by Jason Snell
Behold, the majesty of HBO Max in full-screen mode on an M1 Mac
Keying off of the release of macOS Big Sur 11.1 Monday, Joe Rossignol at MacRumors wrote:
Another notable change mentioned in the update’s release notes is the ability for iPhone and iPad apps with non-resizable windows to enter full-screen mode on Macs with the M1 chip, which is particularly useful for video apps like HBO Max. macOS 11.1 also allows iPhone and iPad app windows to be switched between landscape and portrait orientations.
True story. macOS 11.1 does finally allow apps like HBO Max to go to full-screen, eliminating a major limitation.
Except…
The result is a “full screen” app that’s locked to the iPad’s 4:3 display orientation, meaning that while you can make the video playback bigger, it’s still going to be pillarboxed inside an old-school non-widescreen aspect ratio.
I know, I know, one step at a time. And at least HBO Max offers an app on the Mac, unlike most video streaming services out there.