iPad Pro with M2 and iPadOS 16 can finally work as a computer to get serious work done. iPadOS 16 has various new features, such as external display support, stage manager, customizable UI scaling and new collaboration tools.
Now, the power of the iPad Pro is only restricted by its small screen. So an external monitor can be a worthy investment for anyone who uses iPad Pro for work.

How to replace your computer with an iPad

Dual screen setup is one of the greatest productivity-enhancing benefits of an iPad Pro. It allows users to use more than one application simutaneously and multitask. This is essential for those who are constantly switching between tasks. Using an external monitor can help you get more done in the same amount of time. 

As Chris said in the video The iPad Pro External Monitor Experience Is BETTER Than You've Been Told!

we've seen Davinci will be coming to the iPad, the full version version of DaVinci Resolve, not some dumbed down version. It's going to make full use of the M2 chip on your iPad Pro. This is a heavy hitting Pro level app finally making its way to the iPad and the reason I'm so excited about that is because I've sat here and said for years on this channel that I can do basically 95% of my work on the iPad already. I've been saying that for a few years except for this one thing, that would be professional video editing. Now, lumafusion was around it was never quite good enough for me but now that Blackmagic is bringring DaVinci Resolve to the iPad, I can probably say I can get 100% of my work done with an iPad only setup now which is kind of bonkers. - Daily Tekk

Can I use external monitor with iPad Pro?

In the past, when you connected an external display, it usually just mirrored whatever was on the iPad, but now you can see that I have a sort of desktop background here. I have the dock at the bottom, and if I open Safari, it's big and nice. You can have multiple tabs open here, and you can even have multiple windows open on the left side. You can see I have a bunch of grouped apps, so I can switch from Safari to Twitter, some Apple Notes and Apple Music, I can make these windows layered, I can move them around and rearrange them, I can make them bigger and smaller. Now to make this all work, I'm using the iPad OS 16.2 beta because it's in beta, which does mean there are still some bugs to work out. But the software component that makes it all work is the Stage Manager. So Stage Manager is Apple's new way of letting people resize windows and multitask.

Some people like it, some people don't, but I like this, and I can swipe between my groups of apps with three fingers, which is really cool. I can also swipe up with three fingers, and I can access my most recently used app groups that way. So it's nice to be able to grab a corner of a window and resize it completely, but you wish it was. But I must point out that there are two things going on at the same time with the stage manager and the external display settings.

Nowadays, it's easy to connect an external monitor to the iPad Pro. You just need an portable monitor with one cable connection, plug and play.

What you can and What you can't do under dual screen setup with iPad Pro

After we tested the iPad Pro and Portable monitor combo, there're some information you may want to know. 

• iPad Pro can't extend two screens
• As for now, Touchscreen didn't work with iPad Pro  
• You can't rotate the external display to portrait
• You can't scale the external screen
• You can turn off the screen of iPad and only keep the external display work
• You can't mirror the external monitor
• You can make the video conferences and put the picture to the external monitor

How to Make the Best Use of iPad Pro 2022? 

I checked the review on Youtube, many people are optimized on the future of iPad pro to work as a productivity computer, drawing tablet, and on-the-go entertainment gadget. As more and more PRO APPS like Procreate, DaVinci Resolve runs on iPad, this picture is more and more clear and promising. 

An external monitor for iPad Pro will boost productivity, it helps to make the best use of iPad, get the professional multitask done and unleash the ture power of M2 chip. 

I'm genuinely excited about Stage Manager / External Display Support. Fed up with taking my 1.7kg laptop and iPad on business trips. Instead I can travel iPad only and remote in to my laptop at home with the Mac desktop full screen on the external display when I need it! - Rob Hitch

Finally this works great, iPad is turning out to be really great 3 in 1 device, it runs mobile apps which can be opened in a window in stage manager along with other apps, we already have great ipad apps like procrete and notablility, only thing missing is the desktop apps, if Apple lets installing apps other than App store then its gonna be great dream device for most people, with the support of touch, pencil, mouse and keyboard, then esssentialy this will or should replace macbook air line up and only needing the macbook pro models for power users. - Naveen Kumar

I believe iPad external monitor support is the only way that Stage Manager will be truly useful. It makes little sense to me on the Mac with Spaces around. Since Apple is leaving my very capable 2015 MacBook Pro behind, I plan to use my 12.9” M1 iPad Pro as my main computer along with a monitor moving forward while I use my MacBook for remote login and GarageBand only. Thanks for the great demo. I appreciate all of you videos.- Eddie Kendrick

Please check the video below to see our dual screen setup for the iPad Pro 2022.