After 8 years of trying on and off, I think the iPad and a hardware keyboard have finally become a viable laptop alternative for me. The reason is a change in iPadOS 27.2 that I don't want others on here to miss, especially those who, like me, long ago gave up hoping for a fix.
Many of you will know the bug I'm referring to: when editing text using a hardware keyboard, navigating and selecting text can be inconsistent and unreliable
I first tried using an iPad as a laptop alternative back in 2018, and again in 2020. Both times this issue got in the way. I always found myself reaching for my iPhone or MacBook instead, which left the iPads as expensive paperweights, and both ended up being passed to other members of my family. I tried again in 2024 with the iPad Pro and Magic Keyboard combo that I still have, but the bug had the same effect, and it sat mostly unused until I discovered this fix.
I first reported the issue in 2018 and kept filing reports over the years, but I'd stopped believing it would ever reach Apple's fix list. Filing had become something I did just in case. I filed another at the start of the iPadOS 27.0 beta cycle, and 27.0 shipped with no sign that anything had changed.
I had always assumed that if this were ever fixed, it would come in an x.0 release. So imagine my surprise when the first iPadOS 27.2 beta brought significant improvements.
There's still at least one remaining issue that I know of, but it's easy to work around. In most situations, if you select one or more paragraphs with the paragraph selection shortcut and then use the shortcut to shrink the selection by character, word or line, the selection expands instead, and at the opposite end from where you were trying to shrink it. It's an odd one, but once you know what's happening, it's easy to avoid. For example, select one additional character at the end of the selection before shrinking it.
Apple has marked my report for this as a duplicate of reports from other users, which is encouraging. If you can reproduce this and want to see the longstanding keyboard navigation and selection issue fully resolved, please file a report of your own. The more reports Apple receives, the more likely they are to fix this and any other remaining issues in this area before they mark it as done and move on.
If your needs are like mine, and you don't rely on tools that only exist on a Mac or PC, this release might make an iPad and keyboard a viable laptop alternative for you too. That has certainly been my experience. I've genuinely enjoyed using my iPad Pro and Magic Keyboard since the first iPadOS 27.2 beta, and it's now my MacBook Air that's sitting unused. Long may it last.
Thank you to whoever at Apple decided this finally deserved some attention. It's been a long time coming.
If you have an iPad and keyboard combo, please do check and share your experiences here. Your help in finding any remaining issues would be particularly valuable. We all have different use cases and ways of using our devices, so I may well have missed something. It would also be helpful if someone who uses a keyboard with their iPhone could confirm whether the same improvements are present in iOS 27.2.