5 Apps The iPad Shockingly Took Years To Get

With how often new apps and games pop up on both the iPhone and iPad, it's not unreasonable to think that their libraries are more-or-less the same. There are going to be some iPhone apps that won't work well on the iPad because of its larger screen size, but it has everything the iPhone has, right? Well... not exactly.

It's certainly possible to find, download, and install the iPhone versions of apps onto your iPad via the App Store, but that's not the same thing as having a dedicated iPad app. This is a small distinction, sure, but one that can sometimes result in non-iPad specific apps failing or encountering problems — because you're ultimately running software that's designed for a different platform with different screen dimensions.

That said, there are a few instances of well-known or popular iPhone apps that took way longer than you might think to finally get their own dedicated iPad iterations. We're talking double-digit years, as well as third-party and first-party apps. Here are five of the most recognizable (and "it's about time") examples we've found.

When Apple released the first iPhone in 2007, it helped to expand the idea of what the little phones we carry around in our pockets could accomplish. It was also a shadow of what it would eventually become after nearly two decades of updates and refinements. But there were a handful of pre-installed apps that would continue to be installed by default throughout the device's multitudinous iterations — including, of course, the Weather app.

In other words, Apple's Weather app has been an iPhone mainstay since 2007. And yet, it wasn't until 2022 and the release of iPadOS 16 that we got an exacting interface on the iPad. So for 12 years iPad users had a total of four choices: Download a third-party weather app, try to run the iPhone Weather app on the iPad, don't bother with checking the weather on the iPad at all (i.e. use an iPhone instead), or wait.

It might've taken 12 years, but it did finally happen!

Instagram is one of those apps that just about everyone knows, even if they don't use it. The photo-focused social media app arrived on the iPhone in late 2010, but there was no dedicated iPad version. It was a constant request from loads of users for years, but it never happened. Not until September, 2025 that is.

Yes, it took a whole 15 years for Instagram to make it to the iPad outside of users settling for running the iPhone version on their tablets. Still, it did make it, and is even arguably better on iPad. Sure the iPhone version was old enough to have a learner's permit by the time it eventually happened, butr it on the bigger screen makes a pretty significant difference.

It's just not as portable when it's not on a pocket-sized smartphone. And the iPad experience seems to put a bit more focus on Reels, so if you're not into Instagram's short-form video stuff, it might not be as big a leap from one device to the other.

Back in 2009, a couple of years after the iPhone's initial release, WhatsApp appeared to provide an alternative to the default Messages app. But then it just sort of stayed there. WhatsApp saw a steady stream of updates and changes, to be sure, but the app itself never strayed beyond those boundaries to Apple's tablet. At least, not as its own dedicated app.

For over 15 years, that was the WhatsApp situation. But it did finally receive its own iPad app at the end of May, 2025. Was it worth the wait? I don't know, I don't use WhatsApp. But the app does support the iPad's larger screen, and it also boasts the iPad multitasking function, so you can take advantage of Split View and Slide over.

Both the Magic Keyboard and Apple Pencil work with the iPad version of WhatApp. Whether or not that's a significant upgrade depends on your thoughts on either accessory (and whether or not you actually own them), but they're things you won't find on the iPhone app!

There was no way a list like this wasn't going to have Apple's Calculator app on it. The original iPhone app came pre-installed on the device during its very first release in 2007, but was suspiciously absent on the iPad for a very long time. And it's not like some of Apple's other official iPhone apps where you might see a reason why a dedicated tablet version wasn't a high priority. This is a calculator! People using an iPad are just as likely to need to crunch numbers as someone on an iPhone!

Obviously Calculator did eventually see an official iPad release, otherwise it wouldn't be on this list, but it took Apple a remarkably long time to finally do it. The iPad-specific version of the app was rolled into the release of iPadOS 18 in late 2024, roughly 17 years — 17 years! — after its iPhone counterpart. Again, this is somewhat baffling because a default calculator function seems like the kind of thing that everyone would expect on an iPad. It's something that would see a lot of use on a regular basis, the same way that a lot of us pull up the Calculator on our iPhone (or even Mac) whenever number wrangling is called for.

The inclusion of the Phone app on this list might seem like a bit of a stretch, since it's far more common to default to making calls from a smartphone than a tablet, but the point is that Apple took a very, very long time to give the iPad its own dedicated version to make calls ... kind of. It's a little complicated.

Phone came standard on the iPhone from the very beginning, back in 2007. It did not, however, come standard on the iPad — not until the release of iPadOS 26 in September, 2025, that is. That's essentially 18 years after the fact.

With that said, the iPad's new Phone app is a bit of an anomaly in that it's not actually making or taking calls from your iPad. Instead, calls have to be routed from an iPhone through to the iPad by way of Apple's Continuity feature. As far as the experience goes, it's not much different than if the app did actually field calls via the iPad, but you will need to connect the two devices via your Apple ID. Additionally, the function hinges on iPhone proximity, so if it's too far away from the iPad or is turned off, calls won't go through. 

This list was initially compiled through a combination of examples sourced from reputable websites such as MakeUseOf and MacRumors, personal iPad user experience, and cross-referencing a few default Apple apps' iPad release dates with their iPhone app counterparts. After which it was cut down to five primary examples, which were selected according to the approximate length of time between the original iPhone versions and their eventual iPad releases.