The previous tutorial explained how to check for updates on your iPad; briefly, once you locate the "App Store" icon on one of your Home screens, tap on it to load the application, and tap on the "Updates" button in the bottom right of the screen. From there, you'll see a listing of all available updates for your apps. In this tutorial, we will show you the options at your disposal when it comes to downloading and installing these updates on your iPad. Just because an update is made available doesn't mean that you have to install it; in fact, if you are using a mission-critical app, it may be wise to wait and see how others' experience fares with that latest upgrade before installing it yourself. (Exception being of course a highly sensitive security update, which you should install right away!)
Select the updates to download and install on your iPad
There are several ways to install updates for your iPad apps: (assuming you already loaded the Updates screen of the App Store)
- First, scroll through the entire list of updates to see what they are - not necessarily reading the entire description of each update, but at least see which applications have available updates.
Also, keep in mind that while app updates are nearly always free, you may have to pay for some; if the word "FREE" is displayed inside the description box, that particular upgrade is free to download and apply. - If you decide that you want to apply all these patches, the easiest way to proceed is to tap on the "Update All" button displayed in the top right corner of the Updates screen.
- Your iPad will then display the "iTunes Password" prompt, for your own protection; type the password, and tap on the OK button to download and install these updates.
- If you only want to download and install individual updates, just tap once on the word "FREE" (or a price, if the upgrade isn't free), and then tap on the word "Install" that appears in its place. If this is the first update you are trying to download in this session, you will receive the "iTunes Password" prompt to prevent someone else from downloading and installing updates for your iPad apps: enter your password and tap "OK".
- Your iPad will now close the App Store and start downloading and installing all updates. While you can use other apps at the same time, it may be a good idea to wait until all updates have been installed before resuming using your iPad. You can tell when an update is being downloaded and installed by looking at the app's icon: it displays a progress bar inside it, and a label that says either "Downloading" or "Installing" - when the update is complete, the label reverts to showing the application's name.
And this is how you download and install updates for the applications you have on your iPad.