If you’re looking for the best iPad we have your back. We’ve reviewed all the latest models, from the entry-level $349 iPad to the $1,299 13-inch iPad Pro. We test each iPad in the lab — including performance, display and battery — and evaluate real-world performance by using each model as our everyday tablet.
Based on our in-depth reviews I recommend the latest 13-inch iPad Air M2 as the best iPad since it hits the sweet spot in terms of price and performance and gives you most of the features of the powerful iPad Pro for hundreds of dollars less. For those on a budget, I recommend the latest iPad 10th Gen (thanks to a price cut) but keep in mind that it’s rumored to get a refresh soon.
For now, I would skip the iPad mini 6 since the iPad mini 7 drops on October 23. Power users should opt for the iPad Pro M4, which sports a gorgeous tandem OLED display along with a powerful M4 chip that’s tailor-made for Apple Intelligence.
Here are all the best iPads you can buy right now.
The quick list
Apple’s iPad Air is the best overall iPad for most people due to its features and overall value. I specifically recommend the 13-inch model since you get more screen real estate for watching movies, browsing the web or even getting work done. It’s not cheap at $799 but it also won’t break the bank.
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If you’re on a budget but want a great iPad experience, you can’t go wrong with the basic iPad. This 10.9-inch tablet has a sleeker design than before, a faster A14 Bionic chip and USB-C charging. Though it’s not as light or small as some other models on this list, the basic iPad’s $349 price is hard to beat.
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3. Apple iPad Pro 13-inch M4
The iPad Pro 2024 has a bright and colorful OLED display, powerful M4 performance, a thin yet solid lightweight design and better than all-day battery life. Though some of its peripherals and upgrades are pricey, Apple has delivered its best premium tablet in years. The 11-inch model starts at $999 while the 13-inch variant starts at $1,299.
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If you want the iPad experience in a small size, I recommend the iPad mini. The 8.3-inch display is great for watching videos, reading comics and even gaming. Its light and thin design also makes it easy to slip into a purse or big pocket. This tablet might receive an update later this year, but it’s still worth considering if you need a compact iPad right now.
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Tony Polanco
Tony Polanco is a Senior Writer for Tom’s Guide and a lifelong techy. Though he likes all tablets (even Android ones), iPads hold a special place in his transistor-filled heart. Tony likes watching video podcasts on a 13-inch iPad Pro M4 while eating dinner and reading manga on an iPad mini 6 just before bed. Tony couldn’t imagine life without iPads.
The best iPads you can buy today
Here is a detailed look at each of the iPad models I recommend, based on our lab testing and my hands-on experience.
The best iPad overall
The 13-inch iPad Air M2 is the overall best iPad for most people thanks to its excellent balance of power and performance. This tablet is perfect for consuming and creating content, and its $599 starting price puts it within reach for many people.
Thanks to the addition of Apple M2, the iPad Air 2024 is now on par with 2022’s iPad Pro. That’s not to say the Air is now a Pro replacement, but the power gap is considerably smaller. This, along with its relatively affordable starting price, makes this iPad Air more compelling than the latest iPad Pro for budget-minded shoppers who still want the best iPad their money can buy.
The iPad Air turned in excellent results in our lab tests. Its performance was on par with the iPad Pro 2022 and even the M2-powered MacBook Pros we’ve tested. This tablet also lasted for 11 hours and 30 minutes in our battery test, which is quite long. And though this iPad Air doesn’t sport an OLED display, its Liquid Retina panel is both bright and colorful.
As great as the iPad Air M2 is, it has some faults. Despite now having a landscape-facing camera, the tablet doesn’t feature Face ID. It also lacks Thunderbolt support, so don’t bother trying to connect it to Thunderbolt displays and docks. And as I said, there is no iPad Air with an OLED display.
Faults aside, the 13-inch iPad Air is still an overall excellent tablet. Sure, an OLED option would’ve been nice, but it’s hard to knock this powerful slate down. This is arguably the best tablet for most people and the first slate I think of when helping people decide which iPad to get.
Read our full iPad Air 2024 review
The best budget iPad
The latest basic iPad is a welcome change from the last few iterations. It features a sleeker design and bigger display, though it’s missing the headphone jack of the previous model. Other features I like are the Touch ID-enabled power button, repositioned front camera and USB-C charging — along with the A14 Bionic chip and 5G connectivity. This tablet’s price has dropped to $349 since launch, which makes it even easier to recommend.
The basic iPad might not have the best specs compared to others on this list but it did admirably across our slew of lab tests. The A14 Bionic Chip is strong enough for web surfing, video streaming and even light gaming. You get nearly 11 hours of battery life, along with a vibrant display that can get fairly bright.
There’s a lot to like about the basic iPad, but its most glaring flaw is that it’s not compatible with the Apple Pencil 2 or Apple Pencil Pro. Thankfully, you’re no longer forced to use the Apple Pencil 1 (with its awkward charging) since this tablet is compatible with the Apple Pencil with USB-C charging. Though the stylus doesn’t charge when it’s magnetically attached to the iPad, it’s a better alternative than the Apple Pencil 1, which uses a lighting port to charge.
The iPad 10th gen isn’t the first tablet I’d recommend over some of the other options here, but if you’re on a strict budget and don’t want to deal with an Android tablet, then this is a solid slate to get. Apple may update this iPad later this year, which could make the basic iPad even better.
Read our full iPad 2022 review
The best iPad for performance
Conversations about whether or not the iPad Pro can replace your laptop have been going on for years, but the iPad Pro 2024 might finally end such discussions. If you’re looking for an absolute powerhouse tablet that can rival a laptop’s performance, battery life and display quality, this is the slate for you.
This is my favorite iPad and the one I use as my daily driver. The main draw is the stunning 13-inch tandem OLED panel, with its inky blacks, vivid color, bright whites and overall sharp 2752 x 2064 resolution. I’m not being hyperbolic when I say this tablet’s display is every bit as good or better than many of the OLED laptops I’ve reviewed. It’s truly a sight to behold.
The Apple M4 processor might be overkill for a tablet but that laptop-like performance is what makes this worth considering as a laptop replacement. Whether it’s something demanding like exporting large video files or simpler tasks like web browsing, the iPad Pro 2024 can handle just about anything you throw at it, even gaming.
To use the iPad Pro 2024 as a laptop replacement, you’ll need the Magic Keyboard. Unfortunately, that peripheral costs a hefty $349 for the model compatible with the 13-inch iPad Pro. And if you want the Apple Pencil Pro, that’s an additional $129. Considering how this tablet starts at $1,299, the costly peripherals will put a bigger dent in your wallet.
Though expensive, the iPad Pro is worth it if you want a device that functions as both a laptop and a tablet. And even if you don’t, that gorgeous screen could be worth the asking price.
Read our full iPad Pro 2024 review
The best small iPad
All iPads are relatively easy to travel with but the humble iPad mini is the ideal tablet for when you’re out and about due to its small size, light weight and durable design. In my opinion, it’s the best iPad for reading novels and manga.
This is the most portable and lightweight iPad available, offering many of the same features as its bigger and stronger siblings. It has the iPad Air’s thin bezels, flat-edged design, and support for the Apple Pencil 2. Its A15 Bionic processor is blazing-fast and its battery life is shockingly good for a tablet this small. This tablet is a small wonder, to be sure.
This is something you might not notice, but the iPad mini’s biggest issue is that it suffers from an issue called “jelly scrolling.” This is an effect where both sides of the display scroll at different speeds. You can see this effect easier in portrait mode, and the different rates of scrolling create a noticeable wiggle as you’re trying to navigate up and down the page. Again, this isn’t a deal-break (I barely notice it myself), but it’s worth knowing about.
Reports claim we’ll see the iPad mini 7 announced later this year. This model will supposedly fix the jelly scrolling issue, along with introducing a spec bump to either an A16 or A17 Bionic chip. If that’s the case, then it might be better to wait for that newer model to arrive. But if you don’t want to wait, this is still an excellent iPad to get right now.
Read our full Apple iPad mini 6 (2021) review
How to choose the best iPad for you
I hope the choices above have helped you decide which iPad to get. But if you want more to consider, there are a few key questions you can ask yourself to further hone in on the best iPad for you.
How do you plan to use this iPad? Is it mostly going to stay within easy reach of the couch, and be used primarily for light entertainment like browsing Wikipedia, watching YouTube videos, or reading comics? Then you don’t need something as powerful as an iPad Pro. You’ll be perfectly happy with either model of the iPad Air. Heck, even the base iPad will suffice.
However, if you need a tablet for creative purposes or even to act as a laptop replacement (which requires the pricey Magic Keyboard), you should consider the premium-priced iPad Pro with M4. Both the current 11-inch and 13-inch models are incredibly performant due to packing Apple’s top-of-the-line processor. And if money is no object, the 13-inch model gives you extra screen space.
How much storage do you need? You can’t upgrade an iPad’s storage after you’ve purchased it, so it’s good to know how much you’ll need beforehand. If you plan to store a good amount of high-res videos and apps on your iPad, then the 64GB of storage the base iPad and iPad mini start with might not be enough—though you can upgrade each to 256GB. The iPad Air and iPad Pro start with 128GB and 256GB (respectively) and you can upgrade to as much as 1TB to 2TB (respectively).
Do you want cellular connectivity? Having an iPad that can access cellular data networks really improves your quality of life by letting you use Internet-reliant apps wherever you can get a signal. However, if you’re not planning on taking your iPad on the go, you’ll probably be just fine with a simple Wi-Fi-only model.
How we test iPads
We put the iPads we review through the same lab tests as the best iPhones, the best laptops—focusing on overall performance, display quality and battery life. Below is a quick summary of what each test is for:
- Performance: We use benchmarks such as Geekbench to test overall CPU performance, 3D Mark for 3D graphics, and Adobe Premiere Rush for video editing.
- Display: We use colorimeters and light meters to measure how colorful and bright these tablets’ screens can get. We measure both SDR and HDR brightness in nits, color representation in sRGB and DCI-P3 color gamuts (closer to 100% is best), and Delta-E for color accuracy (closer to 0 is best).
- Battery test: Our in-house battery test, which times how long it takes — while surfing the web with brightness at 150 nits — to drain a tablet of a charge.
After that, we do the same things you do — browse the web, watch YouTube, play games, compose emails — and then a lot more. We try and write some (or all) of our tablet reviews on the tablets we’re testing, on an attachable keyboard if possible. Nobody wants to write a magnum opus on a glass screen, after all (though no judgment if you do!).
iPad benchmarks compared
Knowing how our tests work and what we test for, here’s a table summarizing how the iPads on this list compare to one another in performance, display quality and battery life. Obviously, numbers don’t tell the entire tale, but they give you a good assessment of what these iPads can do in key performance areas.
Performance
| Header Cell – Column 0 | Geekbench (single/multi-core) | Adobe Premiere Rush (mins:secs) | 3D Mark Wild Life Extreme Unlimited (score / fps) |
|---|---|---|---|
| iPad 10 | 1578 / 4029 (Geekbench 5) | 0:26 | 1983 / 11.9 |
| iPad mini 6 | 1595 / 4550 (Geekbench 5) | 0:24 | 2446 / 14.6 |
| iPad Air M2 | 2600 / 10066 (Geekbench 6) | 0:21 | 5829 / 34.9 |
| iPad Pro M4 | 3700 / 14533 (Geekbench 6) | 0:19 | 8529 / 51.1 |
Display benchmarks
| Header Cell – Column 0 | iPad 10 | iPad mini 6 | iPad Air M2 | iPad Pro M4 |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Nits (brightness) | 504 | 520 | 572 | 561 |
| sRGB | 101.2% | 103.1% | 110.9% | 117.4% |
| DCI-P3 | 71.7% | 73.1% | 78.6% | 83.2% |
| Delta-E | 0.21 | 0.21 | 0.27 | 0.29 |
Battery life
| Header Cell – Column 0 | Time (hours:mins) |
|---|---|
| iPad 10 | 10:57 |
| iPad mini 6 | 10:56 |
| iPad Air M2 | 11:30 |
| iPad Pro M4 | 13:13 |
Best iPad apps
The best iPad apps can also make your iPad more useful. There are literally thousands of apps you can try out, which can make searching for apps daunting. But if you know what you intend to use the tablet for, such as for writing, drawing, and editing videos, you’ll have a good place to start.
I’ve listed some iPad apps I personally can’t live out below, but I encourage you to browse the Apple App Store for apps that suit your specific needs.
- Kindle for iPad (for reading books and comics purchased on Amazon)
- YouTube for iPad (for watching YouTube videos, naturally)
- Spotify (for music and podcasts)
- Google Chrome for iPad (for web-browsing)
- Alexa (to control my Alexa-supporting devices
Best iPad accessories
iPads work well on their own, but you can get even more use out of them with some handy accessories.
The best iPad cases are a good place to start since you’ll want to protect your iPad against accidents. If you want to use your iPad as a laptop replacement, you’ll definitely need an Apple Magic Keyboard. Lastly, you should get an Apple Pencil — or one of the best Apple Pencil alternatives if you want to write or draw on your iPad. And, if you really want to use your iPad as a laptop replacement, you’ll need one of the best iPad keyboards.
Here are some iPad accessories worth investing in, both from Apple and from trusted third-party retailers.
