If you've been on the iPad forum at all in the last few months, you may have seen me voicing my thoughts about the new line of iPads, and pontificating over which one to get. I was looking to replace two very aged devices, an iPad Air 2 which has served me very well for nine years, and a 2017 12-inch MacBook, which in the six and a half years I’ve owned it I’ve come very close to throwing it at the wall in frustration several times. I also have an iPhone 12 and an M1 iMac, and I thought that a new iPad would fit perfectly into the mix.
Until the day it was announced, I was leaning toward getting the new iPad Pro, but between the announcement and the release day, I slowly became more and more inclined to get the Air. Alas, on Wednesday I decided to order a new 13-inch blue iPad Air with 128GB, plus a black Magic Keyboard. I picked it up at about 11:30 BST yesterday, and it was about midday when I unboxed it. Since then, I’ve been playing with it almost non-stop, and I thought I’d share my thoughts.
Design: It’s a beautiful device. I still hold that they shouldn’t have washed out the blue colour compared to the previous Air, but I still really like it, it gives it a personal touch. Both my iPhone and iMac are blue, and I feel like this completes the setup. One problem I had with the iPad Pro is that I find it a bit ugly. The colours were boring and I really don’t like the way they made the camera bump metal instead of glass. It just kinda negates the point of having such a huge bump in the first place, especially since there’s only one actual camera. That wasn’t a deal breaker obviously, but it put me off.
Ergonomics: I really like the weight. Not much heavier than my old iPad and very easy to carry around, despite the increased screen size. It’s obviously a lot heavier with the keyboard attached, but honestly the fact that the iPad is lighter than the previous Pros which this keyboard was designed, and the keyboard itself is no lighter, makes the weight perfectly balanced in my opinion. There hasn’t been too much wobble when touching the screen, and it hasn’t been falling backward at all.
Display: Big. Y’all probably take it for granted after having been exposed to 13-inch iPads for years, but this is my first one, and man is it an adjustment. 78% bigger than my old iPad and as wide as the old iPad is tall. That said, the reasons I got the bigger one still apply, and I’m definitely enjoying having more space to browse, watch videos and type. Now OLED…that to me is the big bummer about choosing the Air over the Pro. I really would have wanted OLED, but I was finding it difficult to justify spending an extra £500 for it. Since I started using the new iPad I’ve been very conscious of the backlight bleed on black parts of the screen, and it’s given me a bit of buyer’s remorse. I’mther than that I’m very satisfied with the screen, and I definitely don’t have any complaints about brightness.
Keyboard: I had a few moments where I was tempted by the keyboard for the new iPad but really, I don’t think it would be much different. I‘m fine with the feel of the keys, the material and the physical trackpad. The lack of function keys is an adjustment from typing on my iMac, but I don’t really mind too much not having them there. There are a few quirks, for example typing out this post I can’t move the cursor using the arrow keys, and when I delete a word it deletes the space before it automatically. And I’m always accidentally pressing the globe key on the front left. But I think these are all just learning curves.
Stage manager: I recently started using stage manager on my iMac and it’s worked great. It lets me multitask more efficiently and group windows together when I’ve needed to. On the iPad, I can’t say it’s as efficient, mostly because the screen is a third the size, but it’s also just very different in general. I feel like I’d like apps to open in full screen automatically, but honestly it’s not a huge deal, especially considering a lot of apps don’t seem to take advantage of the big screen. It also makes unoptimised apps like Instagram and Bluesky feel much more useable. I haven’t really managed to multitask properly yet, so we’ll see how good it is in due course.
Sidecar: By far the thing I’ve been most impressed with. Just wow. I’ve hooked it up to my iMac and put it below, and it’s just incredibly useful for work. For the last day I’ve had an excel spreadsheet on the iPad screen which I’ve needed to refer to with the work I’m doing on Chrome on the iMac screen, and at any point I can just drag the mouse down and edit the spreadsheet. As somebody who isn’t used to using multiple monitors, this is just an absolute godsend.
Processing speeds: This is honestly incredibly minor, because I’ve had no issues whatsoever with the speeds. Told myself beforehand that I don’t need the M4, and I’m starting to feel vindicated.
All in all, there’s a lot to adjust to, but I’m very satisfied with my purchase so far, and I think it will come in extremely useful overtime. Just an all-around incredible device, which I’d recommend to anybody who’s looking for a new iPad.
Until the day it was announced, I was leaning toward getting the new iPad Pro, but between the announcement and the release day, I slowly became more and more inclined to get the Air. Alas, on Wednesday I decided to order a new 13-inch blue iPad Air with 128GB, plus a black Magic Keyboard. I picked it up at about 11:30 BST yesterday, and it was about midday when I unboxed it. Since then, I’ve been playing with it almost non-stop, and I thought I’d share my thoughts.
Design: It’s a beautiful device. I still hold that they shouldn’t have washed out the blue colour compared to the previous Air, but I still really like it, it gives it a personal touch. Both my iPhone and iMac are blue, and I feel like this completes the setup. One problem I had with the iPad Pro is that I find it a bit ugly. The colours were boring and I really don’t like the way they made the camera bump metal instead of glass. It just kinda negates the point of having such a huge bump in the first place, especially since there’s only one actual camera. That wasn’t a deal breaker obviously, but it put me off.
Ergonomics: I really like the weight. Not much heavier than my old iPad and very easy to carry around, despite the increased screen size. It’s obviously a lot heavier with the keyboard attached, but honestly the fact that the iPad is lighter than the previous Pros which this keyboard was designed, and the keyboard itself is no lighter, makes the weight perfectly balanced in my opinion. There hasn’t been too much wobble when touching the screen, and it hasn’t been falling backward at all.
Display: Big. Y’all probably take it for granted after having been exposed to 13-inch iPads for years, but this is my first one, and man is it an adjustment. 78% bigger than my old iPad and as wide as the old iPad is tall. That said, the reasons I got the bigger one still apply, and I’m definitely enjoying having more space to browse, watch videos and type. Now OLED…that to me is the big bummer about choosing the Air over the Pro. I really would have wanted OLED, but I was finding it difficult to justify spending an extra £500 for it. Since I started using the new iPad I’ve been very conscious of the backlight bleed on black parts of the screen, and it’s given me a bit of buyer’s remorse. I’mther than that I’m very satisfied with the screen, and I definitely don’t have any complaints about brightness.
Keyboard: I had a few moments where I was tempted by the keyboard for the new iPad but really, I don’t think it would be much different. I‘m fine with the feel of the keys, the material and the physical trackpad. The lack of function keys is an adjustment from typing on my iMac, but I don’t really mind too much not having them there. There are a few quirks, for example typing out this post I can’t move the cursor using the arrow keys, and when I delete a word it deletes the space before it automatically. And I’m always accidentally pressing the globe key on the front left. But I think these are all just learning curves.
Stage manager: I recently started using stage manager on my iMac and it’s worked great. It lets me multitask more efficiently and group windows together when I’ve needed to. On the iPad, I can’t say it’s as efficient, mostly because the screen is a third the size, but it’s also just very different in general. I feel like I’d like apps to open in full screen automatically, but honestly it’s not a huge deal, especially considering a lot of apps don’t seem to take advantage of the big screen. It also makes unoptimised apps like Instagram and Bluesky feel much more useable. I haven’t really managed to multitask properly yet, so we’ll see how good it is in due course.
Sidecar: By far the thing I’ve been most impressed with. Just wow. I’ve hooked it up to my iMac and put it below, and it’s just incredibly useful for work. For the last day I’ve had an excel spreadsheet on the iPad screen which I’ve needed to refer to with the work I’m doing on Chrome on the iMac screen, and at any point I can just drag the mouse down and edit the spreadsheet. As somebody who isn’t used to using multiple monitors, this is just an absolute godsend.
Processing speeds: This is honestly incredibly minor, because I’ve had no issues whatsoever with the speeds. Told myself beforehand that I don’t need the M4, and I’m starting to feel vindicated.
All in all, there’s a lot to adjust to, but I’m very satisfied with my purchase so far, and I think it will come in extremely useful overtime. Just an all-around incredible device, which I’d recommend to anybody who’s looking for a new iPad.
