In some situations, some people prefer a drawing tablet pen to behave more like a mouse.
For this reason, drawing tablet drivers offer mouse mode.
Drawing tablets are absolute positioning devices. Enabling mouse mode makes them behave like a relative positioning device, like a mouse.
Learn more here: Absolute versus relative positioning
Mouse mode is implemented in the tablet driver. It has no effect on the tablet hardware.
The tablet continues to use absolute positioning internally.
The driver takes the absolute positioning information it receives from the tablet and translates it into relative positioning data before sending it to the operating system.
In theory, it should not affect drawing quality.
In practice, it depends on what the driver is doing exactly.
Here's an example of the Wacom driver vs Huion driver in Krita on Windows.
As you can see, the Wacom driver creates very jerky position data when mouse mode is enabled. It does not have to be like this. It could behave more like Huion's implementation.
Also, this difference is not due to hardware. I tested the same Wacom tablet with OpenTabletDriver set to mouse mode too. OTD calls this "Relative mode," and the lines were smooth.
This section is incomplete
XP-Pen (ver 3.4.7): Enabling Mouse Mode loses pressure sensitivity on Windows
Wacom: TBD
Huion: TBD
On Windows, mouse mode in some drivers may disable Windows Ink.
You may need to restart a drawing application if you change the mouse mode setting.
In the Wacom Tablet Properties app, select your pen, open the Mapping tab, and then switch the Mode setting between Pen and Mouse.
Once you enable mouse mode, you'll see some new configuration options.
In the Huion driver, click Digital Pen, then enable or disable Mouse Mode at the bottom.
Some drawing applications may get confused if they are running while mouse mode is switched on or off. So you may need to restart them.
Most often, tablet drivers do not offer a mouse mode option for a pen display.
There is no technical limitation. In theory, pen displays could support mouse mode just as well as pen tablets. It is usually not offered because most users would be confused by the mismatch between the mouse pointer on the screen and the physical position of the pen tip.
Nonetheless, some people do want mouse mode for their pen displays. If you really want it, consider using OpenTabletDriver instead of your manufacturer's driver.
More here: OpenTabletDriver
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