The new iPad Pro 2024 is a big deal.
Announced during Apple’s “Let Loose” event (where we also met the new iPad Air 2024), the new iPad Pro now has a thinner design than its predecessor, along with an OLED display and the Apple M4 chip. The latter is noteworthy not only because of Apple’s claims about its performance and efficiency boosts, but its AI capabilities.
I briefly went hands-on with the 13-inch iPad Pro 2024 and was impressed by Apple’s premium tablet. The lighter weight and thinner profile (even thinner than an iPod Nano) immediately stood out. This isn’t the big and bulky iPad Pro of old. In fact, I want to call this the iPad Pro Air because of how light it feels.
The new OLED display also impresses with its 2,000,000:1 contrast ratio, as the stark blacks and whites left my jaw on the floor. Also jaw-dropping is the price. The iPad Pro starts at $200 more for both sizes versus the previous generation.
Based on what Apple has said about the iPad Pro 2024 and my time with the device, the company’s tablet seems poised to be a winner. The thinner design, OLED panel and the promised performance of M4 could make this one of the best tablets yet.
Read on to find out my initial thoughts about the iPad Pro 2024.
iPad Pro 2024: Specs
| Header Cell – Column 0 | 11-inch iPad Pro | 13-inch iPad Pro |
|---|---|---|
| Price | from $999 | from $1,299 |
| Display | 11-inch Tandem OLED (2420 x 1668 pixels) | 13-inch Tandem OLED (2752 x 2064 pixels) |
| Colors | Silver, Space Black | Silver, Space Black |
| Chip | M4 | M4 |
| Storage | 256GB, 512GB, 1TB, 2TB | 256GB, 512GB, 1TB, 2TB |
| Cameras | 12MP front landscape, 12MP rear | 12MP front landscape, 12MP rear |
| Wireless | Wi-Fi 6E, 5G | Wi-Fi 6E, 5G |
| Size | 9.83 x 6.99 x 0.21 inches | 11.09 x 8.48 x 0.2 inches |
| Weight | 0.98 pounds | 1.28 pounds |
iPad Pro 2024: Price and availability
The new iPad Pro launches May 15 with pre-orders available today.
The iPad Pro starts at $999 and features an 11-inch Ultra Retina XDR Display, 256GB of storage, Wi-Fi connectivity and an M4 chip packing a 10-core CPU and 10-core GPU. That’s $200 more than the $799 starting price for the M2 iPad Pro. If you want a model with nano-texture glass, you’ll need to upgrade to 2TB — which runs the cost up to $2,099. Adding Wi-Fi + Cellular costs an additional $200.
Then we have the 13-inch iPad Pro, which starts at $1,299 (also $200 higher than the previous version). This model features a 13-inch Ultra Retina XDR Display, 256GB of storage, Wi-Fi connectivity, and an M4 chip packing a 10-core CPU and 10-core GPU. Like the 11-inch model, you’ll need to upgrade to 2TB to get a nano-texture glass display.
Lastly, there are the peripherals. The new Apple Pencil Pro costs $129 while the Apple Magic Keyboard for iPad Pro will set you back $299 for the 11-inch model or $349 for the 13-inch variety.
Apple didn’t bump up the entry-level price of the iPad Pro M4, which is appreciated. Unfortunately, you’ll have to spend a lot of cash for nano-texture glass since you can only get it with models packing 2TB of storage.
iPad Pro 2024: Design
Apple emphasizes that the new iPad Pro isn’t a redesign but an “all-new” model. Though it looks like a regular iPad Pro at first glance, actually holding it in your hands reveals that Apple isn’t misleading us. This is indeed a brand-new iPad Pro — and its design is absolutely fantastic.
I’ve used the iPad Pro M2 since it launched and immediately noticed the difference when I held the new iPad Pro. The slate is so thin and light that I could almost mistake it for the 13-inch iPad Air 2024. This 13-inch tablet weighs 1.28 pounds but feels lighter thanks to its excellent weight distribution.
The other big change from the previous model is that the front camera is now landscape-oriented instead of portrait-oriented. Most people use tablets in landscape mode so it’s great that Apple finally moved the front camera (like it did with the iPad 2022). Not only will this help keep you centered during video calls, but should also make using FaceID easier. I’m a fan of this repositioned front camera.
iPad Pro 2024: Display
People have been clamoring for an OLED iPad Pro for ages, and now it’s finally here. The new design is nice but the Ultra Retina XDR display (as Apple dubs it) could arguably be this tablet’s biggest selling point for some people. It’s really quite striking.
We’ll need to get the iPad Pro into our testing lab to see if it can indeed hit the 1,000 nits of standard brightness and 1,600 nits of HDR brightness Apple claims. To my eyes, the screen is both bright and colorful. The contrast between dark and light elements is astonishing, delivering beautiful photos and videos.
I’m a professional writer but even I have a hard time conveying just how good the iPad Pro’s OLED display appears. This is arguably the best OLED display I’ve ever seen on a tablet. You need to see it to believe it.
iPad Pro 2024: M4 power
Instead of an M3 chip like many expected, the iPad Pro runs on the new Apple M4 chip. This slice of Apple silicon utilizes the latest 3nm technology, which means it can cram more functionality into the same space. This is why the company can make a thinner iPad Pro without sacrificing performance.
The M4 is a system-on-a-chip with a 10-core CPU, 10-core GPU and a Neural Engine — which the rest of the industry calls an NPU (Neural Processing Unit). Apple claims its GPU builds on architecture first introduced in the M3. Because of that, M4 brings hardware-accelerated mesh shading, ray tracing and Dynamic Caching to the iPad platform for the first time. This should result in improved performance for games and rendering tasks.
The performance of an NPU and its usefulness as an AI device is measured in TOPS (trillion operations per second). Apple’s new M4 Neural Engine comes in at 38 TOPS. To give you a sense of comparison, the new Intel Core Ultra chips sport NPUs that typically deliver 10-11 TOPS, while Qualcomm has claimed the new Snapdragon X Elite sport NPUs capable of 45 TOPS.
Of course, the numbers matter a lot less than whether or not you can see the results on the screen. During my time with the iPad Pro there weren’t any demos of AI images being generated, but I did see Diablo 4 running on the tablet. The ray-traced reflections and numerous particle effects made the hellish world come to life. Better yet is that the game ran silky smooth without a hint of slowdown. Demos featuring rendering apps like Octane also impressed me with how effortlessly you can manipulate 3D images in real time.
We’ll have a clearer picture of what the M4 chip can do once we’ve run it through our gauntlet of battery tests. But based on what I’ve seen, I don’t think we’ll be disappointed by the results. The M4 chip should be a beast of a processor.
iPad Pro 2024: Apple Magic Keyboard and Apple Pencil Pro
To get the most out of the iPad Pro, you’ll need its two main accessories: the Apple Magic Keyboard and the Apple Pencil. Thankfully, both have received updated versions that enhance the iPad Pro experience.
The Magic Keyboard, its palm rests and touchpad now have an aluminum finish that’s reminiscent of a MacBook. Similarly, the larger touchpad also reminds me of an Apple laptop — as does the new Magic Keyboard’s flatter hinge. As a bonus, this peripheral feels lighter than before and doesn’t add a lot of weight to the iPad Pro.
The Apple Pencil Pro, as it’s called, looks and feels like the Apple Pencil 2 but it some nifty features that make it more useful. This includes rollover to intelligently switch pen styles, haptic feedback and squeeze to control the input in newer ways. The new barrel roll feature is particularly impressive since you can change a line’s thickness by twisting the pen’s orientation.
iPad Pro 2024: Outlook
I’ll need more time with the iPad Pro M4 to make a final determination, but right now I think it might be the tablet to beat for power users.
The tablet ticks all the right boxes, including a slimmer and lighter design, a powerful processor and a gorgeous OLED panel. Are all these upgrades worth an extra $200 though?
I’ll have a full iPad Pro M4 review for you soon, so stay tuned!
