Whereas Apple doesn’t outright say it, the iPad can be utilized as your on a regular basis pc as an alternative of a Mac in plenty of situations. These situations the place the iPad is unsuitable typically contain extra mundane however important duties, however it seems that Apple is slowly fixing these deficiencies in iPadOS–there’s a brand new function within the upcoming iPad OS 18 that’s fairly helpful.
Kaleb Cadle, who writes about Apple stuff (amongst different tech matters) on ByteBits, found the power to erase and format hooked up storage gadgets within the iPadOS 18 beta. The perform is within the Information app—faucet and maintain the exterior storage system to see the Erase choice, and you then’ll have the choice to rename the system and decide certainly one of three codecs: APFS, ExFAT, or MS-DOS (FAT). The choice was additionally found within the iOS 18 beta as nicely, in line with MacRumors.
Kaleb Cadle/ByteBits
Whereas the power to erase and format drives is probably not one you employ continuously on an iPad (you most likely don’t use it loads on a Mac, both), it’s a really helpful perform. It saves you from having to show to a Mac if you end up on this scenario. Cadle wonders if Apple will finally deliver different features from the Mac’s Disk Utility app over to the iPad, corresponding to Restore and First Assist–we definitely hope so.
Understand that that is an iOS 18 and iPadOS 18 function, so it’ll solely be accessible on suitable gadgets—and could also be restricted to sure fashions with particular {hardware} necessities.