Today is the official release date for the iPad mini 7. This is the first new iPad mini released after 2021. It has a much faster chip and a few other tweaks, so I thought I’d check it out and give it a try. A quick review.
Apple hasn’t changed the design of the iPad mini 7 compared to the iPad mini 6, so it’s difficult to tell from the outside. The colors are more subdued this time around, with Apple removing the pink and adding blue, and the text on the back says “iPad mini” instead of “iPad.” Otherwise, the iPad mini 6 and iPad mini 7 are identical.
Under the hood, there’s a faster A17 Pro chip, which is a noticeable improvement over the A15 Bionic, but depending on what you do with your iPad mini, you might not notice a huge performance increase. Possibly. If you want to play games, it’s not only much faster, it also adds support for ray tracing and mesh shading, features that enable console-quality games like Death Stranding.
The A17 Pro’s main draw is its support for Apple Intelligence, with the first AI features expected to arrive in iPadOS 18.1 next week. For now, Apple Intelligence is limited to writing tools, a new look for Siri, summaries, and smart replies, but iPadOS 18.2, an update Apple started testing today, adds Genmoji, Image Playground, ChatGPT integration, and more. It is scheduled to be done.
At $499, the iPad mini 7 is something of a niche product, as it’s only $100 cheaper than the more capable and larger M2 iPad Air. Unless you specifically need the smaller 8.3-inch size for portability, it’s not worth choosing the iPad mini over the iPad Air.
With all the changes under the hood, the iPad mini 7 is a rather boring update, and there’s not much to say about it. Along with the A17 Pro, you get 8GB RAM (up to 4GB), Wi-Fi 6E support (to connect to faster 6GHz networks when available), Bluetooth 5.3, faster USB-C transfer speeds, and Apple Pencil. Pro support, and 128GB or more available. Base starting storage.
Have you bought or are planning to buy an iPad mini 7? Let us know what you think in the comments section below.
