app icon in the Dock while you’re in the app.

This scrollable list allows you to see all of the open windows for an application across workspaces.

On the right edge of the list, is a New Window button.

If you see a window you want to close, you can just swipe up to close it.

If an app doesn’t support multiple windows, you won’t be able to pull up the Shelf.

External Displays (Supported on M-Series iPads)

With an M-Series iPad, users have the ability to utilize a connected external display to spread out their work. The display can be up to 6k in resolution with a max refresh rate of 60 hz. To enable Stage Manager on the external display, you must have a keyboard and pointing device (mouse/keyboard) connected at time of connection.

There are two ways to multitask with an external display:

1. Stage Manager on External Display Only: This is actually the way I prefer to work on iPad. Once you plug your device into a compatible monitor, Stage Manager will enable on the monitor, but your iPad will stay in standard multitasking mode. I generally will keep music or podcasts on the iPad display, while working on the external display.
   
   Moving windows between the iPad and the external display is a little tricky here. The best way I’ve found is to use the Multitasking Menu. You’ll gain a new option to either “Send to iPad” or “Send to Display”. When you send a window from the iPad to the external display, it opens in its own workspace.
   
2. Stage Manager on iPad and External Display: With this configuration, iPad Users can have up to eight apps running at the same time (four on the iPad, four on the external display) without backgrounding. You’re also able to drag windows between displays, and create separate workspaces on either screen.
   

Conclusion

iPadOS gives iPad users a variety of options for working with multiple applications at once. Like most things on iPadOS, these options work best with touch, but mouse and keyboard have become better supported over time. Multitasking on iPadOS may not work like it does on macOS, but it’s more than capable enough to help boost your productivity.