Starting today, iPads run something called “iPadOS” rather than iOS, but the change has more to do with branding than functionality. Apple’s tablets might get a few more keyboard shortcuts and some multitasking features; maybe they’ll diverge more in the future. But for right now, iPadOS is still fundamentally iOS.
That means, as with iOS, Apple is in total control of what hardware can run the new operating system (unlike the Mac, where you can occasionally get around Apple’s restrictions and run new software on unsupported Macs or hardware that isn’t Apple’s at all).
