I’ve been daily-driving the iPadOS 26 developer beta for about a month, and now that the public beta is out, I wanted to break down what’s actually better… and what’s genuinely worse. First, I go through the big “you’ll notice it instantly” changes like Apple’s new Liquid Glass redesign—glassy icons, clearer tinting, updated lock screen effects, and the whole vibe shift after basically a decade of iPadOS looking the same. I also talk about how Apple already tweaked transparency because of legibility backlash, so right now it’s in this weird glassy/frosted in-between stage. Then I get into the productivity upgrades that finally make the iPad feel more like a Mac: a real window management system (not the janky Stage Manager grid stuff), a normal cursor, a menu bar with the traffic lights, folders in the dock, Preview on iPad, Files app customization, background tasks (finally), and manual microphone input selection. But it’s not all sunshine and rainbows—battery life has been mid for me on my iPad Air M2, and the biggest downgrade is Apple removing Split View and Slide Over. My verdict: try the public beta only on a secondary device and back everything up, or just wait for September if you want stability.