The topic iPadOS 26.5 will add three new features for iPad, here’s what’s coming is currently the subject of lively discussion — readers and analysts are keeping a close eye on developments.
This is taking place in a dynamic environment: companies’ decisions and competitors’ reactions can quickly change the picture.
iPadOS 26.5 is launching very soon, and with it three new features for your iPad. Here’s what’s new.
iPadOS 26.5 introduces a change intended to make it easier to pair Apple accessories with your iPad.
Now, when you connect a Magic Keyboard, Magic Trackpad, or Magic Mouse via USB-C, the accessory will automatically establish a Bluetooth connection too.
This means that when you disconnect the USB-C cable, your iPad will maintain a wireless connection with the accessory. So there’s no need to perform manual Bluetooth pairing.
The Mac has worked this way for years, with wired connections automatically enabling wireless pairing too. So it’s good to see a similar feature come to the iPad.
Apple has a new Pride Luminance wallpaper coming in iPadOS 26.5, and it includes far more than one single wallpaper.
Pride Luminance offers 11 colorful wallpapers to choose from. And if that’s not enough, there’s even a custom wallpaper builder feature.
When setting up the wallpaper, you can choose to custom-pick which colors are used. iPadOS 26.5 lets you select as few as 1 and as many as 12 different colors for your wallpaper.
So if your iPad is in need of a fresh wallpaper, Pride Luminance offers a lot of variety to choose from.
I use Apple’s Reminders app on my iPad every day, and there’s a small enhancement in iPadOS 26.5 that’s made it even better.
The snoozing function that’s available when you long-press a reminder alert has been updated to include specific snooze times.
Apple used to just offer the ability to snooze until “This Afternoon,” “This Evening,” or “Tomorrow Morning” based on the current time of day. These were vague descriptions that I ultimately found unhelpful.
But in iPadOS 26.5, you’ll now see snooze options like, “Remind Me at 3:00 PM” or “Remind Me Tomorrow at 9:00 AM.”
It’s a subtle change, but by removing ambiguity, Reminders’ snooze options are now more useful than before.
iPadOS 26.5 also benefits from Apple Maps’ new ‘Suggested Places’ feature. So if you like browsing Maps on your iPad, that addition can help you find new places.
Otherwise, Apple has largely turned its focus to iPadOS 27, which will be unveiled next month with a much bigger lineup of new features for iPad.
What new features do you want to see come to iPad next? Let us know in the comments.