The important thing about the M1 iPad is that it’s the first time iOS is running on M1, and therefore M1 is the first chip that can rup both iOS and OSX.

The obvious next step is for Apple to do a Samsung, and have iOS and OSX running on the same device, with iOS running when the device is in portable mode, and OSX running when it is docked and connected to a KVM.

At some point there won’t be a separate Mac and iDevice line. All devices will be iDevices that can run both iOS and OSX.

Apple has clearly been pushing for this for a long time. They’ve taken so many steps towards making the transition when a user switched from 1 OS to another seamless, with technologies like iCloud Drive that provides a single file system layer, universal apps that work across OS’es, handoff that allows for a smooth transition of state for an app running on OSX to the same app running on iOS and vice versa, etc.