Apple iPad Air (2020) - Review 2022
Apple's iPad line defines tablets for most people. iPads are powerful, widely known, and simple; most schools and businesses understand and cater to iPad users. This year, the $599 iPad Air offers so much more than than the $329 base iPad that it's worth taking the step upwardly if you can afford it. For the increase in price, yous go a larger screen, stronger audio, faster networking, a much more powerful processor, improve Apple Pencil support, and a superior build. That makes the fourth-generation iPad Air a skilful long-term investment and the best Apple tablet to buy in 2022. It also earns the iPad Air our Editors' Option award for high-end tablets.
I'g non going to spend this review explaining what an iPad is in general or going over the details of iPadOS—I encourage that you accept a look at our full iPadOS review if you want details. Rather, I'd like to tell you why this iPad is the one you want.
A High-End Pattern
With its difficult metal frame, the iPad Air looks and feels like an iPad Pro rather than the traditional rounded iPad. It's almost the same size every bit the current ten.2-inch iPad, although it's a impact slimmer and lighter. I think the original Air was a revelation when information technology clocked in at one pound, and this model sticks to that weight.
The Air fits a 10.9-inch, 2,360-by-ane,640 screen into the same body size as the ten.2-inch iPad by reducing the bezels. All iPads have 264ppi screens, so as they get larger, y'all just get more real estate; this screen, therefore, gives you but well-nigh as much surface area as the xi-inch iPad Pro. It's laminated with an anti-reflective coating that makes it much less reflective, and more than pleasantly usable, than the standard iPad's screen; it besides has Apple tree's wide color gamut, which I've never actually personally noticed.
The top and bottom of the tablet take powerful stereo speakers, which give real, two-channel stereo sound in landscape manner; on the lower-cost iPad, the speakers are but at the lesser. On the tiptop of the tablet, there'due south a really absurd innovation in the course of a ability push that doubles as a fingerprint sensor. This means the Air doesn't have to have a large bezel for a physical Dwelling button, just it can also apply a fingerprint sensor so you don't accept to futz around with trying to face-unlock the tablet when you're wearing a mask.
Unleash the Power
The new iPad Air uses an Apple A14 processor with 4GB of RAM and either 64GB or 256GB of storage. It's the fastest iPad available, and benchmarks faster than any Android device, too.
Here are the numbers: Our iPad Air scored 639,962 on the Antutu criterion; 595 on Basemark Spider web; 1,572 unmarried-core and three,931 multi-core on Geekbench 5; 108,481 on 3DMark Ice Tempest Unlimited; and 12,331 on Geekbench's GPU Compute benchmark.
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That'south 20 percent higher on Geekbench Multicore and 22 percent improve on web browsing than the Samsung Galaxy S20 Ultra, the about powerful Android device currently available. Information technology's 58 pct faster on Geekbench and 44 percent faster on Antutu than the base 2022 iPad. This is a super-fast chipset.
The 2022 models of the iPad Pro utilise an A12Z processor with viii CPU and viii graphics cores, as opposed to the A14's six CPU and iv graphics cores. Each of the A14 cores is better, but the A12Z has more of them, and then comparing the Air to the Pro is a mixed bag.
The Air scored about the same on 3DMark as the Pro and scored 25 pct amend on the Geekbench Compute benchmark, only got overpowered by sheer coreage on some of the other tests. The Pro scored xv percent alee of the Air on Antutu, and 16 percent better on Geekbench multi-cadre.
I don't have a Surface Go ii on hand for comparisons, but Geekbench's browser says that the Intel Core m3 version scores up to 1605 in multi-core—less than half of what the A14 accomplishes.
All of these numbers mean absolutely impeccable operation on the iPad Air. No matter what I was doing, whether information technology was video chats, action games, or Apple tree Pencil-enabled art programs, information technology was smooth and responsive.
The ane weak spot in this unabridged review is battery life: iPads have never been bang-up at screen-on time in our tests. This one managed to stream YouTube for just four hours, 45 minutes before needing a accuse, even shorter than previous models. I'm going to run another battery exam to see if that holds up and will update this department with my results.
The Zoom Machine
The iPad Air has a 12-megapixel chief camera, the same equally the main camera on the iPad Pro, and a 7-megapixel front-facing camera, again the same as the front camera on the Pro. The main camera is a bit of an improvement over the base of operations iPad'due south 8-megapixel sensor—information technology records 4K video rather than 1080p, and has better HDR and low-light capabilities.
But the existent news here—and one of the big reasons you desire this tablet in 2022—is the forepart-facing camera. The low-cost iPad has a grainy 1.two-megapixel camera that'southward meliorate than a laptop webcam, only not by much. The iPad Air has a 7-megapixel front camera with much stronger low-low-cal capabilities and makes you lot look infinitely better on Zoom calls.
In that location are ii big reasons to choose the iPad Air over another tablet or laptop for a Zoom lifestyle, and one critical reason not to. The Air's front end-facing camera is far ameliorate than any laptop's built-in camera, and it's amend than most consumer addition webcams, as well. Information technology handles low low-cal well and balances different lighting without making yous hideously shiny. The Wi-Fi connectivity is first-class—certainly better than an older laptop—and if y'all get the LTE version, you have a backup connectedness.
The problem is that iPadOS still doesn't multitask well. If you lot're making a Zoom, Google, or web video call and open a second window, it shuts off your camera. So it's incommunicable to follow a Zoom call and look like you're paying attention while you're really doing something else, which is critical for a lot of people. If yous're OK with the camera turning off, sound all the same works, so you tin can follow a lecture and even so take notes. Simply that just won't work for many meetings.
That puts the Surface Become 2, for case, ahead of the iPad Air simply considering it can run two windows on an equal basis. That said, my daughter would shiv me if I made her give up her iPad for a Windows laptop. She has a Windows laptop to exercise Adobe Creative Suite work on, and every time she boots it up, she gets assaulted with complicated settings and update letters. While I definitely prefer the power of Windows, I can see the argument for the simplicity of iPadOS—provided you're OK with this limitation.
Boosted Wi-Fi
The iPad Air comes in two networking models—a Wi-Fi-but base version and, every bit usual, a model with LTE added on for $130. This year'south iPads don't back up 5G, simply 5G doesn't brand a large difference correct now. Better Wi-Fi and 4G performance, on the other hand, does.
The Air uses the Wi-Fi and 4G chipsets from the iPad Pro line, which take significantly better functioning than the one in the base of operations iPad. The Air has Wi-Fi 6, which the base model doesn't, but you don't need a Wi-Fi half-dozen router to see the difference here.
Tested against a 500Mbps Wi-Fi v (802.11ac) connection, a weak 5GHz Wi-Fi point gave us 136Mbps on the iPad Air (nearly the same every bit on the Pro and most flagship smartphones right now), but just 20.6Mbps on the base of operations iPad. That's a big difference. Note that you need to exist using 5GHz Wi-Fi to come across this difference, as the two tablets have about the same performance when ratcheted down to 2.4GHz-merely mode.
The Air has ameliorate LTE and Bluetooth than the base iPad, likewise. The Bluetooth back up jumps from version 4.ii to version five.0 for longer range. And LTE back up adds bands 46 and 48, too known as LAA and CBRS. These are high-speed, in-city network bands that are used to give Wi-Fi or 5G-like speeds in inner-city areas.
Accessorizing the iPad Air
The iPad Air comes with a 20W USB-C ability adapter and a charging cable. It works with accessories for the 11-inch iPad Pro, including Apple'south Magic Keyboard ($299) and Smart Keyboard Folio ($179), as well every bit third-party keyboards like the Logitech Slim Page Pro ($119.99) and Logitech Folio Touch ($159). It also works with Bluetooth keyboards and mice, which is a much cheaper style to put together a virtual laptop; yous can go with the Logitech K480 keyboard ($49.99), which has a groove for the tablet, plus an M350 mouse ($29.99), for example.
If y'all're going to utilise the Air equally a main laptop for school, you admittedly demand a keyboard. The difference in text entry fluidity between using the on-screen keyboard and using a concrete keyboard is huge. But equally much as the tactile feel of the keys helps, you go dorsum all of the screen existent estate that was being used for the on-screen keyboard.
Apple tree's keyboards are excellent but very expensive. I actually adopt the Smart Keyboard Folio to the Magic Keyboard; the Magic Keyboard includes a trackpad, simply it's expensive and stiff. Having used both trackpad-enabled and non-trackpad-enabled iPad keyboards for a while, I have back my onetime insistence that trackpads actually matter when working on an iPad; it doesn't actually carp me to tap the screen.
The iPad Air also works with the $129, second-generation Apple tree Pencil stylus, which is notably superior to the offset-generation Pencil compatible with the entry-level iPad.
The 2d-generation Pencil has a smooth, dry out feel and isn't completely round, and so it doesn't whorl around in your mitt and won't roll off a table. It also attaches and charges on the side of your iPad magnetically, which makes it much harder to lose with several iPads kicking around the house.
The Air lacks the iPad Pro's 120Hz ProMotion display with 240Hz impact sampling, and in lab tests, that does mean a less responsive stylus. Simply in real life, you lot don't notice. I gave both the Air and the Pro to my wife, an artist and fine art teacher, and she couldn't tell the difference in terms of responsiveness. Brushes in Procreate on the two devices do act a little differently, only nosotros can't say that one is better than the other.
Of class, the iPad Air tin likewise be protected (and personalized) with a plethora of cases.
The iPad Air, Compared
I've spent most of this review comparing the Air only to the base of operations model iPad. What about Android or Windows tablets, you might inquire? The Air is priced similarly to Samsung'south Galaxy Tab S7 and to the college-end version of the Microsoft Surface Go ii. Yet you lot don't hear a lot of people comparing the three devices adjacent. Why is that?
In terms of the Tab S7, there just isn't a big community or a lot of software back up around Android tablets, unfortunately. That means powerful artistic apps similar Photoshop, Illustrator, and Procreate are bachelor for iPads and not for Android tablets. Video editing apps are definitely better on iPad. Most schools support the iPad by default, but not necessarily Android tablets. The Microsoft Office suite and Google's deject office suite are about the same on the two platforms, but unless you're an all-Android household, it's actually hard to make an argument to get the Tab S7 over the better-supported iPad.
The argument around Windows machines is more than circuitous. The iPad is faster, smoother, and more powerful—purely from a hardware perspective—than the Surface Get ii. It boots much more quickly, crashes less often, and is less decumbent to annoying malware. On the other hand, the Surface Go 2 can run 2 programs at once. It's absolutely ridiculous that you lot can't do a video call on the iPad while simultaneously editing a certificate, and if that'south a deal billow feature for you, I get information technology.
The Best iPad for 2022
The iPad Air is the all-time value amid Apple'due south iPad lineup, and a slam-dunk for tablet of the twelvemonth. The lower-cost iPad is still very good, listen yous; nosotros just think the upsell is worth it, especially because this is a tablet you lot're going to be hanging onto for years. It's not only about the A14 processor; the less-reflective display is a large improvement, the compatible Pencil is harder to lose, and the ameliorate Wi-Fi makes a major difference in daily performance. The iPad Air is also good enough that it's impossible to justify the higher cost of an iPad Pro. So if you can beget it, the iPad Air is the right model to buy now, every bit well equally our Editors' Choice winner for high-end tablets.
Source: https://sea.pcmag.com/tablets/39954/apple-ipad-air-2020
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