Sidecar: Use Your iPad as a Second Mac Display

A second monitor changes how you work; Sidecar means you may already own one. It turns an iPad into a genuine extra display for your Mac — wireless or over a cable, with Apple Pencil support that makes the iPad a drawing tablet for Mac apps as a bonus. Setup is one click once you know where the click is.

What you need

• A Mac from roughly 2016 onward (Sidecar arrived with macOS Catalina; every Ventura-capable Mac except the very oldest models supports it).
• An iPad that supports Apple Pencil, running iPadOS 13 or later.
• Both devices on the same Apple ID with two-factor authentication, with Bluetooth, Wi-Fi, and Handoff on.
• Within about ten metres for wireless — or a USB cable, which also charges the iPad and sidesteps every Wi-Fi variable.

Connect

1. Click Control Center in the menu bar, then Screen Mirroring.
2. Your iPad appears under "Mirror or extend to". Click it.
3. The iPad becomes a Mac display within a couple of seconds — by default an extension of your desktop. Whatever iPad app was open steps aside; it comes back the moment you disconnect.

The same connection is available from System Settings → Displays: click the + dropdown and choose the iPad. Either route, disconnecting is symmetrical — the Screen Mirroring menu again, or the disconnect control in the iPad's Sidecar sidebar. Nothing to undo beyond that; the iPad returns to being an iPad instantly.

Mirror or extend — and arranging the desk

In System Settings → Displays, click the iPad's thumbnail and set Use as:

• Extended display — more desktop. Drag windows onto the iPad exactly as with any monitor; drag its thumbnail in Displays so the arrangement matches physical reality, or the cursor will exit the wrong edge forever.
• Mirror — both screens show the same thing. Useful for showing someone across the table, pointless for workspace.

A shortcut worth learning immediately: hover over any window's green traffic-light button and the menu offers Move to iPad — the window flies to the Sidecar display, sized to fit, no dragging across monitors. The same menu brings it back.

Two Sidecar-specific furniture pieces are worth knowing, both toggleable from the iPad's entry in Displays settings: the sidebar (on-screen ⌘, ⌥, ⇧ keys and shortcuts, so you can work on the iPad without the Mac keyboard) and a Touch Bar strip that shows app controls along the edge. Turn either off if you'd rather spend the pixels on your windows.

One expectation to set: Sidecar is not a touchscreen Mac. Fingers scroll and pinch, but pointing, clicking, and drawing are the Apple Pencil's job — which is precisely what makes Sidecar great with drawing and photo apps: the iPad becomes a pressure-sensitive tablet for the full desktop versions of those tools.

Wireless vs. wired, honestly

Wireless Sidecar is very good on a clean network: imperceptible lag for documents, email, and reference material. Push it — congested Wi-Fi, a room's distance, video playing on the iPad screen — and you'll notice softness and stutter. The USB cable removes all of it. A sensible policy: wireless by default, cable for drawing sessions and anything latency-sensitive. If wireless refuses to connect at all, the cable is also the best diagnostic: if wired works, the problem is your Wi-Fi environment, not Sidecar.

Or share just the keyboard instead

If what you really want is the iPad running its own apps beside your Mac — with one mouse and keyboard driving both — that's the sibling feature, Universal Control. Same requirements, opposite philosophy; many desks use both, switching per task.