It’s quite simple actually and a lot of YouTubers miss the wood for the trees: The iPad represents the $400, $600 and $800 price points in Apple’s computing lineup.

At the $400 and $600 price points the competition is similarly priced Chrome and Windows devices. I would argue that for the money the iPad is a much better computer than rival devices due to its near-infinite flexibility.

Whilst I think the iPad Pro isn’t really for anybody (you can get a refurb M1 MacBook Air for the same price) I use it as my main work computer.

To give you an example of what I might use it for I will LiDAR scan a site, take dimensions and then use Shapr3D to draw up some 1:1 plans which can then be sent to AutoCAD for final processing and laser manufacturing. The LiDAR Scanner on the iPad is actually very powerful for the money and capable of on-device* Photogrammetry, thus I can also scan an object, process it in Shapr and then send it to Fusion for cleaning up and 3D manufacture.

I might use a sprite-maker app to built some black and white bitmaps which I will then send to Pixelmator for collation with fictional maps (eg Final Fantasy games). I then send these maps to a desktop for merging with vector graphics and laser cutting.

*Most people don’t know this but the iPad Pro is the best Photogrammetry device you can actually buy. Regular processing of DSLR photographs into a 3D model either requires a server upload (thus a web connection) or, if done on a desktop several hours of processing time. Scaniverse on the iPad uses the LiDAR Scanner to build a rough mesh before applying the photograph textures. It does this in under 10 minutes with no web connection required.