Tested Apple ipad (2018)
With an upgraded CPU and the same Apple Pencil compatibility as the arty Pro model, the ‘ipad for everyone’ is now even more of a crowd-pleaser
A newly tweaked tablet for the masses
from £319 / stuff.tv/ipad2018 Like bezels and human attention spans, tablets have recently begun to feel like they could become an endangered species, pushed close to extinction by perfectly evolved big-screen smartphones.
But Apple’s ipad family has other ideas. Last year’s ipad Pro made a very convincing claim to become your futuristic laptop replacement. And now its cheaper brother, known simply as the ipad, has made subtle tweaks from the previous standard model that promise to turn it into an ‘affordable’ (by Apple standards anyway) creative tool.
Yes, the basic ipad is no longer just your portable Netflix feeding bag. With a faster processor and support for Apple’s Pencil (£89), a toy previously reserved for the ipad Pro, it’s now primed to work with a raft of artsy, educational and AR apps.
Will this be enough to distract you from the fact that it still looks like an ipad from 2013? Let’s get scribbling on one and find out…
1 The song remains the same No, we haven’t re-used the photos from an old ipad review by mistake – this year’s version looks identical to its predecessor. So effectively it’s a tweaked ipad Air from 2013. Well, why mess with a classic design?
2 Browsers of the holy As with the 10.5in ipad Pro, this is a Retina LCD screen with 264ppi resolution that renders text crisply and brings web pages to life with clarity and searing brightness. It can’t reach the same contrast in bright sunlight, though.
3 Whole lotta shove Unless you want a tablet to be your main computer, the new ipad has more than enough grunt for most needs. Thanks to the new A10 processor, it happily zips through most tasks, from Fortnite to AR apps.
4 Store-way to heaven There’s no ‘sweet spot’ 64GB model: your options are 32GB or 128GB. If you can find another £90, then the latter is the one to go for. That extra storage will help you explore this ipad’s workhorse potential with IOS 11.
5 Ramble on This ipad more than lives up to its 10hr billing for battery life. In our tests it gets close to 12hrs of video playback on medium screen brightness. Unless you’re planning a Grid Autosport all-nighter, you can expect it to last you a full day.