French website Numerama interviewed three senior Apple employees regarding the new iPad Pro models released earlier this month. Although the discussion offered few new insights, it did hint at one possible change for future iPads.
The Apple logo on the back of iPads is oriented for vertical use, but many users often use their devices in landscape mode with a keyboard attached, causing the logo to appear sideways. To accommodate this, Apple moved the front camera to the longer edge on the latest iPad Pro and iPad Air models, positioning it at the top-center when in landscape orientation.
With landscape usage becoming more prevalent, Apple product designer Molly Anderson indicated that a landscape Apple logo might be introduced on future iPads. “I think it could change,” Anderson said, according to a computer translation of the French interview. “We are thinking about it. The iPad has long been a product used in portrait mode, but we are using it more and more in landscape mode.”
Apple has already adapted the software to display the Apple logo in landscape mode during boot-up starting with iPadOS 14.5. This openness to change on the hardware side suggests a landscape Apple logo might be seen on future iPads.