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Apple Depicts iPad as Laptop, Textbook, and Paperwork Replacement in Series of New Ads

Apple today shared four new 15-second ads highlighting the portability of the iPad for education and travel.

The ads, titled Travel Simply, Organized Notes, Paperless Paperwork, and All Your Stuff, depict the iPad as a space-saving replacement for textbooks in the classroom, paperwork in the office, and a laptop during a flight.





Many of the comparisons are exaggerated — for example, the baby on the plane suddenly stops crying when the camera pans over the passenger using an iPad — but the ads convey a clear message about the iPad's versatility.

Two of the ads show the iPad Pro, and two show the sixth-generation iPad, introduced at Apple's education event last March. The latter is priced from $329 in the United States, serving as a lower-cost alternative to the iPad Pro.


Apple initially uploaded the ads to its YouTube channels in Asia, Europe, and the Middle East, and later in the United States.

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Top Rated Comments

_Refurbished_ Avatar
107 months ago
An iPad will never be a laptop replacement without mouse support. An iPad is a superior product in many ways than a laptop, but for specific situations, a mouse is needed in order to truly replace the laptop.
Score: 47 Votes (Like | Disagree)
PBG4 Dude Avatar
107 months ago
So the iPad can back up iPhones and other devices now? They can connect to / format external storage drives, run 3D printers and Blender?

No? Guess it isn’t a laptop replacement yet.
Score: 39 Votes (Like | Disagree)
107 months ago
iPads suck as a laptop. I'll let Craig Federighi explain why ('https://www.wired.com/story/wwdc-2018-federighi-ios-apps-on-macos'):

"We really feel that the ergonomics of using a Mac are that your hands are rested on a surface, and that lifting your arm up to poke a screen is a pretty fatiguing thing to do."

The iPad will never be a laptop replacement until Apple adds a trackpad.
Score: 27 Votes (Like | Disagree)
MrBat Avatar
107 months ago
Put a mouse and Desktop applications on the iPad and we can start talking about being a "real" replacement for a laptop.
Score: 25 Votes (Like | Disagree)
Cookie18 Avatar
107 months ago
People in these comments are really ****ing butthurt over these ads. In all of these cases an iPad could be better than a laptop. A laptop is best for some things, an iPad is best for others. I don’t pull out my MacBook Pro on a flight when I can take out my 12.9" iPad instead, the iPad is vastly superior in that situation.

People act like you can only own one of these ****ing devices, own one or both or none. It doesn’t take away from what each device does better.
Score: 18 Votes (Like | Disagree)
107 months ago
The problem here is that Apple is assuming that nobody in a flight is going to open a Terminal and invoke the C compiler. And the shocking reality is that one of the main reasons why I switched to the Mac years ago is how well the Terminal worked (as opposed to Windows) in a computer that "just worked" (as opposed as a Linux PC).

But now, Apple says to us: "go away, use a Linux PC".
Score: 17 Votes (Like | Disagree)