When iOS 18 launched last fall, we were treated to a brand new Calculator app. It has some cool features, including Math Notes, which lets you jot down calculations to solve, and Unit Conversions, which converts things like currency and weight without accessing Safari. It even came to iPad for the first time, with a full feature set and an all-new, unified interface across all platforms.
But one of the most useful features of the old iOS calculator app hasn’t made it to the new iOS 18 version: repeat operations. On the old calculator, like most calculators, you could do one operation, say 2 × 2, and press the equals sign to get 4. Then, if you pressed the equals sign again, the last operation (x2 ) would be repeated. and you would get 8. Then again to get 16, and so on.
This was a useful way to calculate compound interest or a long series of repetitive additions, but for some reason Apple removed it in iOS 18 and macOS 15. Maybe you didn’t notice, but many users did and expressed frustration that in recent months it had disappeared.
In the beta versions of iOS/iPadOS 18.3 and macOS 15.3, the feature is back and you can again mash the equals key over and over again and repeat the last operation as you wish. Apple is expected to release the new updates in late January or early February, so you won’t have too long to wait.
