When Apple first previewed Universal Control way back at WWDC 2021, I, like many others, thought it would be a game-changer in terms of continuity. Apple has been the best at developing an ecosystem so strong it just makes sense to buy more than one of the company's products. Sure, Apple might not make the best smartphone or computer, but it does make the best pairing between a smartphone and a computer.

Universal Control is the pinnacle of that premise, allowing you to control an iPad with a nearby Mac's keyboard and mouse, and vice versa. You can even drag and drop files and links between an iPad and Mac. Why lift your fingertips from the keyboard on your Mac to touch your iPad's display if you can control both devices from your Mac's keyboard and trackpad?

And in theory, I'm the feature's target audience. I own both a MacBook Air and a 12.9-inch iPad Pro, and I pair the tablet with a Magic Keyboard. Plus, I frequently work using both devices from coffee shops, and love using iPad and Macs together to be more efficient. But, as it turns out, Universal Control isn't the best way to be productive while using both an iPad and Mac.

iPadOS is a software designed for touch, first and foremost

The iPad is designed for touch, with the Apple Pencil working as a finer method of secondary input. It isn't necessarily meant for a traditional keyboard and mouse. When the company brought full keyboard and mouse support to the iPad, it didn't just port the existing user interface found in macOS. Instead, the cursor conforms to different UI elements in iPadOS, kind of like a finger would. The software is best used with touch or an Apple Pencil, and Apple's choices to date reflect that.

This concept makes the usability of Universal Control even more perplexing. Why would you want to control your iPad via this feature? The experience would be better if you used your finger or an Apple Pencil since the software is designed for those input methods. Universal Control saves a few seconds in theory, but battling iPadOS with a Mac keyboard and mouse will likely add more time than just lifting your finger to your iPad directly.

Apple introduced mouse support first as an accessibility feature, and that was clear to anyone who used it. Pointer support literally functioned as a finger, so you'd have to use your mouse just like any other multi-touch input. This got a lot better when Apple introduced true mouse and trackpad support with iPadOS 13, but the company hasn't really added features to the existing functionality in the nearly four software versions that have come since.

Apple has introduced new user interface and workflow elements, like Stage Manager, but it hasn't added new features to mouse support on iPadOS. Even the best iPads can't run keyboards and mice like a MacBook can, and since both products use the same Apple silicon chips, it's a software limitation — not a hardware one.

Universal Control isn't even the best way to use iPad and Mac together

Part of the reason Universal Control hasn't shaken up my workflow is that it isn't even the best way to pair the iPad and Mac. That feat belongs to Apple's screen mirroring feature, Sidecar, which can extend your Mac's desktop to a nearby iPad. When using Sidecar with my iPad Pro and MacBook Air, I can essentially double my available screen real estate while still using macOS on both devices. Yes, in this configuration, my iPad is essentially just an external display for my MacBook Air, but that's all it needs to be. My fanless MacBook Air can power an external monitor with ease, and macOS is still a more powerful operating system than iPadOS.

Universal Control is still great for some professionals

None of this is to diminish Universal Control's strengths, which are profoundly impactful for some workflows. For example, the ability to draw something on your iPad and drag it into a Keynote presentation on your Mac would be impossible on any other platform. That reason alone makes Universal Control great for people like graphic designers and artists, who need both the precision of the Apple Pencil and the power of macOS. Universal Control is still a great advancement, it just isn't a feature that has shaken up my workflow like many thought it would.

As a writer and former student, most of my work happens in a web browser or in a word processor. The most power-hungry tasks I complete are light photo editing and graphic design, which I do using Pixelmator Pro on my MacBook Air. As I've come to learn, that just isn't the workflow that Universal Control has the potential to elevate. But my workflow is also similar to that of most people, who don't use their laptops for more than web-based tasks and document creation. That means for the bulk of Apple users, Universal Control isn't the everyday game-changer it was billed to be.

Despite years of constant work to make iPadOS a serviceable laptop replacement, it still isn't there yet. Apple Silicon all but confirms that it's software that holds iPad back, not hardware. So, Apple should focus its time and energy on making it possible for people to run macOS on an iPad since adding a touchscreen to a Mac would be a terrible idea.

As far as continuity features go, Apple has already figured out how to make a universal ecosystem work. It's just been misguided with Universal Control. You can take a photo on your iPhone and immediately have it inserted into a document on your Mac. You can copy something on your iPad and paste it on your Mac. And AirDrop is still the best and fastest way to share files between devices. If Apple focuses on the small continuity features, they'll make a bigger impact than flashy ones like Universal Control.