M2 iPad Air review: The everything iPad

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The iPad Air has been a lot of things in the last decade-plus. In 2013 and 2014, the first iPad Airs were just The iPad, and the “Air” label simply denoted how much lighter and more streamlined they were than the initial 2010 iPad and 2011’s long-lived iPad 2. After that, the iPad Air 2 survived for years as an entry-level model, as Apple focused on introducing and building out the iPad Pro.

The Air disappeared for a while after that, but it returned in 2019 as an in-betweener model to bridge the gap between the $329 iPad (no longer called “Air,” despite reusing the first-gen Air design) and more-expensive and increasingly powerful iPad Pros. It definitely made sense to have a hardware offering to span the gap between the basic no-frills iPad and the iPad Pro, but pricing and specs could make things complicated. The main issue for the last couple of years has been the base Air's 64GB of storage—scanty enough that memory swapping doesn't even work on it— and the fact that stepping up to 256GB brought the Air too close to the price of the 11-inch iPad Pro.

Which brings us to the 2024 M2 iPad Air, now available in 11-inch and 13-inch models for $599 and $799, respectively. Apple solved the overlap problem this year partly by bumping the Air's base storage to a more usable 128GB and partly by making the 11-inch iPad Pro so much more expensive that it almost entirely eliminates any pricing overlap (only the 1TB 11-inch Air, at $1,099, is more expensive than the cheapest 11-inch iPad Pro).

I'm not sure I'd go so far as to call the new Airs the "default" iPad for most buyers—the now-$349 10th-gen iPad still does everything the iPad is best at for less money, and it's still all you really need if you just want a casual gaming, video streaming, and browsing tablet (or a tablet for a kid). But the M2 Air is the iPad that best covers the totality of everything the iPad can do from its awkward perch, stuck halfway between the form and function of the iPhone and the Mac.

Not quite a last-gen iPad Pro

The new iPad Airs have a lot in common with the M2 iPad Pro from 2022. They have the same screen sizes and resolutions, the same basic design, they work with the same older Magic Keyboard accessories (not the new ones with the function rows, metal palm rests, and larger trackpads, which are reserved for the iPad Pro), and they obviously have the same Apple M2 chip.

Performance-wise, nothing we saw in the benchmarks we ran was surprising; the M2's CPU and (especially) its GPU are a solid generational jump up from the M1, and the M1 is already generally overkill for the vast majority of iPad apps. The M3 and M4 are both significantly faster than the M2, but the M2 is still unquestionably powerful enough to do everything people currently use iPads to do.

That said, Apple’s decision to use an older chip rather than the M3 or M4 does mean the new Airs come into the world missing some capabilities that have come to other Apple products announced in the last six months or so. That list includes hardware-accelerated ray-tracing on the GPU, hardware-accelerated AV1 video codec decoding, and, most importantly, a faster Neural Engine to help power whatever AI stuff Apple’s products pick up in this fall’s big software updates.

The 13-inch Air’s screen has the same resolution and pixel density (2732×2048, 264 PPI) as the last-generation 12.9-inch iPad Pro. And unlike the 13-inch Pro, which truly is a 13-inch screen, Apple’s tech specs page says the 13-inch Air is still using a 12.9-inch screen, and Apple is just rounding up to get to 13.

The 13-inch Air display does share some other things with the last-generation iPad Pro screen, including P3 color, a 600-nit peak brightness. Its display panel has been laminated to the front glass, and it has an anti-reflective coating (two of the subtle but important quality improvements the Air has that the $349 10th-gen iPad doesn’t). But otherwise it’s not the same panel as the M2 Pro; there’s no mini LED, no HDR support, and no 120 Hz ProMotion support.

The new iPad Airs only work with the Apple Pencil Pro, partly because the magnets have been moved a bit to make space for the landscape-oriented webcam. The old second-gen Apple Pencil will still attach, but it won't actually pair with the tablet, and the magnets won't hold it in place as securely. Credit: Andrew Cunningham

The other place where the M2 Air falls short of the M2 iPad Pro is video encoding and decoding support. This is the exact same chip, but according to Apple’s spec pages, there’s no hardware acceleration for encoding, decoding, or even playing back ProRes video. The M2 MacBook Air still supports all the ProRes functionality despite not being “Pro,” so it’s not clear why the iPad Air is being held back here, even if it’s probably not super likely that most iPad Air owners will do much with ProRes video.

Finally, the M2 iPad Pro could be upgraded from 8GB to 16GB of RAM, as long as you bought the version with 1TB or more of storage. All versions of the M2 iPad Air top out at 8GB, no matter what storage configuration you buy. You may notice apps or Safari tabs reloading slightly more often than on an iPad with 16GB of memory, and memory-hungry apps may perform more slowly. But this isn’t something most people will notice.

Apple’s cheapest laptop replacement

The new iPad Airs use the same 2020-era Magic Keyboard as the older ones. It has the benefit of not breaking accessory compatibility, but you don't get the metal wrist rest or the function row. Credit: Andrew Cunningham

The 13-inch Air in particular could appeal to people who want to replace their laptops with an iPad. The screen is large enough, and the device is certainly fast enough. The price is OK, though you’ll need to factor in the cost of a keyboard attachment (if you just want a gigantic slab of glass to read on, the 13-inch Air is still fine, but I find the device just a bit too large and unwieldy if you plan to use only as a tablet).

There’s nothing new to report on Apple’s keyboard accessory for the new Airs, which is still the 2020-era Magic Keyboard and trackpad attachment and costs $299 for the 11-inch version and $349 for the 13-inch version. The accessory pretty much single-handedly wrecks the iPad’s value proposition as a laptop replacement, vaulting it over the $999 MacBook Air’s entry-level price.

Logitech’s Folio Touch keyboards are respectable alternatives, though their reliance on a kickstand makes them a bit less comfortable if you’re using the iPad on your lap. At $160 and $230 for 11- and 13-inch options, they each save you quite a bit of money compared to Apple’s keyboards, and I see them go on sale a bit more frequently. Other options exist if you want to take your chances on a no-name alternative from Amazon, but I can only vouch for what I have personally used. For the 13-inch Air, any case or keyboard that lists compatibility with the third- through sixth-generation 12.9-inch iPad Pro should work fine.

The cheapest way to go is to combine a cheap case with an external Bluetooth keyboard and a Bluetooth mouse, which is less convenient to travel with but can set you back as little as $70 or $80.

I’d still like to see Apple’s keyboard pricing get a bit closer to Microsoft’s—Surface keyboard pricing has also crept up over the years, but at $180, the Signature Keyboard is still a sight cheaper than the Magic Keyboard. But in any case, you do have a few viable options for using the iPad as a laptop via external accessories.

What frustrates me most about the iPad as a computer is some small software fit-and-finish things. It's the little floating autocorrect widget thing failing to get out of the way of the input field in apps sometimes, making it so you can’t interact with them. It’s the way the iPad version of Safari still can’t always predictably render a desktop webpage or the way that using apps in Split View mode can still cause small rendering problems. It’s the way you’ll occasionally interact with the multitasking interface without meaning to because so much of it is tied to text-less buttons or screen-edge swipes. It’s the way that trackpad and mouse support still feels inconsistent because some iPadOS apps support a desktop-like right-click (or two-finger click, on a trackpad), and others demand a long-click to simulate a long-press because they’re built to expect finger input.

I’m not looking to reopen the same old “is the iPad a computer” conversation that people have been having for basically as long as the iPad has been a thing. I'm just saying that this is very good laptop replacement-class hardware that still feels restricted by the software it’s running. And while hope springs eternal—the WWDC developers conference and iPadOS 18 are a mere month away—at this point in the tablet’s life, it seems likely that these annoyances and limitations will continue to exist indefinitely. That’s especially true now that the Vision Pro is here, definitively ending the iPad’s time as “the future of computing.”

My other small problem with the Air in particular, when being used in landscape mode with a keyboard attached, is that the Touch ID button isn’t in a particularly convenient place. The Touch ID button on a Mac is right where your fingers already are, and the Face ID scanner on an iPad Pro barely requires any active effort on the user’s part. On the Air, any time you trigger Apple Pay or an app that uses Touch ID for authentication, you’ll need to lift your arm to reach the sensor. It's not a huge deal, but it's still a small point of friction for the Air-as-laptop replacement.

All the iPad most people will need

The 13-inch M2 iPad Air (back) and the 11-inch M1 iPad Air (front). The 11-inch M2 Air will look exactly the same, but with the front-facing camera mounted in landscape orientation instead of portrait. Credit: Andrew Cunningham

The new iPad Airs are a great bridge between the basic $349 iPad and the technically impressive but much more expensive M4 iPad Pros. Both of the Airs are (relatively speaking) inexpensive enough to be justifiable for people who buy iPads mainly to watch or read things but also powerful enough to run the handful of high-end pro apps that Apple, Adobe, and a handful of others make available for iPadOS.

Unlike the M4 iPad Pro, they’re also priced low enough that they’re not competing directly with higher-end MacBook Airs or lower-end MacBook Pros, which makes unflattering comparisons between the capabilities of macOS and iPadOS slightly less relevant here. The 13-inch iPad Air is actually the same price that the original 12.9-inch iPad Pro from 2015 launched at, though the Air is smaller and lighter, dramatically faster, and includes four times the base and maximum storage. It’s an acknowledgment that the 12.9-inch Pro’s sustained price creep has left a hole in the lineup.

As a Mac user for many years, my biggest problem with the iPad Air as a laptop replacement is still iPadOS, which still feels more restrictive and less flexible than I need it to be. Apple could resolve this with software, but you could say that about virtually any iPad Pro released in the last nine years. Don't buy this or any iPad unless you already know you can live with the current limitations of iPadOS.

Presuming you have done that, the new Airs span many possible uses, from premium streaming screen to professional drawing tablet to laptop replacement. Their versatility means that the M2 iPad Air is definitely where you should start looking if you're buying an iPad, even if you end up going with a basic model or a Pro instead.

The good

High-quality hardware at a much lower price than the iPad Pro
Screens aren't OLED and aren't 120 Hz, but they're still very nice-looking LCD panels
More than fast enough to handle any app the iPad can run
New 13-inch model is a welcome addition for people who want a larger screen but don't want to pay iPad Pro prices
Supports the new Apple Pencil Pro and its extra functionality
Compatible with most older iPad Air and Pro cases and keyboards
Base storage starts at a more generous 128GB instead of 64GB

The bad

Not compatible with new Magic Keyboard or old Apple Pencil
M2 is still very good but not cutting-edge
Mac-class hardware still feels held back a bit by the limitations of iPadOS

The ugly

Pricey accessories automatically drive the price way up if you're shopping for a laptop replacement

Andrew Cunningham Senior Technology Reporter

Andrew is a Senior Technology Reporter at Ars Technica, with a focus on consumer tech including computer hardware and in-depth reviews of operating systems like Windows and macOS. Andrew lives in Philadelphia and co-hosts a weekly book podcast called Overdue.

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