After being available on iOS for several months now, iPad users in the EU will have reason to rejoice next week.
Starting Monday, September 16, they will be able to use third-party app stores to download apps to their iPads. This likely means that support for third-party app stores will be built into iPadOS 18, as it will be released on Monday. Additionally, iPadOS browser apps will be able to use alternative engines that are not Safari’s.
This announcement was made back in May and is now well on its way to becoming a reality.
This is good news, but of course Apple is not doing this out of the goodness of their heart. This is a consequence of the EU passing stricter regulations against Apple and other big players like it. Apple was effectively forced to pass these new rules, otherwise it would never have given up its dominance over mobile operating systems.
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