Apple’s recent “Let Loose” event was about the iPad. The iPad Pro, powered by the new M4 chip, debuted. The iPad Air was also upgraded, now available in 11-inch and 13-inch sizes.
Accessories weren’t left out, with updates to the Apple Pencil. Now, let’s dive into the details of the event.
iPad Pro
The iPad Pro now houses the new M4 chip, surprising many who expected an M3. This change boosts performance by 50% compared to the M2 iPad Pro. It also supports dynamic caching, hardware-accelerated ray tracing, and mesh shading.
The M4 chip is power-efficient, delivering M2-level performance at half the power. This means longer battery life for less demanding tasks.
The iPad Pro also features a new display technology, Tandem OLED. It uses two OLED panels for richer colors and deeper blacks. Despite the dual layer, the OLED panels are thinner than an LCD. The iPad Pro is now thinner than an iPod nano, making it Apple’s slimmest product yet.
The Ultra Wide 12MP front-facing camera is now on the landscape edge, a change that Magic Keyboard users may appreciate.
The new iPad Pro starts at $999 for the 11-inch model and $1,299 for the 13-inch model, each with 256GB of storage. Add $200 for 5G cellular connectivity via eSIM.
M4 Chip
The M4 chip, powering the iPad Pro, is a first for Apple. It has a new CPU with up to four performance cores and six efficiency cores. There’s also a 10-core GPU. The chipset’s neural engine focuses on machine learning and AI and is capable of 38 trillion operations per second.
iPad Air
The iPad Air, previously powered by the M1 chip, now boasts an M2 chipset. It comes in two sizes, 11-inch and 13-inch. The base storage has doubled to 128GB. The 11-inch model starts at $599 and the 13-inch model at $799. Add $150 for 5G cellular connectivity.
Apple Pencil and Magic Keyboard
The new Apple Pencil Pro offers haptic feedback and supports a new squeeze gesture. It costs $129 and ships on May 15.
The new Magic Keyboard, compatible only with the iPad Pro, is made from aluminum. It has a larger trackpad with haptic feedback and a row of function keys. It ships next week, costing $300 for the 11-inch iPad Pro and $350 for the larger variant.