The new iPad Air improves a winning formula without raising the price.
The iPad Air is one of the easiest products to recommend. Need a tablet? You should probably go with this one. That’s even more true today now that Apple has equipped the mid-range product with a more powerful engine. The supercharged M1 processor now powering this slate is a proven entity, having logged miles on the MacBook Air, MacBook Pro, and iPad Pro over the past year and a half or so. The M1 is the standout feature this year but there are a few other nice snacks to chew on. For one, the MacBook Air comes in new finishes including the dazzling blue of my review unit. And you also get optional 5G support for quicker mobile speed than 4G LTE. Best of all, Apple isn’t charging a penny extra: the iPad Air still costs $599, putting it in a competitive spot compared to the other iPads and non-Apple competition in this space. Props to Apple for maintaining the iPad Air’s $599 price despite swapping out an A-series chip for the M1 processor. At this price, the Air is significantly cheaper than the iPad Pro models and Samsung’s higher-end tablets. Keep in mind, however, that the base iPad Air has only 64GB of storage. Apple annoyingly omits a 128GB storage model so you have to jump to 256GB by spending another $150. Still, at $749, the high-end Air comes in at $200 less than the iPad Pro with the same storage, though you can get the iPad Pro 11 with 128GB for only $50 more than the 256GB iPad Air. As for how it compares with Samsung’s options, the iPad Air costs as much as the standard Galaxy Tab S8 except that you get twice as much storage on the Samsung. The Galaxy Tab S8+ with 128GB of storage starts at $899. Borrowing a line from the Jonas Brothers: I’m a sucker for blue. Or…something like that. The new color option for the iPad Air is a gorgeous metallic gunmetal blue that shimmers under the right lighting. It’s a unique shade I haven’t seen before on a product. I’d personally choose this blue, but if it’s not your thing, Apple had some fun this year by offering the Air in Pink, Purple, and Starlight (a metallic cream color), along with the classic Space Grey. I spent so many words on color because there isn’t much else to talk about. This iPad looks identical to the previous model. It’s a slim aluminum slab with a single circular camera module on the rear above a centered chrome Apple logo. Thin bezels help modernize a design that adheres to the minimalist aesthetic seen throughout Apple’s product lineup. There are also some welcome convenience features, including a magnetic strip on the side for charging and holding the optional Apple Pencil, and a Touch ID fingerprint sensor built into the power button. Sadly, the Air still lacks lack Face ID, a faster, hands-free login method found on the iPad Pro. Unlike the larger iPad Pro 12.9 or some of Samsung’s new Galaxy Tab S8 devices, the iPad Air can be comfortably held aloft without straining your arms. At 0.23 inches thick and 1.02 pounds, the Air has about the same dimensions and weight as the iPad Pro 11. For reference, the Surface Pro 8 weighs about 2 pounds without the keyboard. The iPad Air’s 10.9-inch,2360 x 1640-pixel display is indiscernibly smaller than the 11-inch panel on the iPad Pro and dwarfed by the iPad Pro 12.9 and Samsung’s Galaxy Tab S8 and S8 Ultra. Though the pool of large-screen tablets is growing, the iPad Air’s display doesn’t feel too small. I enjoyed streaming March Madness and watching YouTube videos on the Air; the panel produces accurate, punchy colors, text appears crisp, and the screen is bright enough to view outdoors on a sunny spring day even though our colorimeter clocked a peak of 427 nits, well below the 500-nit rating.
