Top Five New Features in iPadOS 17 - MacRumorsOpen MenuShow RoundupsShow Forums menuVisit ForumsOpen Sidebar
Skip to Content

Top Five New Features in iPadOS 17

While iPadOS 17 has adopted almost all of the features that are available in iOS 17, there are also several additions designed specifically for the larger display of the iPad. In our latest video, we've highlighted the best new features available for the ‌iPad‌ in the iPadOS 17 update.

  1. Updated Lock Screen - In iPadOS 17, the ‌iPad‌ gets the Lock Screen customization features that came to the iPhone with iOS 16. iPadOS 17 users can choose the look of the date and time, select different iPad-optimized wallpaper options, and have multiple Lock Screens that are tied to Focus modes.
  2. Widgets and Live Activities - Live Activities are now supported on the ‌iPad‌'s Lock Screen, so you can follow along with timers, food orders, sports games, and more. Widgets on the Lock Screen and the Home Screen are interactive, allowing you to turn on the lights, play a song, mark a reminder as complete, and more, directly from the widget with no need to open an app.
  3. Health App - The Health app is available on the ‌iPad‌ in iPadOS 17, showing health data in detail. The app is optimized for the ‌iPad‌'s display with an updated Favorites view and interactive charts for categories like Trends and Highlights.
  4. PDF & Notes Additions - Enhanced Autofill allows the ‌iPad‌ to identify fields in a PDF or scanned document so names, addresses, phone numbers, email addresses, and other information can be added from contact cards. There's also a new feature for collaborating on PDFs with others directly through the Notes app. The Notes app has been enhanced for PDFs, and PDFs will show up in full width for quick annotations with Apple Pencil.
  5. Stage Manager Updates - When using Stage Manager, windows can be freely resized, repositioned, and placed anywhere on the display. ‌Stage Manager‌ also supports an external camera like the one on the Studio Display for FaceTime and conference calls.

For more on what's new in the iPadOS 17 update, we have a dedicated iPadOS 17 roundup.

Related Forums: iOS 17, iPadOS 17

Popular Stories

iPhone 18 Pro Deep Red Feature

iPhone 18 Pro Launching Later This Year With These 12 New Features

Wednesday March 18, 2026 7:39 am PDT by
While the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max are not expected to launch for another six months or so, there are already plenty of rumors about the devices. It was initially reported that the iPhone 18 Pro models would have fully under-screen Face ID, with only a front camera visible in the top-left corner of the screen. However, the latest rumors indicate that only one Face ID component...
imac video apple feature

Apple Released Yet Another New Product Today

Friday March 20, 2026 2:39 pm PDT by
Apple has unveiled a whopping nine new products so far this March, including an iPhone 17e, iPad Air models with the M4 chip, MacBook Air models with the M5 chip, MacBook Pro models with M5 Pro and M5 Max chips, the all-new MacBook Neo, an updated Studio Display, a higher-end Studio Display XDR, AirPods Max 2, and now the Nike Powerbeats Pro 2. iPhone 17e features the same overall design as...
ios 26 4 yellow

Here Are Apple's Release Notes for iOS 26.4

Wednesday March 18, 2026 11:56 am PDT by
Apple provided developers and public beta testers with the release candidate versions of iOS 26.4 and iPadOS 26.4, which means we're going to see a public launch as soon as next week. The RC versions of the software include Apple's official release notes, giving us final details on what's included in the update. Apple Music - Playlist Playground (beta) generates a playlist from your...

Top Rated Comments

TheYayAreaLiving 🎗️ Avatar
36 months ago
Can't believe it's 2023 and still no stock iPad Calculator App for iPadOS.



Attachment Image
Score: 42 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Mrkevinfinnerty Avatar
36 months ago
Tim Cook 2015: "the iPad is the clearest expression of our vision of the future of personal computing".

2023: A new lock screen
Score: 27 Votes (Like | Disagree)
36 months ago
Multiuser-Support?

This would be a key feature.
Score: 22 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Kylo83 Avatar
36 months ago
Funny how iPadOS is just the year before for iOS, they don’t really put any work into it, just last years iOS features
Score: 17 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Unami Avatar
36 months ago

Can't believe it's 2023 and still no stock iPad Calculator App for iPadOS.


I sometimes find my self typing "calc" into the search field and wondering why nothing happens before I remember.

Either there's some calculator-app-developer who's paying big money to Tim's retirement fond or they're just messing with us. How hard can it be to slap a more or less predefined GUI over some basic calculator functions already which are already defined in the programming language? That's something an intern who has never written a line of code before could do in a month. Do they think, people expect something like Mathematica as the standard calculator for an iPad?
Score: 14 Votes (Like | Disagree)
1284814 Avatar
36 months ago
Seriously, that’s it?
Score: 11 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Related Apple News: Nike | Ios 18 New Features | Airtag | Airpods Deals | Studio Display Vs Studio Display Xdr Buyers Guide