Ever since iPadOS 13.4 introduced full mouse and trackpad support, the entire iPad experience has been phenomenal. The cursor works incredibly well throughout the iPadOS UI. If you’re using a trackpad or mouse with your iPad, you can make the experience even better by enabling the right-click feature.
iPadOS is full of useful contextual menus that require you to tap/click and hold, or worse, long press to bring up the screen. Right-clicking will help you get to them much faster.
Note: The following instructions were written for Magic Keyboard w/ Trackpad, Magic Trackpad (2nd generation), and Magic Mouse (2nd generation). Screenshots may look slightly different for third-party trackpads and mice.
How to Enable Right Click on Trackpad
To enable right-clicking on the trackpad (like the Magic Keyboard with Trackpad or Magic Trackpad 2, for example), start by opening the Settings app on your iPad. Then click General in the sidebar. Follow by clicking the Trackpad option.
On the next screen, turn on the switch next to Secondary Two-Finger Click. You can now right-click your trackpad – simply press two fingers on the trackpad to do this.
You can also turn on the slider next to Click-to-Click to avoid physically pushing the trackpad down. This also applies to left-clicking and makes interactions with the trackpad much easier.
Other options on the screen include Natural Scrolling, which lets you specify direction while scrolling with the trackpad. You can also adjust the speed at which the cursor moves using the Tracking Speed slider at the top of the screen.
How to Enable Mouse Right Click
If you are using an external mouse such as Magic Mouse (2nd Gen) with your iPad, you can easily enable the right mouse button.
Go to the iPad’s Settings screen. Next, click on the option labeled General. Track by selecting Trackpad and Mouse.
Click on the option labeled Secondary Click.
Select Right in the next menu. You can now right-click with your mouse. Alternatively, you can bind the action to the left mouse button if you want.
You can also change the scrolling direction and pointer speed of the cursor via the Trackpad and Mouse screen.
Tips for Right-Click on iPadOS
There are numerous examples on iPadOS where a simple right-click can help you get things done much faster. Let’s check a few.
Icons and Widgets
Right-clicking mimics the long-press gesture (or left-clicking and holding), so you can now access quick actions menus on any Home screen icon in a second. For example, you can open a Private tab directly in Safari by right-clicking on the Safari icon and selecting New Private Tab. Do this a few times and you’ll start using quick actions much more than before.
Files and Other Apps
Right-clicking on a folder or file brings up a nifty context menu that lets you easily perform operations such as copying, tagging, and renaming. You can also right-click empty areas to create new folders and paste items.
Same, Photos, Mail etc. also true when right-clicking on items in apps – otherwise you’d expect to see familiar menus with a long press. From an efficiency standpoint, this works wonders.
Internet links
You can right-click any web link to bring up a context menu full of interesting actions. In Safari, for example, you can choose between opening a link in the background, adding it to your reading list, or copying the URL to your clipboard.
Control Center
Control Center plays an important role in managing your iPad with quick access to network, playback and display related options. With a right click, you can easily inspect each control and access additional options. For example, right-clicking the Brightness slider reveals toggles for Dark Mode, Night Shift, and True Tone.
Back Menu
Right-clicking on various items in applications can often produce good results. For example, if you’re dealing with multiple pages in a native iPadOS app, right-clicking the button to go back brings up a menu of previous pages.
Then you can select the exact page you want to return to instead of clicking the button multiple times.
Get it Right
Enabling right-click on your trackpad or mouse is essential for staying productive on iPad. Some apps still need to implement better mouse interaction on iPad (Google Docs, anyone?). But for a device that completely lacked mouse support just a year ago, the cursor functionality we already have is pretty exceptional.
Next: Click the link below to learn about the seven best ways to use Universal Search on iPad.
