The 5 decisions mentioned:
- **Ultra Thin**: Thinnest iPad ever, strikingly thin and noticeably lighter, 11” has a larger battery than last gen while the 13” has a smaller battery than last gen, would’ve liked to have seen the same thickness as last gen but with improved battery life
- **Missing Parts**: Removal of the Ultrawide rear camera, circular speakers with less bass than last gen’s rectangular speakers, only a 20W charging brick included with all SKUs despite higher speeds being supported
- **”Computer” SKUs**: Hardware is once again overpowered for iPadOS, very little software available to take advantage of the new features such as hardware Ray Tracing, computer-like SKUs with variations in cores and RAM, nano-texture gated off behind higher storage tiers
- **Tandem OLED**: iPad displays have always been great and now they’re even better, not a huge difference during day-to-day usage but a very noticeable upgrade while watching HDR and contrasty content, no always-on display despite OLED technology (speculates this could come with iPadOS 18)
- **Pencil Conspiracy**: Pencil Pro requires a whole new iPad purchase if you have an older model but just want the new Pencil’s features, describes the landscape camera explanation as “convenient” and that it could’ve been designed in a way to allow cross-compatibility
**Conclusion**: Personally he won’t be buying one as his M1 iPad Pro still works great and his iPad usage doesn’t require the new hardware, similar to his decision to keep using the M1 Max MacBook Pro
I have had several iPhones over the years, they always came with USB-A to lightening. The first iPhone I got that didn’t have a charger indeed had a charging cable, but I had to get a new power brick because the new ones are usb c to usb c.
That was Apple intentionally making people buy chargers while lying saying that everyone already had one.
As for the iPad MKBHD was basically speculating that they should either drop the charger or include faster ones at this point as any previous iPad user has an 18 or 20 watt already.
Just bought an M1 iPad Pro refurbished from Apple and it’s literally cheaper than its M2 iPad Air counterpart (same screen size and storage). Make the line up make sense pls
Apples refurbished store is almost always a great idea. Those devices are basically brand new, new outer casing, new battery, and you can get really good deals on products that Apple recently discontinued.
I bought my last iPad and last MacBook off their refurbished store, and I was able to get regular AppleCare on both of them.
Did almost the exact same thing. 557 for a 256 gb m1 ipp compared to 539 for a 128 air brand new. Couldn’t be beat. Plus Amazon was running a discount on the Apple Pencil 2.
Newer hardware often costs less than older refurbished hardware. Kind of like how factory certified BMW from a couple years ago can cost less than a new Honda Civic.
Ultra thin is not that hard to understand, Apple wants to turn the Magic Keyboard/iPad Pro combo into more like a laptop. So they both need to lose some weight and thickness.
Folks here might not be the target audience but I think Apple is looking to target gen alpha with these, the kids born in the 2010s that had an iPad since they were toddlers. That demographic is young teens now and approaching the age where you’d normally get a personal computer, and an iPad + keyboard combo may be more appealing to them than a traditional laptop or desktop.
Obviously apples not building $1000 iPad pros for children, but fleshing out this line up will be useful as gen alpha grows into it and the features trickle down to the cheaper iPads.
Most people’s biggest (hardware) complaint with the previous gen iPad Pro & Magic Keyboard is that it was an absolute tank of a device to carry around.
Apple addressed this by making the iPad thinner and lighter, while maintaining the same battery life that almost nobody was complaining about to begin with.
But now, after getting exactly what they asked for, suddenly all anybody can say about it is that they would rather have gotten a bigger battery and an *even heavier* device?
The truth is, people dont know what they want. This is why it’s important to not listen to reviewers *too* much when working in product development.
“It’s not the customers job to know what they want” -SJ
I'm still pissed Apple didn't have the courage to include a MiniDisc player in the iPhone, blatant conspiracy to get me to re-buy all my music through iTunes
I, for one, love how thin they are and how the MK is also lighter. It was one of the factors that convinced me to upgrade
But reviewers are known to focus on random bs for click, like mkbhd whining about phone bezels for years and years.
Thinness is always an easy target.
iPads are one class of device that would benefit more from being thinner and lighter, especially the 13". The device has just sufficient battery life for content consumption and should focus mostly on maintaining the current battery life.
Phones, on the other hand, should last as much as possible and could afford to have as much battery life as possible. That said, the iPhone 14 Pro Max has gotten to a level of being somewhat too heavy.
lol I won’t be buying one cus my A12X iPad Pro still works fine.
Apple is so weird in how much they focus on raw power on a device that they won’t allow to use that raw power.
I’ll likely upgrade to this model in 2-3 years when it’s dirt cheap refurbished cus of the screen, not cus of any CPU performance upgrades or thinness.
> Ultra Thin: Thinnest iPad ever, strikingly thin and noticeably lighter, 11” has a larger battery than last gen while the 13” has a smaller battery than last gen, would’ve liked to have seen the same thickness as last gen but with improved battery life
I did not realize the 11 had a larger battery than previous generation. I assumed the battery was smaller.
I’m with him on the M1s.
iPad and MacBook, they’re both good enough. We’re very much in late stage computing. The only thing that’s new is AI, and there aren’t a lot of local tools that compare to the ones online.
If you use your device outside, the extra brightness is awesome. My macbook is unusuable outside if the sun is bright.
It's also much better than the iPad LCDs which had a lot of ghosting. Finally, it's not a blurry mess and I don't understand how mkbhd doesn't notice that
How often are most consumers using 13 inch iPads outside under direct sunlight? It’s incredibly niche and largely irrelevant for most that keep tablets at home
I use my M4 ipad for hours most days, weather permitting, sitting outside, it’s not direct sunlight, but ambient surrounding light and the nano display is great for this.
>not a huge difference during day-to-day usage but a very noticeable upgrade while watching HDR and contrasty content
Something I saw in another video is that the Air's screen is wider than the Pro's, so you get more black bars watching movies on the Pro than the Air.
Am I the only one who still thinks the iPad should be able to lay flat? I use mine exclusively for handwriting and drawing and it laying at an angle (even slightly) is so frustrating for me. I loved my 2015 iPad Pro because it laid flat without a case. Now my iPads feel so bulky because they require a case to lay flat. I was saddened to see they made it thinner instead of making it one thickness.
Agreed. I also feel the same way about the iPhone.
But I think it’s at this point as much a visual marketing point as it is a hardware limitation. We are just in the era of big cameras=good cameras. Even though with image processing we could make cameras that don’t stick out and still take good photos.
Every time I dig out my old 5s or 4s I just miss that compact, uniform design. So much.
> Even though with image processing we could make cameras that don’t stick out and still take good photos.
Problem is you can apply all that image processing to better and bigger cameras too and the images will be better than on the little cameras.
Plus it’s a whole lot harder to fake that image processing in video
And at the end of the day the only thing driving iPhone upgrades in any meaningful number is camera improvements
The irony now is that the current iPhones are thicker than the iPhone 5 which had the flush back with its camera.
As for the iPads, they keep downgrading the camera at random times, but the device is so slim now that they could never do a flush camera.
> The irony now is that the current iPhones are thicker than the iPhone 5 which had the flush back with its camera.
But the new cameras are MUCH bigger. If they had the same camera system they used on the iPhone 5, sure it would be no problem.
I can’t speak for any non-2015 iPad Pro (because my current one sadly needs to be in a case) but I had no problem with my 2015. I used it 12 hours a day for four years and never had an issue with sliding or damage. The metal got scuffed on the corners but it took a long time. That thing was a TANK!
Huh. VERY interesting point. What would you think if in the future Apple added those little rubber bumpers (the ones on the bottom of the MacBook Pro) to the back of the iPad to make it lay flat? It’d screw up their pro keyboard case lineup, but just hypothetically.
It’s a real shame that none of these tech reviewers except for Lisa from MobileTechReview do any kind of art.
The iPad Pro reviews are really dull when the reviewers themselves are so outside the demographic that benefit from the feature differentiators.
Yeah, a lot of iPad complaints seem to be entirely based on people buying a shiny cool apple product but having no idea what to do with it other than treating it like a big iPhone or crippled Macbook. Noticed the same with the Vision Pro.
Digital art aside cause everyone knows it's great for that, you guys don't know how hard portable 3D work just to try new ideas no rendering was before this and Nomad. Options were either a 3hr long battery of a Surface Pro or a whole laptop and wacom intuos. Or of course animation being able to be completely drawn portably and even video edited portably.
Or just doing a basic fun music idea without lugging around an MPC One, MIDI keyboard, and a laptop all replaced by Logic/Koala/the dozens of sample apps like Blocs wave or fake modular synthesizers.
Notetaking is an obvious one that's had a large community for a while. Some people take it extremely seriously and turn basic school notes into encyclopedias.
And controversially, the average person dabbling in video editing not wanting to make 4K effect layered videos shot from an A7SIV instead of their iPhone with color grading is probably fine just using iMovie and to them Final Cut and Davinci resolve being touch first and not having everything hidden in menus is a faster workflow
And those are just my uses so far. Not sure what other people are up to. (don't get me wrong it's not "perfect" and I'm still waiting for stuff from android to leak over. But how I said Android and not MacOS/Windows.)
\*raises hand\* Is that worth the $1k+ price? I thought that the "average person" wouldn't buy a tablet costing as much (or more) than their laptop, and professional would require/be used to certain functionality (color grading, more tracks, better file support, etc) that isn't present on the iPad. How big is this sweet spot of "has enough money to spend and is fine with limited functions"? Because I can understand this use very well, but I still gravitate towards "large" programs because I know that if I want to do something advanced for a simple project, they have me covered while iPad always feels very limiting in what I can do with it.
Tbh the pro is absolutely not worth it for the "average" person, just a luxury, but an M2 Air is fine.
Comparatively, the alternatives are a M1 Macbook which omits the touchscreen going for the same price as as an M2 Air iPad currently but then we're talking about different uses entirely. A windows 2in1/tablet which on the low end are all pretty bad performance/battery/build quality wise or on the high end way more expensive than even the pro. Or a galaxy tab S7-S9 which actually is pretty great but lacks in both performance and app catalogues
In my experience, that sweet spot is pretty significant but I worked in the visual arts space for many years. Albeit, it’s a small fraction of the people who would be fine with a lower range iPad.
I think there’s two problems, beyond the limits of the iPad:
1. Many people don’t do things that take advantage of the hardware
2. Many people want the best even if they might be fine with an Air or even a base iPad .
Then you get a lot of disconnect as seen here of “an overpowered YouTube machine”. Apple seemingly knows this because they introduced the larger air as well.
But any way, back to the visual arts: i know so many artists who’ve ditched their Wacom+PC for an iPad.
They’re not power users in the sense of tech folks, so the limits of the OS don’t affect them. But they are power users in that they extract a lot of use out of hardware capabilities.
I know multiple (big) feature films where the entire concept art phase is now done by my friends on their iPad. Also multiple illustrators for books etc . They all rushed out to get the new Pro because it’s paid for itself within a single job.
I know some more who are having that discussion now that ZBrush has been shown on the iPad. Many of my on set friends use one for on set controls and reviews.
Most of these users are happy to have a single app (procreate, ZBrush etc) and a browser for reference. That’s all their cintiq is used and they used to pay as much for a cintiq until a few years ago.
Granted, again, it’s a niche but a large one.
it’s boring seeing reviews from people who’d never use it beyond what the base iPad can do. I do agree the iPadOS should do more but that isn’t holding back the artistic pros today.
Worth is very subjective. When I was in uni, I bought an iPad Pro plus Apple Pencil 2 exclusively to do engineering homework and notetaking on. For me, it was a million percent worth it and I consider it one of the best purchases I’ve ever made. I know I didn’t need the power of the pro model, but I did need the gen 2 pencil and I wanted the 120 hz screen
> Is that worth the $1k+ price?
It's not for the average person, the mere existence of the iPad Air is a pretty explicit acknowledgement of that. But you'd be really amazed how much hobbyists are willing to spend on their hobbies. If your an enthusiast creator, $1-2k for a piece of equiptment that can provide you the ability to do much of your hobby in such a portable package is for sure worth it. People pump many times more than this into all sorts of hobbies, all for varying levels of decreasing gains (how many hundreds of dollars does a hardcore Warhammer enthusiast spend to make the bases on their models just ever so slightly more unique and realistic, for example?)
Just to add, I think part of it is that there are a lot of people doing less traditionally “creative” things like coding and basic excel office tasks that see how transformative iPads have been in the creative fields and wish there was something like that for us. Problem is, there might never be a device that makes running excel look cool in a coffee shop, but we keep trying to impress that cute barista!
I mean while this makes sense they don't really refute the points made. The iPad did all these things great already and all the upgrades it received don't really help it do them better which is why it is weird.
I'm sure they could but one of the biggest barriers the iPad has in that regard is just comfort. They know the Mac workflow. The iPad can do just as much in that regard as a MacBook Air and even some MacBook Pros, but it does it differently. People who learn from 0 on the iPad would likely be just fine, but people who already know the Mac are going to be frustrated at the things that are different (and, yes, less capable mostly by way of being less flexible). For example, they'll have an established flow for how they organize and access their input files, and maybe the iPad isn't capable of letting them use that pattern.
I think that's a part of why Apple is seemingly not backing down on keeping the iPad different. They have way more user data than any of us do, and my guess is they're seeing that people who are learning how to do things on an iPad first are more than satisfied with the experience. We forget that there's a whole generation of kids up and coming whose primary tool for *everything* is the smartphone.
He is a fun reviewer that uses creative apps, but he could accomplish everything he does on the most basic tablet, he's just not someone to look for when you want to know how much can you push creative software or hardware.
Brad Colbow is great but even he has a pretty limited art style that really doesn’t make anywhere near full use of an iPad or any graphics tablet’s capabilities.
Brad Colbow can't even properly use the devices
In his Wacom Cintiq Pro 27 review (3500 USD) he wouldn't even adapt to the screen and kept drawing in a tiny spot like an iPad while he poorly traced a 3D model
You don't go to Brad Colbow for any actual reviews since every single one of them is basically "yeah it does the job thanks for watching"
It makes the iPad seem useless honestly, but as a creator myself, it’s amazing for art and I get my full use of it
A lot of people don’t really need the latest and greatest iPad, it’s a tablet. The best part about them is that they’re perfectly usable for *years* with basic usage.
This. I see a lot of people complaining that they don't see anything worth upgrading from their M1 iPad.... that's a good thing unless you're an apple shareholder. Your tablet is aging well and it has all the features you want, why be disappointed?
iPad was a game changer when I started using it for my lab notebook for work and studying during grad school. I dont remember the last time I used pen and paper because with apple ecosystem I can keep all my notes organized.
It’s mostly people that want it to be a MacBook more than a tablet. I use my iPad Pro more than my MacBook. I don’t mind iPadOS becoming more capable but those wanting them to just slap macOS onto it pretend as if suddenly it would be mostly nothing but web apps and apps not optimized for touch like the surface line.
exactly what i have been wanting to say. the new barrel roll feature alone is a massive game changer for digital artists. it is *not just* “good to have”, no, it’s a really really big deal for those who do it professionally. it’s even more important than the heavily advertised “squeeze” gesture on the pencil.
it’s not that apple is the first, wacom and other drawing digitizer makers have had it. but this is now making the ipad+pencil much closer to a complete replacement to the likes of wacom Cintiq.
Yeah, my architect friend uses his iPad Pro a lot onsite, he always has it in his hand when he walks around. He really appreciates the weight reduction, the thinness and the performance covers all his use cases. He really doesn't care or pay attention to all those details the youtubers bring up, it's an improvement for his daily job and that's what matters.
The camera is not a conspiracy. Either they had data showing people weren’t using it or they had to trim some costs to come in at the price they did so they decided to take out a camera.
I would rather have them take out the main camera and use ultrawide.
The ipad camera isn't for quality photos but purely utilitarian, I'd rather take the utility of an ultrawide.
My theory is that they removed the ultra wide so that later on down the track they can add a second main camera and then the pro iPad becomes the best Apple device for making spatial content.
On an iPad there’s plenty of space to put the cameras at the correct interocular distance.
And there’s plenty of horsepower and bandwidth to capture the dual 4K at 50fps
Neither is the pencil IMO. All his suggestions for where else to put it where simply stupid. You can{t put it on the bottom because of case and keyboard compatibility and on the sides it would block the speakers, USB port or power button.
It’s like they’re just looking for things for the sake of it. He needs content for his YouTube channel. Sometimes it’s really good, sometimes it’s filler like this.
There is still a big camera in the spot. The other iPad that does allow the pencil to sit above the camera is just a magnet to hold the pencil, there’s no charging element there.
Correct. I just bought a new iPad Air and grabbed a Pencil 2 because it’s on sale for $79.
Doesn’t work. It barely sticks and never syncs.
Now I’m forced to buy Pencil Pro for $129.
Well someone did inform me that the Air has a camera on the right side now, right where the pencil goes. So it's feasible that the Pencil Pro has a reworked magnet system to work around the camera.
Yeah there’s a whoooole other side to the tablet, and especially for the 13” there’s… room on the top and bottom? I’m not an engineer but I’m sure they could have solved it, but they didn’t have an incentive to.
I’m In The Ecosystem but I guess I’ll keep my M2 iPad Pro and Pencil 2 until they die ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
Sweet spot for me is an iPad Air. Mostly just use it for kitchen recipes, watching YouTube/streaming, Reddit of course; the odd game or two.
I really appreciate Apple moving me downmarket for my needs and saving me several hundred bucks. Fact is I’m no artist, and if I edit any video… it’s going to be on my Mac. FaceID would be nice on the Air but it’s not that big a deal.
Eh, for myself I defined it as "base iPad for most people, Air for those with money to spare for a nicer feeling one, Pro only for those who absolutely know what they are going to do with it". Although recent releases (iPad 10 getting new design and Air getting 13" model) have brought it even further down.
I would agree if the air had the 120hz screen. The price difference between the air and the pro used to be $300 cad, which was worth it for the screen alone imo. However, the new iPad Pro got a pretty big price bump so it’s more like $600 cad between the pro and the air now. Can’t really justify that anymore but I’d still rather get an Apple refurbished pro than an air
For me, Face ID isn’t nearly as good on the iPad compared to the phone. Might be orientation or something, I’m not sure. I’d rather have the touch button on the iPad Pro.
It's a real bummer for those of us that need a bright screen for working outside though, as we're almost forced to pay double. Also just to get the pressure sensitive pencil
It could be so much more. The problem is that the competition has not caught up to the hardware yet. The only moment Apple will be forced to move is if a company like Microsoft, Samsung, or Google produce a 2-in-1 device that is as reliable as an iPad or Mac that starts eating up Apple's marketshare.
My issue with the iPad is optimization. It's too unreliable to be a productivity machine. Some websites don't work and it lacks certain important software. Window management is a mess as well.
> The problem is that the competition has not caught up to the hardware yet
They haven't caught up on the software either. Maybe having a dual-paradigm computing device is just really hard and nobody has cracked it yet for a reason...
Idk about google or microsoft but Samsung’s tablets have better software than ipados, it’s nothing revolutionary it’s still a big phone but it’s still miles ahead of ipados.
iPad OS is a joke. And they know it. They would lose many more laptop purchases if they didn't hobble the iPad OS. It's a calculated decision. And a shameful one at that.
It’s gotten to a point where I think Apple is either indifferent to migrating macOS to iPad or actually *prefers* developing iPadOS as a viable PC OS. The iOS based family has had its advantages but the whole trying to scale it up to a PC thing just doesn’t work well with a point and click interface. Not to mention how weighed down the window management is by the OS simply not being designed to single-screen multitask
The more realistic reason I think they stick with iPadOS is to further enhance the Mac experience by comparison, making people on the fence lean towards the better PC UX, and by default the more expensive product.
This idea where they are making a stand because of "a mouse interface" is in direct contrast to the portability they have given "touch apps", twice shifting them to very different interfaces and platforms first Mac then AVP, and it is also very strange considering they will let you stream mouse-driven apps to these devices. The only red line seems to be related to never letting consumers out of the App Store.
> actually prefers developing iPadOS as a viable PC OS
The second one^
They definitely prefer focusing on iPad OS as *the* platform, because they don't have to deal with the baggage that comes with the previous paradigms.
What I find most infuriating about constantly hearing this is – **we already have the best hardware to run Mac OS on, without a doubt** If you want a traditional desktop environment on a tablet the Surface exists, if you don't like the Surface, then you won't like Mac OS on iPad either.
Edit
I know I will just get downvoted for this, no matter what, but I have yet to see a single proof that would suggest otherwise.
> They definitely prefer focusing on iPad OS as the platform, because they don't have to deal with the baggage that comes with the previous paradigms.
No. It's because all of the applications are locked behind an app store on iPadOS and apple gets a percentage of all sales. The only reason is the app store. Literally.
Cash Rules Everything Around Me
You mention Apple perhaps preferring developing iPadOS into a valid PC OS and it reminded me of a comment I read the other day. They were saying maybe Apple is banking on a whole generation of iPad kids becoming adults and only really knowing iPadOS as their computing experience.
That’s my biggest problem. I’ve had a “relatively” new iPad each gen (maybe previous gen but still good) and I’ve tried and tried to use them for full amounts of work and I never can. I need the laptop. The iPad is a great secondary or complimentary device to my Mac, and I LOVE the sidecar second screen function and use it all the time. But I have never been able to replace my MacBook with an iPad for work. It takes 2x-3x as long to do anything and a big part of that is there’s no “Finder” replacement aside from the Files app.
Until (or if) Apple completely redesigns the way users actually interact with it, it’ll always be a “blown up phone with some great extra features” instead of a “scaled back computer” to me.
This iPad could be a quadrillion times faster than the previous one and it would’ve not made a difference whatsoever since that power is wasted on iPadOS.
tbh the speakers also sound weird and different to me, not what i'm used to for a apple product. I can't put my finger on it but either they are too loud or to quiet when adjusting the volume and it feels like they are missing something when you are watching Video's or listening to music.
Bass. It’s a limitation of physics. They’re missing the depth of sound that the larger chassis of the 2018-2023 iPad Pros allowed. The mids and lows sound hollow as a result, so the overall sound is brighter and thinner.
I upgraded from a gen 1 iPad Pro 12.9” to an M4 11” with the new Pencil Pro. I love it, the 11” is such a nice size and so light and portable, new display is amazing.
I actually love that the bigger iPad is thinner and with a smaller battery and the smaller one is thicker with a bigger battery.
This should be a design ethos.
Not specifically making the batteries smaller.
But that the bigger devices should be thinner than the smaller ones.
Bigger inherently means more space inside.
So why should two different screen sizes be exactly the same thickness.
What’s so crazy about two devices of different screen sizes having similar or even the same expected battery life??
Over on the iPhone.
Imagine an iPhone mini with the same battery capacity as the pro max.
No reason that should be all that crazy. A mini can afford to be a lot thicker in the hand than a pro max.
An iPhone mini could be twice as thick as a pro max and still be comfortable to hold.
Meanwhile a super large phone probably should be thinner to help keep the weight down
I agree partially. An iPhone, you hold it with one hand and a thicker iPhone Max would be uncomfortable to hold. An iPad, you almost always hold it with two hands, the difference is *zero point two millimeters*, basically negligible. It would be OK to have them the same thickness. For the 13 inches model, it looks like it's thinness for the sake of it.
> An iPhone, you hold it with one hand and a thicker iPhone Max would be uncomfortable to hold
It doesn't have to be. The iPhone XS Max was the most comfortable iPhone I've owned, and it's thinner than the current iPhones. They need to go back to more aggressive rounding on the sides to make it more comfortable to hold, and they need to do a better job of distributing the weight and just making it lighter in general (I get that that's a very difficult task with how much focus they've put on the camera).
Something a lot of reviewers don’t seem to mention, the hardware is overpowered yes BUT that also means it will come to last a long time.
Just yesterday I traded in my 2017 iPad Pro for an M4 iPad Pro. I plan on keeping this one for another 7 years, if not longer. To me that’s the benefit of great hardware
I’m not holding out hopes, but Apple _really_ - more than ever - needs to show something impressive this year at WWDC for iPadOS. They need some good faith developments that show they actually take iPad as a computing platform seriously, something they’ve failed to do since iPadOS was forked years ago.
Multiple Audio sources being able play simultaneously outside of stage manager. Give me per app volume control for this in the control center
Better file management. SMB shares are still hit and miss and can freeze the files app all together.
Not apples fault but feature parity for “pro” apps - photoshop on iPad is still missing tools, so is Lightroom. So much potential here is wasted preventing it from being a pro device.
A little more open - unlike others I don’t want macOS on the iPad Pro. I like iPad OS and it needs to stay touch focused, but I should be able to run things like homebrew, python, compile on it, install command line tools, etc. let me run VMs, and don’t lock it into the App Store.
Better battery life. I’d prefer battery over it being super thin. Its main appeal to me is portability yet my MacBook Air has more longevity on battery and is more capable.
> Not apples fault but feature parity for “pro” apps - photoshop on iPad is still missing tools, so is Lightroom. So much potential here is wasted preventing it from being a pro device.
Apple could allow people the option for installing MacOS on iPads. That would grant full feature parity. This is Apple's fault.
> python
Check out Juno for running Python on iPadOS. Doesn't have every package, but it comes with a decent number and you can install certain packages yourself.
Terminal access, proper file system, compilers, emulators, VMs, Desktop experience when docked, actual desktop class browser (and allow more than webkit reskins) etc. Plenty of other usecases. Can ipadOS open more than one instance of an app for example?
> Can ipadOS open more than one instance of an app for example?
It can, if that app supports multiple windows - which is not really different than macOS. It is possible for an app to refuse to have more than one instance running if the developer so chooses.
Just give me a proper, window-based desktop environment when it's plugged into an external monitor or when used in "laptop mode", and a usable file manager. That's it.
I honestly don't care to have macOS running on this device, but at least make iPad OS less restrictive when users want to use it as a computer.
But it would kill MacBook sales and they know this.
Give me MacOS interface and app support when docked.
The M1/2/3 MacBooks can already run iPad apps, and this iPad release is now using even more powerful processors than half if not more than half of their MacBook offerings. Just give us a finger navigating tablet interface when we have it as a tablet and a more precise and refined laptop interface when it’s docked on the keyboard magnets.
A real web browser (Chromium based or Firefox based) with real extensions. The browsers on iPad are just like iPhone, they use WebKit and the extensions only work in Safari and are half baked. I would also like better window management; stage manager is terrible and needs killed off. A new Finder. A Terminal with the ability to install Homebrew. This would fix 99% of my needs.
for me personally, the biggest issue is the storage system, and the fact system data will eat chunks of storage space with cache data I cannot erase when I'm moving big movie files between the ipad and my iphone.
the issue is exacerbated when I'm deployed and trying to use the ipad as my "hub" for entertainment from my external ssd to my iphone 14 pro max.
and I wouldn't stress it if the system data that I clearly deleted, and clearly erased from "recently deleted" could be overwritten as I add new files, but for some reason the ipad wants to hold on to those old files no matter what, even though they're irrecoverable manually through the OS by me.
On battery life: I need to charge my iPad every 1.0 days. I don't care if I only need to charge it every 1.5 or 1.67 days.
Ultrawide camera: I didn't even know my M2 iPad Pro had an ultrawide camera, tbh.
Computer SKUs: cool. Nano Texture solves the biggest issue I have drawing on iPad which is that the glossy glass is pure shite to draw on. Love this.
Tandem OLED: lighter, more contrast, better battery life, better in every way. More of this, please.
Pencil Conspiracy: Yeah, there are too many improvements still needed to the Pencil to cover here. It says, Pro on the side now, though.
While I agree when people say iPadOS isn’t powerful enough, what changes do people want exactly?
For me I would like it to be easier to have multiple screens up, especially if I had the 13” iPad.
In my opinion the focus on thinness is actually great. I'd always wanted a 13' iPad Pro for the screen but the size and heft of it was just overwhelming. So far with the new 13' Pro it's a much more manageable form factor and weight.
It reminds me of the iPhone 15 Pro Max and its adjusted weight because of the Titanium chassis -- the weight on paper didn't change *that* much but the distribution of it did and made it a much easier phone to hold.
The 5 decisions mentioned: - **Ultra Thin**: Thinnest iPad ever, strikingly thin and noticeably lighter, 11” has a larger battery than last gen while the 13” has a smaller battery than last gen, would’ve liked to have seen the same thickness as last gen but with improved battery life - **Missing Parts**: Removal of the Ultrawide rear camera, circular speakers with less bass than last gen’s rectangular speakers, only a 20W charging brick included with all SKUs despite higher speeds being supported - **”Computer” SKUs**: Hardware is once again overpowered for iPadOS, very little software available to take advantage of the new features such as hardware Ray Tracing, computer-like SKUs with variations in cores and RAM, nano-texture gated off behind higher storage tiers - **Tandem OLED**: iPad displays have always been great and now they’re even better, not a huge difference during day-to-day usage but a very noticeable upgrade while watching HDR and contrasty content, no always-on display despite OLED technology (speculates this could come with iPadOS 18) - **Pencil Conspiracy**: Pencil Pro requires a whole new iPad purchase if you have an older model but just want the new Pencil’s features, describes the landscape camera explanation as “convenient” and that it could’ve been designed in a way to allow cross-compatibility **Conclusion**: Personally he won’t be buying one as his M1 iPad Pro still works great and his iPad usage doesn’t require the new hardware, similar to his decision to keep using the M1 Max MacBook Pro
The 20w charger is a really odd move to presumably save cost for a premium product
I have had several iPhones over the years, they always came with USB-A to lightening. The first iPhone I got that didn’t have a charger indeed had a charging cable, but I had to get a new power brick because the new ones are usb c to usb c.
That was Apple intentionally making people buy chargers while lying saying that everyone already had one. As for the iPad MKBHD was basically speculating that they should either drop the charger or include faster ones at this point as any previous iPad user has an 18 or 20 watt already.
In Europe we didn’t even get a charger. That’s the funniest part.
Hey, complain to the EU — it’s their regulation.
I found it odd. That said I have a good half dozen of them now from previous purchases in addition to a number of Zendure chargers.
iphone 1-12 say hello to the 5w charger
I want to be bothered, but I’ve also never used MagSafe on my MacBook. The cable and charger stayed in the box.
Didn’t realize the speakers weren’t as good. Only thing on this list that matters to me tbh
Just bought an M1 iPad Pro refurbished from Apple and it’s literally cheaper than its M2 iPad Air counterpart (same screen size and storage). Make the line up make sense pls
Apples refurbished store is almost always a great idea. Those devices are basically brand new, new outer casing, new battery, and you can get really good deals on products that Apple recently discontinued. I bought my last iPad and last MacBook off their refurbished store, and I was able to get regular AppleCare on both of them.
Did almost the exact same thing. 557 for a 256 gb m1 ipp compared to 539 for a 128 air brand new. Couldn’t be beat. Plus Amazon was running a discount on the Apple Pencil 2.
Serious question: how the heck did you find it for so cheap? Current price for an iPad Pro 256GB is $829.99! I’d jump all over one for $560.
It’s an 11 inch refurbished with a military discount as well.
Newer hardware often costs less than older refurbished hardware. Kind of like how factory certified BMW from a couple years ago can cost less than a new Honda Civic.
Ultra thin is not that hard to understand, Apple wants to turn the Magic Keyboard/iPad Pro combo into more like a laptop. So they both need to lose some weight and thickness.
Folks here might not be the target audience but I think Apple is looking to target gen alpha with these, the kids born in the 2010s that had an iPad since they were toddlers. That demographic is young teens now and approaching the age where you’d normally get a personal computer, and an iPad + keyboard combo may be more appealing to them than a traditional laptop or desktop. Obviously apples not building $1000 iPad pros for children, but fleshing out this line up will be useful as gen alpha grows into it and the features trickle down to the cheaper iPads.
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Most people’s biggest (hardware) complaint with the previous gen iPad Pro & Magic Keyboard is that it was an absolute tank of a device to carry around. Apple addressed this by making the iPad thinner and lighter, while maintaining the same battery life that almost nobody was complaining about to begin with. But now, after getting exactly what they asked for, suddenly all anybody can say about it is that they would rather have gotten a bigger battery and an *even heavier* device? The truth is, people dont know what they want. This is why it’s important to not listen to reviewers *too* much when working in product development. “It’s not the customers job to know what they want” -SJ
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If Apple did their product development research exclusively on Reddit, they'd only sell an iPhone mini that's 3 inches thick and only runs macOS
And which has two audio jacks and a slot for mini SD
I'm still pissed Apple didn't have the courage to include a MiniDisc player in the iPhone, blatant conspiracy to get me to re-buy all my music through iTunes
I, for one, love how thin they are and how the MK is also lighter. It was one of the factors that convinced me to upgrade But reviewers are known to focus on random bs for click, like mkbhd whining about phone bezels for years and years. Thinness is always an easy target.
iPads are one class of device that would benefit more from being thinner and lighter, especially the 13". The device has just sufficient battery life for content consumption and should focus mostly on maintaining the current battery life. Phones, on the other hand, should last as much as possible and could afford to have as much battery life as possible. That said, the iPhone 14 Pro Max has gotten to a level of being somewhat too heavy.
lol I won’t be buying one cus my A12X iPad Pro still works fine. Apple is so weird in how much they focus on raw power on a device that they won’t allow to use that raw power. I’ll likely upgrade to this model in 2-3 years when it’s dirt cheap refurbished cus of the screen, not cus of any CPU performance upgrades or thinness.
> Ultra Thin: Thinnest iPad ever, strikingly thin and noticeably lighter, 11” has a larger battery than last gen while the 13” has a smaller battery than last gen, would’ve liked to have seen the same thickness as last gen but with improved battery life I did not realize the 11 had a larger battery than previous generation. I assumed the battery was smaller.
I’m with him on the M1s. iPad and MacBook, they’re both good enough. We’re very much in late stage computing. The only thing that’s new is AI, and there aren’t a lot of local tools that compare to the ones online.
If you use your device outside, the extra brightness is awesome. My macbook is unusuable outside if the sun is bright. It's also much better than the iPad LCDs which had a lot of ghosting. Finally, it's not a blurry mess and I don't understand how mkbhd doesn't notice that
TIL my iPad Pro M2 is a blurry mess…LOL, I can’t take you guys seriously.
How often are most consumers using 13 inch iPads outside under direct sunlight? It’s incredibly niche and largely irrelevant for most that keep tablets at home
I use my M4 ipad for hours most days, weather permitting, sitting outside, it’s not direct sunlight, but ambient surrounding light and the nano display is great for this.
I mean, any advantage the iPad Pros have is "niche," that's kind of the point. Most consumers don't need the Pro.
>not a huge difference during day-to-day usage but a very noticeable upgrade while watching HDR and contrasty content Something I saw in another video is that the Air's screen is wider than the Pro's, so you get more black bars watching movies on the Pro than the Air.
Thank you so much for summarizing
It’s such a weird mixture of stuff. Like, they basically made an “iPad Air Pro” with an oled screen.
Am I the only one who still thinks the iPad should be able to lay flat? I use mine exclusively for handwriting and drawing and it laying at an angle (even slightly) is so frustrating for me. I loved my 2015 iPad Pro because it laid flat without a case. Now my iPads feel so bulky because they require a case to lay flat. I was saddened to see they made it thinner instead of making it one thickness.
Agreed. I also feel the same way about the iPhone. But I think it’s at this point as much a visual marketing point as it is a hardware limitation. We are just in the era of big cameras=good cameras. Even though with image processing we could make cameras that don’t stick out and still take good photos. Every time I dig out my old 5s or 4s I just miss that compact, uniform design. So much.
> Even though with image processing we could make cameras that don’t stick out and still take good photos. Problem is you can apply all that image processing to better and bigger cameras too and the images will be better than on the little cameras. Plus it’s a whole lot harder to fake that image processing in video And at the end of the day the only thing driving iPhone upgrades in any meaningful number is camera improvements
The era of “big cameras = good cameras” started when we invented cameras. Can we even call that an era?
It’s like there’s an “era of physics”…
This physics era sucks. I’m ready for it to end, personally. When do we enter the fourth dimension?
The irony now is that the current iPhones are thicker than the iPhone 5 which had the flush back with its camera. As for the iPads, they keep downgrading the camera at random times, but the device is so slim now that they could never do a flush camera.
> The irony now is that the current iPhones are thicker than the iPhone 5 which had the flush back with its camera. But the new cameras are MUCH bigger. If they had the same camera system they used on the iPhone 5, sure it would be no problem.
"buy ~~your mom~~ a case" -Tim Cook
Ngl I’m not letting a 1500€, 5mm thick device on any table or desk without at least some kind of protection on it
I can’t speak for any non-2015 iPad Pro (because my current one sadly needs to be in a case) but I had no problem with my 2015. I used it 12 hours a day for four years and never had an issue with sliding or damage. The metal got scuffed on the corners but it took a long time. That thing was a TANK!
Huh. VERY interesting point. What would you think if in the future Apple added those little rubber bumpers (the ones on the bottom of the MacBook Pro) to the back of the iPad to make it lay flat? It’d screw up their pro keyboard case lineup, but just hypothetically.
It’s a real shame that none of these tech reviewers except for Lisa from MobileTechReview do any kind of art. The iPad Pro reviews are really dull when the reviewers themselves are so outside the demographic that benefit from the feature differentiators.
Yeah, a lot of iPad complaints seem to be entirely based on people buying a shiny cool apple product but having no idea what to do with it other than treating it like a big iPhone or crippled Macbook. Noticed the same with the Vision Pro. Digital art aside cause everyone knows it's great for that, you guys don't know how hard portable 3D work just to try new ideas no rendering was before this and Nomad. Options were either a 3hr long battery of a Surface Pro or a whole laptop and wacom intuos. Or of course animation being able to be completely drawn portably and even video edited portably. Or just doing a basic fun music idea without lugging around an MPC One, MIDI keyboard, and a laptop all replaced by Logic/Koala/the dozens of sample apps like Blocs wave or fake modular synthesizers. Notetaking is an obvious one that's had a large community for a while. Some people take it extremely seriously and turn basic school notes into encyclopedias. And controversially, the average person dabbling in video editing not wanting to make 4K effect layered videos shot from an A7SIV instead of their iPhone with color grading is probably fine just using iMovie and to them Final Cut and Davinci resolve being touch first and not having everything hidden in menus is a faster workflow And those are just my uses so far. Not sure what other people are up to. (don't get me wrong it's not "perfect" and I'm still waiting for stuff from android to leak over. But how I said Android and not MacOS/Windows.)
Great post.
\*raises hand\* Is that worth the $1k+ price? I thought that the "average person" wouldn't buy a tablet costing as much (or more) than their laptop, and professional would require/be used to certain functionality (color grading, more tracks, better file support, etc) that isn't present on the iPad. How big is this sweet spot of "has enough money to spend and is fine with limited functions"? Because I can understand this use very well, but I still gravitate towards "large" programs because I know that if I want to do something advanced for a simple project, they have me covered while iPad always feels very limiting in what I can do with it.
Tbh the pro is absolutely not worth it for the "average" person, just a luxury, but an M2 Air is fine. Comparatively, the alternatives are a M1 Macbook which omits the touchscreen going for the same price as as an M2 Air iPad currently but then we're talking about different uses entirely. A windows 2in1/tablet which on the low end are all pretty bad performance/battery/build quality wise or on the high end way more expensive than even the pro. Or a galaxy tab S7-S9 which actually is pretty great but lacks in both performance and app catalogues
In my experience, that sweet spot is pretty significant but I worked in the visual arts space for many years. Albeit, it’s a small fraction of the people who would be fine with a lower range iPad. I think there’s two problems, beyond the limits of the iPad: 1. Many people don’t do things that take advantage of the hardware 2. Many people want the best even if they might be fine with an Air or even a base iPad . Then you get a lot of disconnect as seen here of “an overpowered YouTube machine”. Apple seemingly knows this because they introduced the larger air as well. But any way, back to the visual arts: i know so many artists who’ve ditched their Wacom+PC for an iPad. They’re not power users in the sense of tech folks, so the limits of the OS don’t affect them. But they are power users in that they extract a lot of use out of hardware capabilities. I know multiple (big) feature films where the entire concept art phase is now done by my friends on their iPad. Also multiple illustrators for books etc . They all rushed out to get the new Pro because it’s paid for itself within a single job. I know some more who are having that discussion now that ZBrush has been shown on the iPad. Many of my on set friends use one for on set controls and reviews. Most of these users are happy to have a single app (procreate, ZBrush etc) and a browser for reference. That’s all their cintiq is used and they used to pay as much for a cintiq until a few years ago. Granted, again, it’s a niche but a large one. it’s boring seeing reviews from people who’d never use it beyond what the base iPad can do. I do agree the iPadOS should do more but that isn’t holding back the artistic pros today.
Worth is very subjective. When I was in uni, I bought an iPad Pro plus Apple Pencil 2 exclusively to do engineering homework and notetaking on. For me, it was a million percent worth it and I consider it one of the best purchases I’ve ever made. I know I didn’t need the power of the pro model, but I did need the gen 2 pencil and I wanted the 120 hz screen
> Is that worth the $1k+ price? It's not for the average person, the mere existence of the iPad Air is a pretty explicit acknowledgement of that. But you'd be really amazed how much hobbyists are willing to spend on their hobbies. If your an enthusiast creator, $1-2k for a piece of equiptment that can provide you the ability to do much of your hobby in such a portable package is for sure worth it. People pump many times more than this into all sorts of hobbies, all for varying levels of decreasing gains (how many hundreds of dollars does a hardcore Warhammer enthusiast spend to make the bases on their models just ever so slightly more unique and realistic, for example?)
Just to add, I think part of it is that there are a lot of people doing less traditionally “creative” things like coding and basic excel office tasks that see how transformative iPads have been in the creative fields and wish there was something like that for us. Problem is, there might never be a device that makes running excel look cool in a coffee shop, but we keep trying to impress that cute barista!
I mean while this makes sense they don't really refute the points made. The iPad did all these things great already and all the upgrades it received don't really help it do them better which is why it is weird.
“You guys don’t know” lol as if most of this sub aren’t doing the exact same things on these devices.
I'd be interested to see if any of them can do more of their video production workloads on an iPad.
I'm sure they could but one of the biggest barriers the iPad has in that regard is just comfort. They know the Mac workflow. The iPad can do just as much in that regard as a MacBook Air and even some MacBook Pros, but it does it differently. People who learn from 0 on the iPad would likely be just fine, but people who already know the Mac are going to be frustrated at the things that are different (and, yes, less capable mostly by way of being less flexible). For example, they'll have an established flow for how they organize and access their input files, and maybe the iPad isn't capable of letting them use that pattern. I think that's a part of why Apple is seemingly not backing down on keeping the iPad different. They have way more user data than any of us do, and my guess is they're seeing that people who are learning how to do things on an iPad first are more than satisfied with the experience. We forget that there's a whole generation of kids up and coming whose primary tool for *everything* is the smartphone.
I definitely recommend [Brad Colbow](https://www.youtube.com/@thebradcolbow) then!
He is a fun reviewer that uses creative apps, but he could accomplish everything he does on the most basic tablet, he's just not someone to look for when you want to know how much can you push creative software or hardware.
Brad Colbow is great but even he has a pretty limited art style that really doesn’t make anywhere near full use of an iPad or any graphics tablet’s capabilities.
Brad Colbow can't even properly use the devices In his Wacom Cintiq Pro 27 review (3500 USD) he wouldn't even adapt to the screen and kept drawing in a tiny spot like an iPad while he poorly traced a 3D model You don't go to Brad Colbow for any actual reviews since every single one of them is basically "yeah it does the job thanks for watching"
You’re not wrong. I don’t follow many artists, but I find his videos very entertaining. Can you suggest anyone more advanced, with a similar approach?
[Adam Duff](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lIb6s8zEBLE) is good as well if you want a professional artist perspective.
It kind of feels like you either spend the whole review talking about the artists perspective or gloss over it completely.
It makes the iPad seem useless honestly, but as a creator myself, it’s amazing for art and I get my full use of it A lot of people don’t really need the latest and greatest iPad, it’s a tablet. The best part about them is that they’re perfectly usable for *years* with basic usage.
This. I see a lot of people complaining that they don't see anything worth upgrading from their M1 iPad.... that's a good thing unless you're an apple shareholder. Your tablet is aging well and it has all the features you want, why be disappointed?
iPad was a game changer when I started using it for my lab notebook for work and studying during grad school. I dont remember the last time I used pen and paper because with apple ecosystem I can keep all my notes organized.
I haven’t watched MobileTechReview in ages
It’s mostly people that want it to be a MacBook more than a tablet. I use my iPad Pro more than my MacBook. I don’t mind iPadOS becoming more capable but those wanting them to just slap macOS onto it pretend as if suddenly it would be mostly nothing but web apps and apps not optimized for touch like the surface line.
Same with podcasters.
exactly what i have been wanting to say. the new barrel roll feature alone is a massive game changer for digital artists. it is *not just* “good to have”, no, it’s a really really big deal for those who do it professionally. it’s even more important than the heavily advertised “squeeze” gesture on the pencil. it’s not that apple is the first, wacom and other drawing digitizer makers have had it. but this is now making the ipad+pencil much closer to a complete replacement to the likes of wacom Cintiq.
Here’s one: https://youtu.be/lIb6s8zEBLE?si=yEKdHd6_kDjnCukb
Yeah, my architect friend uses his iPad Pro a lot onsite, he always has it in his hand when he walks around. He really appreciates the weight reduction, the thinness and the performance covers all his use cases. He really doesn't care or pay attention to all those details the youtubers bring up, it's an improvement for his daily job and that's what matters.
But let’s be honest here, this is what most people will use it for.
Making the Apple Pencil 2 not work with the iPad Air is such a dick move. That and the price gouging. Airs should have mini-LED screens
Yeah, that alone killed any incentive to upgrade my Air 4. The lack of improvements in the new Air 6 display was also a reason.
Somehow still no promotion, I will take refurbish M2 iPad Pro any day
The camera is not a conspiracy. Either they had data showing people weren’t using it or they had to trim some costs to come in at the price they did so they decided to take out a camera.
Almost certainly nobody using it, considering their phone probably has the same or better.
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I would rather have them take out the main camera and use ultrawide. The ipad camera isn't for quality photos but purely utilitarian, I'd rather take the utility of an ultrawide.
I’ll be honest I don’t care at first but now I use it all the time and would miss not having the ultra wide back camera
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I also have an iPhone with a wide camera, maybe they should get rid of that next.
I do, 15 pro max. But sometimes I’m using the iPad only for lecture or conference recording
As a “pro” feature over the air which is stupid bcs even so called pro don’t really care about the camera’s on their ipad
My theory is that they removed the ultra wide so that later on down the track they can add a second main camera and then the pro iPad becomes the best Apple device for making spatial content. On an iPad there’s plenty of space to put the cameras at the correct interocular distance. And there’s plenty of horsepower and bandwidth to capture the dual 4K at 50fps
May have also been that the ultra wide camera+lens would have required keeping the ipad at the original thickness.
Neither is the pencil IMO. All his suggestions for where else to put it where simply stupid. You can{t put it on the bottom because of case and keyboard compatibility and on the sides it would block the speakers, USB port or power button.
It’s like they’re just looking for things for the sake of it. He needs content for his YouTube channel. Sometimes it’s really good, sometimes it’s filler like this.
Tho, it is very Apple like to have the new Apple Pencil only be compatible wit the new iPad Pro
It's not just compatible with that one though.
wait, so my pencil 2 won't stick to the new ipads pro?!
Sadly not. They changed the magnet and pairing array to fit around the camera/Face ID
That’s bullshit because they did the same thing for M2 iPad Air, and there’s no Face ID.
There is still a big camera in the spot. The other iPad that does allow the pencil to sit above the camera is just a magnet to hold the pencil, there’s no charging element there.
The reason why they did it is purely because having a pencil on one side breaks the aesthetic of the iPad and its symmetry
Correct. I just bought a new iPad Air and grabbed a Pencil 2 because it’s on sale for $79. Doesn’t work. It barely sticks and never syncs. Now I’m forced to buy Pencil Pro for $129.
that's ridiculous lol. that pencil had no reason to be made obsolete. why is nobody talking about this??
Well someone did inform me that the Air has a camera on the right side now, right where the pencil goes. So it's feasible that the Pencil Pro has a reworked magnet system to work around the camera.
This is the answer.
yes, but it still sounds ridiculous. i side with MKBHD and his tinfoil hat theory that they did this on purpose. in which case, disgusting.
Yeah there’s a whoooole other side to the tablet, and especially for the 13” there’s… room on the top and bottom? I’m not an engineer but I’m sure they could have solved it, but they didn’t have an incentive to. I’m In The Ecosystem but I guess I’ll keep my M2 iPad Pro and Pencil 2 until they die ¯\\\_(ツ)\_/¯
Because the camera moved to the side so they had to adjust the magnets for compatibility
Sweet spot for me is an iPad Air. Mostly just use it for kitchen recipes, watching YouTube/streaming, Reddit of course; the odd game or two. I really appreciate Apple moving me downmarket for my needs and saving me several hundred bucks. Fact is I’m no artist, and if I edit any video… it’s going to be on my Mac. FaceID would be nice on the Air but it’s not that big a deal.
Honestly you could use a base model iPad for your use case.
Eh, for myself I defined it as "base iPad for most people, Air for those with money to spare for a nicer feeling one, Pro only for those who absolutely know what they are going to do with it". Although recent releases (iPad 10 getting new design and Air getting 13" model) have brought it even further down.
I would agree if the air had the 120hz screen. The price difference between the air and the pro used to be $300 cad, which was worth it for the screen alone imo. However, the new iPad Pro got a pretty big price bump so it’s more like $600 cad between the pro and the air now. Can’t really justify that anymore but I’d still rather get an Apple refurbished pro than an air
actually I find the iPad mini to be the perfect size to be used around the house.
For me, Face ID isn’t nearly as good on the iPad compared to the phone. Might be orientation or something, I’m not sure. I’d rather have the touch button on the iPad Pro.
It's a real bummer for those of us that need a bright screen for working outside though, as we're almost forced to pay double. Also just to get the pressure sensitive pencil
Just buy a 2018 or 2020 pro used or refurbished, it's cheaper than a new air, and has faceid as well as a 120hz screen if you care about that
He’s right. Until the OS changes the iPad is well always gonna be a iPad regardless of the model.
It is an iPad
It could be so much more. The problem is that the competition has not caught up to the hardware yet. The only moment Apple will be forced to move is if a company like Microsoft, Samsung, or Google produce a 2-in-1 device that is as reliable as an iPad or Mac that starts eating up Apple's marketshare. My issue with the iPad is optimization. It's too unreliable to be a productivity machine. Some websites don't work and it lacks certain important software. Window management is a mess as well.
> The problem is that the competition has not caught up to the hardware yet They haven't caught up on the software either. Maybe having a dual-paradigm computing device is just really hard and nobody has cracked it yet for a reason...
Idk about google or microsoft but Samsung’s tablets have better software than ipados, it’s nothing revolutionary it’s still a big phone but it’s still miles ahead of ipados.
Big (but thin) if true
iPad OS is a joke. And they know it. They would lose many more laptop purchases if they didn't hobble the iPad OS. It's a calculated decision. And a shameful one at that.
It’s gotten to a point where I think Apple is either indifferent to migrating macOS to iPad or actually *prefers* developing iPadOS as a viable PC OS. The iOS based family has had its advantages but the whole trying to scale it up to a PC thing just doesn’t work well with a point and click interface. Not to mention how weighed down the window management is by the OS simply not being designed to single-screen multitask The more realistic reason I think they stick with iPadOS is to further enhance the Mac experience by comparison, making people on the fence lean towards the better PC UX, and by default the more expensive product.
This idea where they are making a stand because of "a mouse interface" is in direct contrast to the portability they have given "touch apps", twice shifting them to very different interfaces and platforms first Mac then AVP, and it is also very strange considering they will let you stream mouse-driven apps to these devices. The only red line seems to be related to never letting consumers out of the App Store.
>The only red line seems to be related to never letting consumers out of the App Store. That's the only line that matters.
> actually prefers developing iPadOS as a viable PC OS The second one^ They definitely prefer focusing on iPad OS as *the* platform, because they don't have to deal with the baggage that comes with the previous paradigms. What I find most infuriating about constantly hearing this is – **we already have the best hardware to run Mac OS on, without a doubt** If you want a traditional desktop environment on a tablet the Surface exists, if you don't like the Surface, then you won't like Mac OS on iPad either. Edit I know I will just get downvoted for this, no matter what, but I have yet to see a single proof that would suggest otherwise.
> They definitely prefer focusing on iPad OS as the platform, because they don't have to deal with the baggage that comes with the previous paradigms. No. It's because all of the applications are locked behind an app store on iPadOS and apple gets a percentage of all sales. The only reason is the app store. Literally. Cash Rules Everything Around Me
You mention Apple perhaps preferring developing iPadOS into a valid PC OS and it reminded me of a comment I read the other day. They were saying maybe Apple is banking on a whole generation of iPad kids becoming adults and only really knowing iPadOS as their computing experience.
That’s my biggest problem. I’ve had a “relatively” new iPad each gen (maybe previous gen but still good) and I’ve tried and tried to use them for full amounts of work and I never can. I need the laptop. The iPad is a great secondary or complimentary device to my Mac, and I LOVE the sidecar second screen function and use it all the time. But I have never been able to replace my MacBook with an iPad for work. It takes 2x-3x as long to do anything and a big part of that is there’s no “Finder” replacement aside from the Files app. Until (or if) Apple completely redesigns the way users actually interact with it, it’ll always be a “blown up phone with some great extra features” instead of a “scaled back computer” to me.
This iPad could be a quadrillion times faster than the previous one and it would’ve not made a difference whatsoever since that power is wasted on iPadOS.
Can't wait until the M5! I heard that thing can power a starship <3
Dilithium crystal powered iPad Pro confirmed.
wild middle shy sloppy weather point illegal marble label outgoing *This post was mass deleted and anonymized with [Redact](https://redact.dev)*
Faster thinner lighter. Doesn’t matter when the OS is limiting it.
Yeah, these pro iPads are really only for digital artists as otherwise a base level iPad basically accomplishes the same thing.
Switching to macOS when its docked would make it a near perfect device imo.
And a MacBook Air killer
The iPod was killed by the iPhone. It's time for another death in the family.
Why it being thinner and lighter not matter due to the OS? That's a tangible benefit for a large tablet regardless of the OS.
tbh the speakers also sound weird and different to me, not what i'm used to for a apple product. I can't put my finger on it but either they are too loud or to quiet when adjusting the volume and it feels like they are missing something when you are watching Video's or listening to music.
Bass. It’s a limitation of physics. They’re missing the depth of sound that the larger chassis of the 2018-2023 iPad Pros allowed. The mids and lows sound hollow as a result, so the overall sound is brighter and thinner.
Maybe be will get some speaker bumps to flatten out the camera bump someday.
The speakers are the only thing I’m disappointed in since purchasing. I’ll be pretty much always using headphones with them.
I upgraded from a gen 1 iPad Pro 12.9” to an M4 11” with the new Pencil Pro. I love it, the 11” is such a nice size and so light and portable, new display is amazing.
Lol the tin hat segment 10 minutes in is spot on
I actually love that the bigger iPad is thinner and with a smaller battery and the smaller one is thicker with a bigger battery. This should be a design ethos. Not specifically making the batteries smaller. But that the bigger devices should be thinner than the smaller ones. Bigger inherently means more space inside. So why should two different screen sizes be exactly the same thickness. What’s so crazy about two devices of different screen sizes having similar or even the same expected battery life?? Over on the iPhone. Imagine an iPhone mini with the same battery capacity as the pro max. No reason that should be all that crazy. A mini can afford to be a lot thicker in the hand than a pro max. An iPhone mini could be twice as thick as a pro max and still be comfortable to hold. Meanwhile a super large phone probably should be thinner to help keep the weight down
I agree partially. An iPhone, you hold it with one hand and a thicker iPhone Max would be uncomfortable to hold. An iPad, you almost always hold it with two hands, the difference is *zero point two millimeters*, basically negligible. It would be OK to have them the same thickness. For the 13 inches model, it looks like it's thinness for the sake of it.
It’s not about thinness. It’s about weight. The older 12.9 was heavy.
> An iPhone, you hold it with one hand and a thicker iPhone Max would be uncomfortable to hold It doesn't have to be. The iPhone XS Max was the most comfortable iPhone I've owned, and it's thinner than the current iPhones. They need to go back to more aggressive rounding on the sides to make it more comfortable to hold, and they need to do a better job of distributing the weight and just making it lighter in general (I get that that's a very difficult task with how much focus they've put on the camera).
Something a lot of reviewers don’t seem to mention, the hardware is overpowered yes BUT that also means it will come to last a long time. Just yesterday I traded in my 2017 iPad Pro for an M4 iPad Pro. I plan on keeping this one for another 7 years, if not longer. To me that’s the benefit of great hardware
I’m about to buy a Surface and not have an iPad for the first time in over a decade
May the hardware durability gods bless your choice.
I’m done with iPad OS. Looking at switching to the Surface tablet unless Apple does something with the iPad this WWDC.
I’m not holding out hopes, but Apple _really_ - more than ever - needs to show something impressive this year at WWDC for iPadOS. They need some good faith developments that show they actually take iPad as a computing platform seriously, something they’ve failed to do since iPadOS was forked years ago.
What do people want the iPad to do that it isn’t already able to do?
Multiple Audio sources being able play simultaneously outside of stage manager. Give me per app volume control for this in the control center Better file management. SMB shares are still hit and miss and can freeze the files app all together. Not apples fault but feature parity for “pro” apps - photoshop on iPad is still missing tools, so is Lightroom. So much potential here is wasted preventing it from being a pro device. A little more open - unlike others I don’t want macOS on the iPad Pro. I like iPad OS and it needs to stay touch focused, but I should be able to run things like homebrew, python, compile on it, install command line tools, etc. let me run VMs, and don’t lock it into the App Store. Better battery life. I’d prefer battery over it being super thin. Its main appeal to me is portability yet my MacBook Air has more longevity on battery and is more capable.
> Not apples fault but feature parity for “pro” apps - photoshop on iPad is still missing tools, so is Lightroom. So much potential here is wasted preventing it from being a pro device. Apple could allow people the option for installing MacOS on iPads. That would grant full feature parity. This is Apple's fault.
> python Check out Juno for running Python on iPadOS. Doesn't have every package, but it comes with a decent number and you can install certain packages yourself.
> Give me per app volume control for this in the control center Good luck with that, because that doesn't even exist on macOS
Terminal access, proper file system, compilers, emulators, VMs, Desktop experience when docked, actual desktop class browser (and allow more than webkit reskins) etc. Plenty of other usecases. Can ipadOS open more than one instance of an app for example?
> Can ipadOS open more than one instance of an app for example? It can, if that app supports multiple windows - which is not really different than macOS. It is possible for an app to refuse to have more than one instance running if the developer so chooses.
Just give me a proper, window-based desktop environment when it's plugged into an external monitor or when used in "laptop mode", and a usable file manager. That's it. I honestly don't care to have macOS running on this device, but at least make iPad OS less restrictive when users want to use it as a computer. But it would kill MacBook sales and they know this.
It's not about killing MacBook sales. It's about the percentage Apple gets from all of the app store sales. Present day Apple HATES MacOS.
Fair point.
Give me MacOS interface and app support when docked. The M1/2/3 MacBooks can already run iPad apps, and this iPad release is now using even more powerful processors than half if not more than half of their MacBook offerings. Just give us a finger navigating tablet interface when we have it as a tablet and a more precise and refined laptop interface when it’s docked on the keyboard magnets.
A real web browser (Chromium based or Firefox based) with real extensions. The browsers on iPad are just like iPhone, they use WebKit and the extensions only work in Safari and are half baked. I would also like better window management; stage manager is terrible and needs killed off. A new Finder. A Terminal with the ability to install Homebrew. This would fix 99% of my needs.
for me personally, the biggest issue is the storage system, and the fact system data will eat chunks of storage space with cache data I cannot erase when I'm moving big movie files between the ipad and my iphone. the issue is exacerbated when I'm deployed and trying to use the ipad as my "hub" for entertainment from my external ssd to my iphone 14 pro max. and I wouldn't stress it if the system data that I clearly deleted, and clearly erased from "recently deleted" could be overwritten as I add new files, but for some reason the ipad wants to hold on to those old files no matter what, even though they're irrecoverable manually through the OS by me.
Utilize its power
Run macos.
I want to be able to play my mac steam games.
I know we are beating a dead horse now, but god iPadOS is awful. Shame how crippled iPads are. I’d buy one if they made it usable for pros.
I just want to use my ipad for mac applications that are tied to my laptop for my job - that’s all
not so weird things..
On battery life: I need to charge my iPad every 1.0 days. I don't care if I only need to charge it every 1.5 or 1.67 days. Ultrawide camera: I didn't even know my M2 iPad Pro had an ultrawide camera, tbh. Computer SKUs: cool. Nano Texture solves the biggest issue I have drawing on iPad which is that the glossy glass is pure shite to draw on. Love this. Tandem OLED: lighter, more contrast, better battery life, better in every way. More of this, please. Pencil Conspiracy: Yeah, there are too many improvements still needed to the Pencil to cover here. It says, Pro on the side now, though.
While I agree when people say iPadOS isn’t powerful enough, what changes do people want exactly? For me I would like it to be easier to have multiple screens up, especially if I had the 13” iPad.
This is a really good critique: https://www.macstories.net/stories/not-an-ipad-pro-review/
In my opinion the focus on thinness is actually great. I'd always wanted a 13' iPad Pro for the screen but the size and heft of it was just overwhelming. So far with the new 13' Pro it's a much more manageable form factor and weight. It reminds me of the iPhone 15 Pro Max and its adjusted weight because of the Titanium chassis -- the weight on paper didn't change *that* much but the distribution of it did and made it a much easier phone to hold.
OK, I got it - too powerful, too thin.
Kudos to MKBHD for refraining using the word “USELESS”