**The Smart Keyboard Folio: A Follow-Up Review**

After spending several weeks with the Apple Smart Keyboard Folio, I wanted to share my thoughts on its usability and design. One of the main differences between this keyboard and the standard Apple Smart Keyboard is the lack of a stand when not in use. The Smart Keyboard Folio can be folded up, but it doesn't have the same stability as the standard Smart Keyboard, which can make it prone to tilting or falling off the edge of my desk.

However, I've found that this isn't a major issue for me. When I'm working on a laptop, I usually keep it propped up at an angle using a book or my other hand, so the lack of stability hasn't been a problem. But if you're looking for a keyboard to use with your iPad in bed or on a couch, this might not be the best option.

Another difference between the Smart Keyboard Folio and the standard Apple Smart Keyboard is the trackpad. Some people have complained that it's too small, but I've found it to be perfectly usable. In fact, I turned up the tracking speed almost to the top, which has made a huge difference in terms of how responsive it feels. This has really helped me get into a workflow rhythm.

One feature that I do wish was more intuitive is tap-to-click. I know some people love this feature, but I've found it takes a bit of getting used to. However, once you do get the hang of it, it can be a real game-changer. It's just one of those little things that makes you wonder how you ever managed without it.

The pass-through charging port on the left side of the keyboard is another feature that I really appreciate. It's been super convenient to be able to charge my laptop while using the keyboard, and it's opened up a lot of flexibility in terms of where I can place my charger. Sometimes the outlet is over on the other side of my desk, so this extra port has been a real lifesaver.

One thing that I was wondering about when people started talking about the Smart Keyboard Folio was its viewing angle. Some people were saying that it only had 130 degrees of adjustability, which wasn't enough. But for me, this hasn't been an issue at all. In fact, I've found that the viewing angle is more than enough to accommodate my needs.

One use case that I really appreciate about the Smart Keyboard Folio is its ability to be used as a stand when watching videos or playing games. The keyboard can be adjusted to a perfect viewing angle, which has been really convenient for me. It's also great for taking notes or working on documents while watching something.

Finally, one thing that really sets the Smart Keyboard Folio apart from other keyboards is its design. It's truly unique and feels like a floating sculpture on my desk. I love how it looks, and I think it's a big part of what makes this keyboard feel premium. The thought and attention to detail that went into designing this product is really evident.

**Additional Thoughts**

If you own an iPad or are looking to get one soon, be sure to check out Paper-Like 2.0, the new accessory from today's sponsor. It's an amazing tool for anyone who wants to use their Apple Pencil with more precision and control. The paper-like resistance it offers is a game-changer for apps like Apple Notes or Procreate, among many others. Plus, it reduces glare and fingerprints, which is a big plus.

When you place your order, you'll get two Paper-Like 2.0 covers, application accessories, and free worldwide shipping, along with a 100% satisfaction guarantee. You can place your order using the link in the description below.

That's all for this follow-up review of the Apple Smart Keyboard Folio. If you have any questions or comments, be sure to leave them down in the comments below. Don't forget to check out my podcast, Apple Hype Comm, and subscribe to it using the link below. You can also connect with me on Twitter and Instagram, @dailytkk, where I post daily updates and behind-the-scenes content. Thanks for watching, and I'll catch you guys in the next video!

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: entoday's video is sponsored by the new paper-like 2.0 which makes writing or drawing with any Apple pencil on any iPad feel more like paper hey it's Chris and welcome to my thoughts on the iPad pro magic keyboard after about two months now to be honest this isn't gonna be so much of a re review hitting all the same points as it's gonna be just me bringing up some extra talking points and things that I've noticed since I released this original review now here's the funny story I got to share with you guys that happened just this morning and it's related to this keyboard so I'm sitting there I'm putting together my thoughts for an outline for this video and I'm eating a granola bar you guys already know where this is going granola bars have crumbs they just crumble all over the place and as soon as I opened up the wrapper the crumb started pouring out and right onto my magic keyboard and luckily I was able to swipe those crumbs off I don't think any got underneath but that is one thing that I miss about the smart folio keyboards design is that the keys actually hold on I got one right here yeah I miss the keys being sealed with this fabric even though it didn't make for a great typing experience this particular accessory I really like the typing on here but it is susceptible and prone to crumb egde and actually the first thing that went through my head when I saw those crumbs going down there and slow motion was you guys remember Kenan and Kel was like why that's what was going through my head but yeah look here I am about two months later and I'm still using this keyboard it's my go-to for my iPad pro I have never taken this off to try to use anything else this is my preferred typing experience still and I think that says a lot it kind of speaks for itself you really don't even need to listen to the rest of this review if you just want to know is somebody gonna get this love it use it while somebody like me is going to I'm a business type of user I do a lot of typing and so things like email things like messages throughout the day things like just writing opening up I a writer or notes and getting to work I love doing all that with this keyboard like look here's a typical way that I'll use this keyboard I'll open up notes I'll have a note on each side and right here I've got my video pipeline some of the ideas that I'm looking at making a video about and then over here I've got the actual outline for this video that you're watching right here it's like video Inception let's type something I'll show you what I mean hey it's Chris and this is the world's greatest iPad pro typing experience now those are actually true words I'm not just saying that for the video here the switches in the keyboard here now that we're back to the old way of doing things they really are magical compared to the smart folio keyboard that I just showed you now here's the thing and people knew this already I knew it I knew it heading into buying and using this for the very first time it's really annoying to have to take this off set this aside somewhere just to be able to do some hand written notes which is something that I actually do pretty frequently I would say for maybe 80 to 90 percent of the time that I'm using my iPad I'm using it with the keyboard because by default I'm doing those business things that do require typing but there is that 20% where I come in and I want to do handwritten notes and it is a pain to have to take this off and set it to the side you can see it's just sitting there there's no good place and let's be honest you know I'm in a hurry I'm not gonna sit there and fold it up and store it away in the bookshelf or something no most of the time I take it off and it's just sitting there on my desk kind of off to the side sort of in the way it's inconvenient this just isn't the friend of tablet mode and here's the kicker it's worth it to me to put up with that pain point to be able to use this amazing keyboard and also to be honest I rarely rarely if ever use the pencil on the screen like this because it really has nothing to do with whether or not this is stable enough or sturdy enough for me to use the pencil on women's understand like this but it's just because I can't get very precise with my pencil you know like drawing motor sketching mode I need to be precise and I can't really do that with it wobbling around on here you know and while we're at it let me just mention that turning your iPad over while you're using this and using it as a stand like this is not a good tip some people act like that's the greatest iPad 2 of all time it's awkward it's weird wasn't meant for this it's not convenient I'm just really not a fan of this as a mode so really it isn't perfect as a solution for your iPad you have to decide what mode am I gonna use this in the most and if the answer is for a majority of the time you're gonna be in typing mode then maybe having this and having to do this in order to get things usable for some situation then take it off and put over here you know maybe that's worth it but on the other hand if you're an artist and you need to get in here and do some actual drawing but you also do some typing you know maybe it's Reverse for you maybe for 80% of the time you're using this in tablet mode but there's that 20% of the time where you need to use a keyboard what about for those people well for those people I would probably say nah don't do it I would probably go the smart Keyboard folio just for the convenience of being able to flip back and forth into those modes and then you don't need the best typing experience there is for the iPad which is this guy one thing that's been kind of a pain ever since I got this was that it wasn't easy to access voice dictation so you know that little microphone button on your soft keyboard and you can talk and it will type for you on the screen that is something to use all the time at least on my iPhone and I would like to use it more on my iPad it's just until today actually I didn't have a good way to do that because once you get this keyboard connected well where's that microphone button to activate voice dictation so I reached out on Twitter and somebody actually told me that if I come in here and put it into typing mode and then see this arrow down here if I long press on that it'll bring the soft keyboard up and then I can click here and it will actually activate voice dictation which is pretty usable I mean yeah I can do that but it's 2 taps away and it's just not as intuitive as if there was actually a key down here and why you can't remap a lot of these keys in the settings there's no way to actually remap one of them to enable voice dictation now in a recent video I covered the new scribble feature in my iPad OS 14 walkthrough video and honestly after using that for a little bit and right now it's installed on my other iPad pro it's not on this one so I can't show you right now but after using it I feel like I want to use it more and so to have to take this off just to enable the scribble functionality yeah it's just it's imperfect now in terms of durability this thing is held up really I mean there's obvious signs on the trackpad and on the spacebar of being used you know you can tell for sure which hand I use the spacebar with the most there's a few little scrapes and scratches but honestly I don't even know if they'll show up on the camera this material is actually pretty durable and a lot of people and their initial reviews are saying this is so sharp around the edges and that hasn't been a problem for me at all it's never sliced me or even come close it's never even been something that have been like oh that's annoying then it's that sharp because it's not a big deal at all and speaking of things that aren't a big deal at all the weight hasn't been a big deal at all that's another thing everyone was griping about when the first wave of reviews hit people were like oh it's so heavy how am I even gonna live with that well I've been taking it with me all over the place everywhere I go but yeah it's significantly hefty there's definitely some added weight here especially compared to the smart Keyboard folio it's just I don't care I like the typing experience so much it just doesn't bother me and that's the thing really if you want a feature bad enough then you'll put up with a few other inconveniences I feel like that's kind of the theme of this review the typing experience is so amazing but there's no real function keys but I put up with it the typing experience is so great but it's heavy but I'm willing to put up with it and then just a word about the battery life because obviously if you're using this keyboard with its backlit keys yeah it's gonna use more battery than the smart key portfolio which didn't have backlighting but the battery life's been great for me like honestly it hasn't been a problem if I use it a lot which is almost daily I do end up charging it probably every other day usually gets down into 17% it's like okay I need to charge it overnight or something but I haven't experienced that crazy battery drain issue that some small amount of users were experiencing where you're not even using it and you open it back up and it's almost dead I haven't had that and hey look at this I just opened up Twitter just to see what was going on and shout out to Marco's Malaga for creating an apple hype shortcut maybe you should steal that from it I'm gonna give that a retweet so if you're following on Twitter you'll be able to find it and since I mentioned it when I was talking about the battery let me just mention that the backlighting has been really nice because there are times when I'm using it at night and it's dark and this is just night and day difference versus the smart Keyboard folio in terms of usability when it's not being used just right in the middle of the day so what about the trackpad a lot of people were complaining that it was too small too small to be usable and for me that hasn't been the case at all I think I mentioned in the first video that I turned the tracking speed up almost near the top and made a little bit speedier that made a huge difference in terms of how usable it's actually been so I really have no complaints there and even though I really do like the sound of the click let me see if I can get up to the mic for you guys I actually did go back and turn on tap to click I don't know there's something about it I just like it helps me flow through my workflow just a little bit faster it just seems a little more intuitive but that's a personal preference this pass-through charging port over here on the left side of the keyboard that's been awesome and obviously the best use for it is just to free up your other port over here so you can actually use like an external hard drive or something like that but I'm actually liked it because it's opened up some flexibility and this isn't a huge feature in terms of what side I can charge from because sometimes the outlet is way over here and the cord doesn't really stretch all the way over here depending on where you are like in a certain chair or something and then you have to kind of move it over here in it's awkward but now it's like whatever is more convenient to charge you just have that extra space and option which has been pretty convenient one thing you might be wondering about is after having lived with it for several weeks what about the viewing angle is 130 degrees actually enough and to be honest after all the hype died down when people were talking about it I just forgot about it and started using it and I never had a reason to actually complain about this angle and also if you've been wondering if when it's extended to 130 degrees if your fingers are gonna hit up here when you're typing well the answer for me there has also been no I've never hit my fingers there I will say one of my favorite uses for this keyboard stand combo is to use it as a stand when I'm watching some content so when we throw on Hulu or Netflix or YouTube this is so adjustable that it's just really convenient you know because on the smart Keyboard folio that only had those two angles and really neither of them was perfect for much of anything so just being able to adjust this however I want has been good not only for when I'm working but for when I'm relaxing and I want to actually watch something as well or for gaming for that matter but one thing you can't argue about with this is just how good it looks I said before it was sort of like a floating sculpture on the desk it really does feel like that there's a lot of thought put into this it's unique and you don't see any other products out there you know the Microsoft Surface line they've been doing some interesting things from a hardware perspective but you don't see anything else like this and that design aspect is something that I really appreciate I like to be around great designs one of the reasons I like Apple products in the first place if you own an iPad or you're looking to get one soon then check out today's sponsor paper-like now in the second version which is an accessory that makes it feel and sound more like you're using real paper when you're working with an Apple pencil one of my favorite things about the new paper like is that it's much clearer to watch movies or view content through it when you're not writing or drawing paper like actually gives you more control with your Apple pencil thanks to that paper like resistance that it offers and yes it really makes a difference plus it reduces glare and fingerprints which who doesn't want that paper likes great for anyone who wants to use apps like Apple notes or notability or procreate or affinity photo among many others when you place an order you're gonna get two paper light covers plus application accessories along with free worldwide shipping and a 100% satisfaction guarantee you can place a paper like 2.0 order using a link down in the description all right so I think it's gonna wrap it up for this video this follow-up if you have any questions let me know down in the comments I'll try to get those answered as always don't forget to check out Apple hype comm and you can also catch up with me on the after party that's the podcast every Friday you can subscribe using the link down below and you should connect with me on Twitter and Instagram it's daily tag spelled daily tkk in both of those places and I'll catch you guys in the next video latertoday's video is sponsored by the new paper-like 2.0 which makes writing or drawing with any Apple pencil on any iPad feel more like paper hey it's Chris and welcome to my thoughts on the iPad pro magic keyboard after about two months now to be honest this isn't gonna be so much of a re review hitting all the same points as it's gonna be just me bringing up some extra talking points and things that I've noticed since I released this original review now here's the funny story I got to share with you guys that happened just this morning and it's related to this keyboard so I'm sitting there I'm putting together my thoughts for an outline for this video and I'm eating a granola bar you guys already know where this is going granola bars have crumbs they just crumble all over the place and as soon as I opened up the wrapper the crumb started pouring out and right onto my magic keyboard and luckily I was able to swipe those crumbs off I don't think any got underneath but that is one thing that I miss about the smart folio keyboards design is that the keys actually hold on I got one right here yeah I miss the keys being sealed with this fabric even though it didn't make for a great typing experience this particular accessory I really like the typing on here but it is susceptible and prone to crumb egde and actually the first thing that went through my head when I saw those crumbs going down there and slow motion was you guys remember Kenan and Kel was like why that's what was going through my head but yeah look here I am about two months later and I'm still using this keyboard it's my go-to for my iPad pro I have never taken this off to try to use anything else this is my preferred typing experience still and I think that says a lot it kind of speaks for itself you really don't even need to listen to the rest of this review if you just want to know is somebody gonna get this love it use it while somebody like me is going to I'm a business type of user I do a lot of typing and so things like email things like messages throughout the day things like just writing opening up I a writer or notes and getting to work I love doing all that with this keyboard like look here's a typical way that I'll use this keyboard I'll open up notes I'll have a note on each side and right here I've got my video pipeline some of the ideas that I'm looking at making a video about and then over here I've got the actual outline for this video that you're watching right here it's like video Inception let's type something I'll show you what I mean hey it's Chris and this is the world's greatest iPad pro typing experience now those are actually true words I'm not just saying that for the video here the switches in the keyboard here now that we're back to the old way of doing things they really are magical compared to the smart folio keyboard that I just showed you now here's the thing and people knew this already I knew it I knew it heading into buying and using this for the very first time it's really annoying to have to take this off set this aside somewhere just to be able to do some hand written notes which is something that I actually do pretty frequently I would say for maybe 80 to 90 percent of the time that I'm using my iPad I'm using it with the keyboard because by default I'm doing those business things that do require typing but there is that 20% where I come in and I want to do handwritten notes and it is a pain to have to take this off and set it to the side you can see it's just sitting there there's no good place and let's be honest you know I'm in a hurry I'm not gonna sit there and fold it up and store it away in the bookshelf or something no most of the time I take it off and it's just sitting there on my desk kind of off to the side sort of in the way it's inconvenient this just isn't the friend of tablet mode and here's the kicker it's worth it to me to put up with that pain point to be able to use this amazing keyboard and also to be honest I rarely rarely if ever use the pencil on the screen like this because it really has nothing to do with whether or not this is stable enough or sturdy enough for me to use the pencil on women's understand like this but it's just because I can't get very precise with my pencil you know like drawing motor sketching mode I need to be precise and I can't really do that with it wobbling around on here you know and while we're at it let me just mention that turning your iPad over while you're using this and using it as a stand like this is not a good tip some people act like that's the greatest iPad 2 of all time it's awkward it's weird wasn't meant for this it's not convenient I'm just really not a fan of this as a mode so really it isn't perfect as a solution for your iPad you have to decide what mode am I gonna use this in the most and if the answer is for a majority of the time you're gonna be in typing mode then maybe having this and having to do this in order to get things usable for some situation then take it off and put over here you know maybe that's worth it but on the other hand if you're an artist and you need to get in here and do some actual drawing but you also do some typing you know maybe it's Reverse for you maybe for 80% of the time you're using this in tablet mode but there's that 20% of the time where you need to use a keyboard what about for those people well for those people I would probably say nah don't do it I would probably go the smart Keyboard folio just for the convenience of being able to flip back and forth into those modes and then you don't need the best typing experience there is for the iPad which is this guy one thing that's been kind of a pain ever since I got this was that it wasn't easy to access voice dictation so you know that little microphone button on your soft keyboard and you can talk and it will type for you on the screen that is something to use all the time at least on my iPhone and I would like to use it more on my iPad it's just until today actually I didn't have a good way to do that because once you get this keyboard connected well where's that microphone button to activate voice dictation so I reached out on Twitter and somebody actually told me that if I come in here and put it into typing mode and then see this arrow down here if I long press on that it'll bring the soft keyboard up and then I can click here and it will actually activate voice dictation which is pretty usable I mean yeah I can do that but it's 2 taps away and it's just not as intuitive as if there was actually a key down here and why you can't remap a lot of these keys in the settings there's no way to actually remap one of them to enable voice dictation now in a recent video I covered the new scribble feature in my iPad OS 14 walkthrough video and honestly after using that for a little bit and right now it's installed on my other iPad pro it's not on this one so I can't show you right now but after using it I feel like I want to use it more and so to have to take this off just to enable the scribble functionality yeah it's just it's imperfect now in terms of durability this thing is held up really I mean there's obvious signs on the trackpad and on the spacebar of being used you know you can tell for sure which hand I use the spacebar with the most there's a few little scrapes and scratches but honestly I don't even know if they'll show up on the camera this material is actually pretty durable and a lot of people and their initial reviews are saying this is so sharp around the edges and that hasn't been a problem for me at all it's never sliced me or even come close it's never even been something that have been like oh that's annoying then it's that sharp because it's not a big deal at all and speaking of things that aren't a big deal at all the weight hasn't been a big deal at all that's another thing everyone was griping about when the first wave of reviews hit people were like oh it's so heavy how am I even gonna live with that well I've been taking it with me all over the place everywhere I go but yeah it's significantly hefty there's definitely some added weight here especially compared to the smart Keyboard folio it's just I don't care I like the typing experience so much it just doesn't bother me and that's the thing really if you want a feature bad enough then you'll put up with a few other inconveniences I feel like that's kind of the theme of this review the typing experience is so amazing but there's no real function keys but I put up with it the typing experience is so great but it's heavy but I'm willing to put up with it and then just a word about the battery life because obviously if you're using this keyboard with its backlit keys yeah it's gonna use more battery than the smart key portfolio which didn't have backlighting but the battery life's been great for me like honestly it hasn't been a problem if I use it a lot which is almost daily I do end up charging it probably every other day usually gets down into 17% it's like okay I need to charge it overnight or something but I haven't experienced that crazy battery drain issue that some small amount of users were experiencing where you're not even using it and you open it back up and it's almost dead I haven't had that and hey look at this I just opened up Twitter just to see what was going on and shout out to Marco's Malaga for creating an apple hype shortcut maybe you should steal that from it I'm gonna give that a retweet so if you're following on Twitter you'll be able to find it and since I mentioned it when I was talking about the battery let me just mention that the backlighting has been really nice because there are times when I'm using it at night and it's dark and this is just night and day difference versus the smart Keyboard folio in terms of usability when it's not being used just right in the middle of the day so what about the trackpad a lot of people were complaining that it was too small too small to be usable and for me that hasn't been the case at all I think I mentioned in the first video that I turned the tracking speed up almost near the top and made a little bit speedier that made a huge difference in terms of how usable it's actually been so I really have no complaints there and even though I really do like the sound of the click let me see if I can get up to the mic for you guys I actually did go back and turn on tap to click I don't know there's something about it I just like it helps me flow through my workflow just a little bit faster it just seems a little more intuitive but that's a personal preference this pass-through charging port over here on the left side of the keyboard that's been awesome and obviously the best use for it is just to free up your other port over here so you can actually use like an external hard drive or something like that but I'm actually liked it because it's opened up some flexibility and this isn't a huge feature in terms of what side I can charge from because sometimes the outlet is way over here and the cord doesn't really stretch all the way over here depending on where you are like in a certain chair or something and then you have to kind of move it over here in it's awkward but now it's like whatever is more convenient to charge you just have that extra space and option which has been pretty convenient one thing you might be wondering about is after having lived with it for several weeks what about the viewing angle is 130 degrees actually enough and to be honest after all the hype died down when people were talking about it I just forgot about it and started using it and I never had a reason to actually complain about this angle and also if you've been wondering if when it's extended to 130 degrees if your fingers are gonna hit up here when you're typing well the answer for me there has also been no I've never hit my fingers there I will say one of my favorite uses for this keyboard stand combo is to use it as a stand when I'm watching some content so when we throw on Hulu or Netflix or YouTube this is so adjustable that it's just really convenient you know because on the smart Keyboard folio that only had those two angles and really neither of them was perfect for much of anything so just being able to adjust this however I want has been good not only for when I'm working but for when I'm relaxing and I want to actually watch something as well or for gaming for that matter but one thing you can't argue about with this is just how good it looks I said before it was sort of like a floating sculpture on the desk it really does feel like that there's a lot of thought put into this it's unique and you don't see any other products out there you know the Microsoft Surface line they've been doing some interesting things from a hardware perspective but you don't see anything else like this and that design aspect is something that I really appreciate I like to be around great designs one of the reasons I like Apple products in the first place if you own an iPad or you're looking to get one soon then check out today's sponsor paper-like now in the second version which is an accessory that makes it feel and sound more like you're using real paper when you're working with an Apple pencil one of my favorite things about the new paper like is that it's much clearer to watch movies or view content through it when you're not writing or drawing paper like actually gives you more control with your Apple pencil thanks to that paper like resistance that it offers and yes it really makes a difference plus it reduces glare and fingerprints which who doesn't want that paper likes great for anyone who wants to use apps like Apple notes or notability or procreate or affinity photo among many others when you place an order you're gonna get two paper light covers plus application accessories along with free worldwide shipping and a 100% satisfaction guarantee you can place a paper like 2.0 order using a link down in the description all right so I think it's gonna wrap it up for this video this follow-up if you have any questions let me know down in the comments I'll try to get those answered as always don't forget to check out Apple hype comm and you can also catch up with me on the after party that's the podcast every Friday you can subscribe using the link down below and you should connect with me on Twitter and Instagram it's daily tag spelled daily tkk in both of those places and I'll catch you guys in the next video later\n"