Apple Once Again Doesn’t Bring Accounts to the iPad

Not every family has multiple iPads and sharing one can be a one-way ticket to awkwardville.

Photo by Kelly Sikkema on Unsplash

Apple had a commercial once that showed a child using an iPad Pro in fun places like at a shop and up a tree then exclaiming, “what’s a computer?” Yeah, it was a weird flex for a company that makes and sells quite a lot of computers. The general theme was that the iPad Pro is capable of doing most of the things a computer can do and in some cases, do it better because of the touchscreen. Then kids will use and forget all about those pesky computers the olds have been using for decades.

But even with its weird ad campaign, the iPad operating system (iPadOS) still lacks support for multiple accounts which is sort of important for a computer. Even for a computer that helps you do homework while laying on the ground in the backyard. It’s a huge oversight that not only presumes that all families can afford multiple iPads (many can’t) and that only one person will use an iPad at a school or business.

I’m not here to debate the merits of the iPad as a computer. Many people use it as their main computing device. But if the tablet is truly the computer that Apple says it is, it should include a feature that would help families, schools, and yes even businesses. But really, mostly families.

If we learned anything during the pandemic it’s that computers and broadband are essential, in fact, mandatory in order to receive an education. Students without the resources afforded to more affluent families had to contend with internet access that continually dropped Zoom sessions and older hardware that wasn’t equipped to handle the added computing power needed to install the new software needed to handle distance learning.

For students, iPads and other tablets make sense as computing devices because they’re portable and typically more rugged than the average laptop. But issues are likely to arise when multiple family members need to use the…