I need to use a mouse with my ipad pro. What gives?

If you think that you can change Apple’s stance on this,

The only way to get Apple to, DIRECTLY, listen to you is to use their feedback portion of their website.

iPad Feedback

http://www.apple.com/feedback/ipad.html

Cognizant Apple employees read ALL feedback generated from all of the various feedback pages and transfers the data to the and responsible Apple teams and personnel , but NO Apple employees will ever respond with any type of direct, individual replies from the feedback you post.

Good Luck!

People seem to have selective reading and/or listening. At no time did Apple (as far as I can find anywhere) say iPad Pro is a laptop replacement.

Really? Did you bother to watch Apple's own keynote for the 2018 iPad Pro?

They did say, it is as powerful as a laptop (it is). They did it is as fast (in many cases faster) than a laptop (it is). They said the resolution of the display exceeds the resolution of most laptops (it does). They never said it is a laptop or provide all the functionality of a laptop.

Oh, okay, you did watch the keynote. You simply parsed the bits that support your argument that iPad doesn't require a mouse, or, that Apple didn't compare the iPad to a notebook, or that the iPad can replace a notebook?

Or should I focus simply on what Apple doesn't say vs. what they do?

*SIGH*

It's perfectly reasonable to assume that everyone posting here has been around long enough to understand that the iPad has been replacing notebooks ever since it was introduced back in 2010. For those who use a notebook for web, email and even a few work apps, an iPad can easily support those needs. I don't think anyone that's posted in this thread denies this?

Even so, it would seem that many require that Apple's iOS for iPad support mouse input. Whether it's for spreadsheets (Excel), print media content creation, or even design, some users have been asking for this feature support for years. assuming a negative position versus an affirmative one on this one, specific feature request, it seems as if Apple is simply asking their customers to do without? How does adding mouse support diminish iOS or iPad considering that Apple has already added Apple Pencil and the software support necessary for stylus input while at the same time seeming to ignore the requests of countless customers who have requested mouse support on iPad? I simply don't see Apple Pencil and mouse support as mutually exclusive to one another?

That's the real shame of this entire topic: Apple could have added this feature years ago. The first generation iPad Pro was launched alongside the Apple Pencil, which was only supported (initially) by the iPad Pro. Apple designed both a new screen for the Pad Pro that supported stylus input, AND an entirely new Apple Pencil, which was Apple's first attempt at a stylus in nearly 20 years. And, it was so successful they've recently released its replacement (sibling?), the Apple Pencil 2.

I mentioned the Apple Pencil because iPad Pro owners are finding more uses for their iPad Pros and wondering aloud "If Apple can make an entirely new product specifically for iPad, it shouldn't be difficult to add support for a mouse?" I've paraphrased several threads from both here and on several Apple fan forums that are intensely pro-Apple. These aren't the voices of those who have some unreasonable distaste for Apple. Apple iPad owners are asking for this feature so they can try to use their iPad's more and their notebooks less. This feature request actually supports Apple's narrative that the new iPad Pro can take the place of the notebooks they use daily.

I can recall the emerging feature requests for a stylus days after the release of the first iPad. (Seriously: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/2395385) But Steve Jobs infamously asked "Who want's a stylus?" and we know the rest of the story (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4YY3MSaUqMg) Hint: Apple Pencil, both the original and 2nd gen, has been a resounding success for Apple. It saw sales double in year-to-year sales from 2017 to 2018.

Could mouse support affect iPad sales? I'm not completely sure, but seriously, how could it hurt? This could even become an opportunity for Apple, by announcing mouse support for iOS alongside something like Adobe Photoshop for iOS or even iOS's upcoming "Dark Mode" support in iOS 13. At the very least Apple Mouse sales could spike, as Apple is now offering Space Grey options for both Apple Mouse and Smart Keyboard.

Sorry for length, got a bit ahead of myself! In summary, I just don't understand how those who defend Apple by suggesting there's nothing to this mouse support issue and we should all just move along. After nearly a decade of asking for it, perhaps Apple will surprise us soon?

Even so, I'm not holding my breath 😑

Sorry for length, got a bit ahead of myself! In summary, I just don't understand how those who defend Apple by suggesting there's nothing to this mouse support issue and we should all just move along. After nearly a decade of asking for it, perhaps Apple will surprise us soon?

You can let Apple know how you feel here:

Product Feedback - Apple

After 5 years, Apple acquiesced on allowing stylus support on iPads.

It is almost 9-years since the first iPad and Apple still has not acquiesced on allowing mice or trackpad support for their tablet line.

It is what it is. Any opinions, yes even mine, notwithstanding.

Apple doesn’t care what I think or what anyone else in these support communities thinks here in this post.

EVERYONE is entitled to their opinions on this topic/post, but Apple is not listening to any of us.

My opinion is just that, but doesn’t change any of the current facts.

If you feel vehemently that all iPads/iPad Pros should natively support mice and trackpads, you can keep adding feedback to Apple’s feedback page more than just once.

iPad Feedback

http://www.apple.com/feedback/ipad.html

We're to understand, Larry, that you are comparing the iOS map fiasco response or the like in this forum to traffic from a simple feature request? Does such a comparison make sense!? No matter -- if anyone is genuinely interested in knowing whether there is significant interest in iOS mouse support or in the iPad as a laptop replacement I refer you to my earlier comment, which links to several high-profile reviews of the new iPad Pro: https://discussions.apple.com/thread/8307855?answerId=250192467022#250192467022. Either those pundits are wrong or the ardent naysayers in this thread have misplaced their zeal.

Asking here is pointless - Apple is not here in the user community forums. The Apple feedback site is the only place Apple Engneers and iOS design staff will see your request for mouse support - https://www.apple.com/feedback/

This thread persists because people, for a decade now, continue to ask for something that does not exist in iOS, and which no one here in the user forums can do a thing about, even if they wanted it too. People keep asking for it, and people keep explaining it is not available. These are global forums - anyone can post anything they wish to whatever thread they wish to. If it violates the TOU, the moderators will intervene.

"So why not question why iPad Pro has no mouse?"

This has been asked and answered over and over and over and over and over and over. The answer is quite simple: Because Apple hasn't given it mouse support. That should end the discussion. No one here works for Apple. No one here has any input into Apple design or engineering direction. You can ask daily and the answer will be the same.

On the data you provided. Neither supports your claim that Apple is losing market share to Surface. Both articles are about Laptops. iPad is not now, nor has it ever been a laptop. It is a tablet. And the best tablet at that. Anyone who 'must' have a tablet with a mouse, will likely purchase a Surface. And that is great, fine, wonderful. It's great there are options in the marketplace for people to make informed buying decisions and purchase the device which best meets their needs. But if someone buys an iPad and then feels cheated because it doesn't include mouse support, well that's just an example of someone not doing their due diligence pre-purchase.

Again, I would be happy if Apple provided mouse support for iPad. I'd probably add one. But Apple doesn't and complaining on a forum whose sole purpose is for users to seek technical support from other users is a waste of time. And yes, I am also wasting my time. But that's me. I spend a lot of time on these forums and if you look, you'll see most of my time is spent helping people with technical issues.

Have a great day Drb. I mean that honestly. It's just time for this thread to come to a close for there isn't any reason to keep debating mouse support here.

It's been posted over and over, but for anyone who wants mouse support on iPad, PLEASE PROVIDE FEEDBACK directly to Apple, via this link: Feedback - iPad - Apple

“The real question is, should a user really adapt to OS, or maybe OS should adapt to the user!?”

With any operating system ever created, it is some of both. Those developing the OS will evolve it with updates over time, but they will never be able to meet every wish, desire or expectation form every user - no OS is infinitely customizable. So, every user needs to understand the capabilities and limitations of the OS they choose to use.

Quite honestly, if it were any other way, we would not have alternate operating systems persisting for so long and the market would have converged on one standard long ago. Windows, BSD, Linux, Chrome OS, MacOS, Android, iOS, etc are all different for reasons based on the hardware they’re tailored to, the creative vision of the developers, the intended end-user, the intended input interface, and so forth.

iOS from inception (actually, from before it even was “iOS”) to this day was intended as a touch interface operating system - https://www.apple.com/newsroom/2007/01/09Apple-Reinvents-the-Phone-with-iPhone/

“iPhone is a revolutionary and magical product that is literally five years ahead of any other mobile phone,” said Steve Jobs, Apple’s CEO. “We are all born with the ultimate pointing device—our fingers—and iPhone uses them to create the most revolutionary user interface since the mouse.”

I don't know where to begin with MichelPM's comment, above. You are clearly on a mission to stifle any and all interest in mouse support in iOS, if your numerous, repetitive comments in this thread are any indication. Perhaps a serious repetitive stress injury explains your zeal in the matter, your abject hatred of pointing devices, and naysayers are wasting their time but I'll respond to a few of your more vapid assertions:

1. Do you actually speak for Apple in an official capacity when you state, "The mouse is never coming to any iPad"? Apple continues to hope people will "make do" with the iOS touch interface and new pencil but, far as I know, they've never said "never" where mouse support is concerned.
2. You're clearly not a gamer as the notion that any current WoW-like or, especially, first-person shooter offering could be ported to or improved with the current iOS touch interface is silly.
3. "The future ... is NOT old school, 50 year old mice and trackpad technology!" Unlike, say, the Apple Pencil, which is 4,000-year-old technology? iOS supports external keyboards, which are far older than the mouse. There are hundreds or millions if not billions of people using mice and trackpads every_single_day across a veritable sea of devices and platforms. One or both will likely be in use by millions more long after iOS is vague memory. I'm not claiming either is perfect but for a whole raft of applications they are superior to any current touch interface and may remain so indefinitely.
4. In marketing the new iPad Pro Apple wants us to think of it as a computer replacement that is unlike any computer, never mind the seeming paradox. But there is a whole host of recent reviews from publications like Business Insider, Washington Post, Mac Observer, Apple World, Apple Insider, Macworld, The Verge, ZDNet and others which level the same basic complaint: the iPad will never be a computer replacement or be the near-ideal productivity tool it could be absent mouse support. All manner of business and photo, music and video editing applications and tools are given in these reviews as examples where mouse support is needed, and the latter are clearly marketed by Apple as being in the iPad's wheelhouse.
5. I don't believe for a second that adding mouse support to iOS would be difficult for a company with Apple's resources, while the few claims I've seen in this thread and elsewhere about mouse support being "incompatible with the touch paradigm" are farcical, at best. In truth, the feature could remain completely invisible to those like MichelPM who feel it somehow sullies their otherwise "very modern and high tech devices."
6. Apple, perhaps wisely, keeps two distinct walled gardens in order to avoid cannibalization in its product line: iOS and touch versus Mac and mouse/trackpad. If you believe they doggedly hang on to this distinction to "keep pushing forward and NOT stay clinging on to old technologies and kludges to be able to adapt old technologies to new," you're simply naive.

Mark D.

LOL. iPad is a computer. iPhone is a computer. They just aren't full featured computers, like a desktop or laptop. And if anyone purchased an iPad because they believed they were buying a full featured laptop desktop computer, they clearly didn't do due diligence in researching what they purchased.

com·put·er

/kəmˈpyo͞odər/

noun

• 1.
• an electronic device for storing and processing data, typically in binary form, according to instructions given to it in a variable program.

Nothing has changed.

No mouse support.

Woudn’t hold my breath for it any time soon!

There is no on screen software pointer/cursor programmed into iOS for an external mouse or trackpad input device to navigate such a software pointer.

If you use the onboard iOS software keyboard,

iOS has an insertion point "I" beam cursor that can now controlled by invoking the iOS software keyboard and then do a two-finger single tap to turn the entire software keyboard area into a giant trackpad area.

You can place insertion "I" beam anywhere you want, then use the delete key to delete a letter and/or replace a letter in a word.

If you use two-finger double tap within the keyboard area, you can highlight words, lines of text or entire paragraphs for editing.

That’s as close to a regular mouse/trackpad the IOS has available.

Nope. There has never been, and likely will never be any mouse support on an iPad.

Apple has made it clear that mouse support is not something they are likely to consider on an iPad, as it goes against every design cue and usage philosophy the iPad follows.

If you need a mouse that badly, use a computer or tablet that supports one.

netman09 wrote:

I know this has been a question before. Has Apple pulled their head out yet and made it possible to pair a mouse with this thing. I have things to do and little time for what the world will be like in the future. Right now I need a mouse to work with my ipad pro. Or send me some kind of futuristic device that allows me to place my cursor where I want it without having to reach out and touch the **** display everytime i want move something or cut and paste or select an object, etc. The pen has it's moments but touch screens are for drawing not for a replacement to the mouse. I would like a pair of glasses that know exactly what my eyes are looking at within a micron and then when I blink that would place the cursor then I could say "select next word" and it would just do that. You know or,.... maybe for now a mouse....

I don‘t quite understand the tone of your post. iOS was designed from the ground up to be a touch-only interface. A mouse was never part of the equation and remains clearly not part of the equation. Apple “pulled its head out” back in the early 2000’s when it began designing iOS and the first iOS devices and said - no mouse, touch only.

No iPad has ever supported a mouse, and there is no indication that any iOS device ever will. If you’ve been waiting for that to happen, I suspect you’re in for an endless wait.