backup ipad to external thumb drive and restore a different ipad

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backup ipad to external thumb drive and restore a different ipad

A good friend of mine is going to a remote place with his family. I introduced them to iPads and everyone in the family has at least one now, some have 2. He’s going to the remote place for 6-8 months, no internet avail. He’s wondering if there’s a way to clone an iPad to an external thumbdrive and then restore from the drive. His plan is to take 2 spare ipads and if someone in the family has an ipad that gets damaged or dies, restore it to one of the spares. He’s very worried about family entertainment w/o internet and the loss of an an iPad could be rough. He’s NOT an expert or even proficient w. iPads technically, so the simpler the better. Since I’m the ipadpusher (lol) I’ll help him before he leaves. Thanks in advance.

iPad Pro, iPadOS 16

Posted on Nov 17, 2024 5:00 PM

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Answer 1

Nov 17, 2024 5:23 PM in response to unxrules

You cannot backup an iPad directly to a thumb drive.

You can backup to a computer, Mac or PC, and then copy the backup to a thumb drive, but you would then need a computer to restore that backup onto the new iPad.

With that said, without internet, the iPads will be limited to whatever is downloaded onto them prior to losing internet access and would be pretty hard to download 6 to 8 months of content on them.

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