How to Use Your iPad as a Second Monitor With Your Mac (2025)

Mirroring duplicates what’s on your iPad to your Mac. You’ll see the same content on both screens. This is useful when sharing your screen or streaming content to another device like your TV or external monitor. You can also enable Screen Mirroring right from your iPad by swiping down on the Control Center, tapping the Screen Mirroring icon, and then selecting your Mac.

How to Use Sidecar

If you’re extending the display, using Sidecar is fairly intuitive. It works the same way as a standard external monitor. You can drag windows between the display and the iPad using your cursor. If you’re using an app, you can click Window > Move Window to Mac or Window > Move to iPad, and it will move to the respective device.

You’ll notice the Side Bar on the side of the iPad. You can trigger different actions depending on the icon. You can use them to: hide or show the dock, show the onscreen keyboard, and use shortcuts like Shift, Control, Option, and Command. You can hide it by going to the Control Center on your Mac, clicking the Screen Mirror icon, and selecting Hide Side Bar.

Photograph: Brenda Stolyar

You can show or hide the Touch Bar. It appears at the bottom of the screen and displays certain functions depending on the app you’re using. For example, if you’re typing, you’ll see the Emoji key and predictive text. If you open a new tab in your browser window, you’ll see a text box to type in the URL along with the back, forward, and home buttons.

If you’re mirroring the display, you can use the iPad as you normally would. It will recognise all the same gestures, like swipe, tap, scroll, and zoom. You can also navigate the screen with your Apple Pencil. If you have the second-generation Apple Pencil, you can enable double tap to trigger custom actions using certain apps.

How to Turn Off Sidecar

When you’re done using the iPad as a secondary display, you can turn it off via the Mac or iPad. If you’re extending the display, you’ll need to complete the following steps.

On a Mac, click on the Control Center, then click Screen Mirroring and deselect your iPad from the dropdown list. On the iPad, tap on the icon with a rectangle and diagonal line across it on the Touch Bar, then tap Disconnect. If you’re mirroring the display, swipe down on the Control Center on the iPad and tap Stop Mirroring.

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