With such a competitive environment, you'll find that iPad apps are updated much more often than their PC or Mac counterparts; this is in part due to the tight integration with a rating system on the App Store, which allows everyone to immediately detect problems other users have faced. For that reason alone, bugs tend to be fixed extremely quickly! A previous tutorial explained how to check for updates on your iPad; when you don't get that information, you will want to see when an app was last updated, and we'll show you how to do just that.
See when the last updates were released for an iPad app
Follow these steps to check the latest upgrade date for an app:
- First, click on the Home button on your iPad to see your Home screens; then, flick through them until you see the "App Store" icon, and tap on it.
- Tap inside the search field in the top right corner of the screen, and start typing the name of the app in question; you should not have to finish typing its name before you see it suggested as match by the App Store - tap on it inside the AutoComplete dropdown menu.
- Once you are on the application's "homepage" in the App Store or iTunes Store, depending on whether you are checking for the latest release from your iPad itself, or from a computer (in which case you'll use iTunes to browse the store and find apps).
- On the iPad app page, there are two places that will typically give you date at which the application was last updated (in other words, the date of the latest release).
- The first is on the left hand side of the screen, right below the app icon: you will find a "Category" information, and right below it, an "Updated" date follows.
- You will also typically find a timestamped listing of updates, and their detailed description, appear on the right side of the screen (and you can expand to open and see the full list of updates and releases, with dates, by clicking on the "More" button you'll find when there is more content to list than available space. (And both dates should match, as long as there are "release notes" for the latest version of the app on the right.)
If you want to confirm this information or find out more about the release cycle, click on the "Developer Page" link that is normally displayed in the top right corner of the screen, on the app page inside the App Store. Many iPad developers maintain blogs that allow you to stay abreast of the latest developments and details on future releases of that app!