Apple iPad 2018 review

Apple's 2018 model iPad was launched with a strong education focus, as Apple seeks to drive away competitor devices such as Windows 2-in-1 tablets and Chromebooks from its education heartland.

However, it's by no means an education-exclusive device, and with its minor upgrades in power and addition of Apple Pencil support, it's a compelling proposition in its own right.

Still, it sits in the shadow of Apple's far more expensive and shiny Apple iPad Pro 10.5. That creates a situation where a consumer after an iOS tablet has a choice to make because Apple typically reserves the best mix of features and price points for its truly premium products.

Except in this case, because with very limited exceptions, anyone considering the iPad Pro 10.5 right now should instead pocket the substantial price difference and opt for the 2018 6th generation iPad instead. That's a perspective that may change if Apple releases an updated iPad Pro this year, but for now, the standalone iPad is powerful enough for most users.

Design

• Near-identical design to 2017's iPad
• Supports all accessories and peripherals from the previous model

• Read our full review of the iPad 2018's design

  Apple didn't really reinvent the tablet with the 2017 iPad, borrowing the essential design notes of its own predecessor, the iPad Air. The big design news for the 2018 model iPad is that absolutely nothing has changed.

  Really, there's no difference whatsoever in physical terms between this year's iPad and last year's model. That's undoubtedly a huge cost saver in construction terms for Apple, but that should really only fuss you if you happen to own Apple shares.

  What it means in practical terms is that existing peripherals should fit the 2018 model precisely as well as they did the 2017 version. There's a noticeable air gap in the screen display that's not present on the iPad Pro models, and it's slightly thicker than the iPad Air family that the 2017 iPad itself replaced.

  

  The 2018 iPad measures in at 240 x 169.5 x 7.5mm, weighing in at either 469g or 478g, depending on whether you opt for the lighter Wi-Fi only model or the LTE-enabled Wi-Fi+Cellular variant. By way of comparison, its closest relative, the 10.5 inch iPad Pro weighs in at 469/477g with measurements of 250.6 x 174.1 x 6.1mm.

  That lack of change means that everything you'd expect to see on an iPad is exactly where you'd expect to find it, from side mounted volume buttons to a top mounted power switch and nano-SIM slot if you opt for the Wi-Fi+Cellular model.

  You don't get a connector for the iPad Pro's fancy Apple-built smart keyboard, but it's not as though Bluetooth tablet keyboards are a scarce commodity anyway.

  

  You're also still committing to Apple's position of never offering iOS devices with expandable storage, which makes the 128GB model (as tested) arguably a much better option than the 32GB one, simply because you can't easily upgrade the new iPad in any way that all apps will understand.

  Yes, there are lightning-connected or Wi-Fi drives you can buy, but they are all clunky solutions that don't work as seamlessly as internal storage would. Apple, no doubt, would be happy to sell you increasing quantities of iCloud storage to fill that particular gap.

Camera

• No improvements over 2017's camera tech
• Acceptable, but not particularly great for anything other than basic photography

• See sample photos and read our full review of the iPad 2018's camera

  Just as on the design front, Apple hasn't made any significant changes to the camera on the 2018 iPad iteration, which means you're looking at optics that are seriously dated in a mobile sense now.

  Apple's own iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X have amongst the world's best mobile cameras, but the 2018 iPad's camera is straight out of the iPhone 5 era. Realistically, tablets make for lousy cameras simply from a framing and comfort arrangement, but that doesn't mean that somebody won't use the 2018 iPad as their camera of choice.

  The iPad's camera is at least good enough for AR-based apps to utilise it, which ties in neatly with Apple's positioning for the new iPad as an education-centric tool for schools that want to play in the AR space.

  If you really must use the iPad as a standalone camera, what you'll get are shots that are OK in fine lighting and predictably terrible the further you push lighting or zoom conditions. Here's some sample shots from the 2018 iPad:

  Apple iPad 2018 Sample Photos

  
  
  
  
  
  

Performance

• Now supports Apple Pencil for graphic designers
• Processor upgrade delivers considerably faster performance than 2017's iPad
• TouchID sensor is a little slow to respond

• See test results and read our full review of the iPad 2018's performance

  If there's no difference from the outside of the new iPad, then why would you buy one?

  The answer lies under the 9.7 inch 2048 x 1536 pixel display because that's where Apple has made two major changes from last year's iPad.

  The first is to add the necessary touchscreen controller for Apple Pencil support, giving the new iPad compatibility with Apple's pricey stylus.

  However, the Apple Pencil is not bundled in the box so if you do want to get artistic, or use any of the Pencil-supported iOS tablet apps, you'll have to fork out an additional $145 for the privilege, or slightly less if you happen to be an educational institution.

  Apple Pencil works very well with apps that intelligently make use of a pressure-sensitive stylus, such as photo editing applications or art apps. At the higher end, the added reflectivity and less accurate display on the new iPad compared to the iPad Pro could be a problem for some, but for most users, it will be more than adequate.

  It's fairly likely that most iPads will sell without an Apple Pencil, but for those owners, the shift up to Apple's A10 Fusion CPU will be the major upgrade of note. That still leaves the regular iPad predictably trailing the iPad Pro family in pure power terms, while providing a much needed power boost against last year's model.

  Benchmarks can be a useful guideline as to relative performance, although the smaller pool of available Android tablets in the local market makes benchmark comparison tricky. We've included Huawei's low-cost Mediapad to give you an entry level performance comparison, as well as Google's no-longer-sold Pixel C, simply because it's one of the few Android 8.0 ("Oreo") tablets, allowing us to make a like-for-like comparison at an operating system level:

  Here's how that suite of tablets compare using 3DMark's Slingshot Extreme benchmark:

  Here the iPad is outclassed by Google's much older Pixel C, showing the power of software optimisations. The Huawei Mediapad can't run Slingshot Extreme, but it's a good example of a lower-cost Android tablet that we've used for comparisons above.

  Again, though, Apple's own tight iOS code and the efforts of its developers do give it a performance edge, simply because apps on an iPad behave consistently, where in the Android space it's a question of how each and every app has been optimised against many possibilities.

  The 2018 iPad compares well against its field, and especially against last year's model. There's still a power gulf between the iPad and iPad Pro, and one that you'll notice primarily if you make significant use of iOS 11's multi-tasking features. Where the iPad Pro can keep multiple apps humming along in Slide-Over and picture-in-picture modes, the 2018 iPad will rather quickly draw focus to just a couple of them.

  Apple is very keen to position the iPad as a productivity and education tool, but the reality here is that it's still a weaker solution than a full Mac laptop if true multi-tasking is your objective. Yes, the 2018 iPad has less grunt than the iPad Pro, but realistically this isn't going to impinge on your usage to any substantial degree.

  

  Where the 2018 iPad really sells itself is by comparison to the rest of the tablet market, simply because Apple has long had a stranglehold on really good tablet-centric app development.

  One of the real challenges in the tablet market comes from the very simple fact that while there are tablet-style alternatives to the iPad, there's not much that actively compares favourably.

  Android tablets exist as a class, but the wide variance in specifications makes utilising a given app something of a roll of the dice in terms of compatibility with resolutions, or even if it will run in the first place. There's no such issue with an iPad.

  Likewise, while Windows tablets, especially two-in-one devices, have a wide variety of applications and do support proper multi-tasking, actual touch input is rather hit-and-miss, more often veering towards miss.

  Apps that will run on the 2018 iPad will do so natively and well, and there's a wide variety of choice present here. Where the gulf in performance terms last year between the 9.7 inch iPad and the 9.7, 10.5 or 12.9 inch iPad Pros was quite palpable, you're not going to see the same kind of lag in real world use. Indeed, unless you do put them side by side to time the difference in app opening speed, you probably wouldn't notice it at all.

  One key difference you would quickly notice is in the quality of the TouchID sensor. Again, iFixit's teardown tells the story here, because Apple certainly won't admit out loud that it's using the older generation of TouchID sensors on the basic iPad lines. What that equates to is noticeably slower fingerprint recognition. Thanks to iOS' two-tap unlocking process, I was left wondering more than once if a reading was even happening and tended to resort to PIN unlocking more often than I would have liked.

Battery

• Still delivers the 10-hour battery life iPads are known for

• Read our full review of the iPad 2018's battery

  Apple's claim for iPad battery life hasn't veered much away from a claimed "up to 10 hours" for years now, and the new 2018 iPad is no exception. Any time a vendor utters the words "up to" you've got to be nervous, because it gives them a lot of wriggle room for when you don't hit that target mark.

  Apple's control over both hardware and software does give it a significant edge when it comes to eking out every last bit of battery life. A teardown from iFixit shows that it's using a 32.9Wh battery, the same one as found in last year's iPad.

  Given the lack of design innovation present, that's hardly a surprise, but then the new iPad has a better processor to run, not to mention that Apple Pencil digitiser, so I was keen to run it through its paces.

  Geekbench 4's mobile battery benchmark isn't exactly written with tablets in mind, but it can give a decent straight line performance indication. Here the 2018 iPad managed a very respectable 9:51 of battery life with an overall battery life score of 5910. Most of our prior battery life tests were performed with the older Geekbench 3 battery life test so aren't directly comparable in a numerical sense, but the key takeaway is still one of good battery life overall.

  That's certainly borne out in day to day testing, where the 2018 iPad can keep going for many hours of light use, and even a respectable number if you push a lot of heavy apps at it. Recharging is via Apple's own proprietary Lightning interface, and while wireless charging arrived for the iPhone 8, iPhone 8 Plus and iPhone X last year, there's no sign of it on Apple's first tablet for 2018.

Verdict

• Simply one of the best tablets you can buy

Apple didn't drop the price on the 2018 model iPad from its 2017 incarnation, and it didn't radically redesign it, either. However, what it did do was give it a solid processor upgrade that brings it more into line with the iOS 11 feature set, as well as adding Apple Pencil compatibility for the crowd that's going to want that.

The end result, once you take pricing into consideration, is the conclusion that this is easily the best tablet that you can buy. Yes, the iPad Pro has a nicer screen, speakers and TouchID sensor, but the gulf in performance isn't that great between them, and the gulf in pricing could more accurately be described as a chasm. A 64GB iPad Pro 10.5 will cost you $979, more than twice the price of the entry-level Wi-Fi 32GB iPad. Even if you do bump up the storage to 128GB, you're looking at $599/$799, well below the entry-level iPad Pro price for a tablet that will meet at least 90% of the target market's needs.

Pricing and availability

The Apple iPad sells in 32GB and 128GB variants, with either Wi-Fi or Wi-Fi+Cellular (ie 4G LTE) compatibility. The new 2018 iPad is available to purchase outright through Apple or its reseller network now at the following price points:

Telstra is also offering the Wi-Fi+Cellular model on 24 month contract terms. We've analysed the value of those plans here if you're keen on a new iPad and a mobile data plan to go with it.

Alternatives

If all you want and need is a web browsing device with light social media duties, just about any Android tablet would fulfil your needs, right down to the cheapest models, although you wouldn't get the range of quality iOS tablet applications on that platform.

In the iOS space, you could alternatively opt for the Apple iPad Mini 4, but unless you absolutely, positively had to fill a space that only a 7.9 inch tablet can fill, there's really not much point in doing so.

For the same price range you could pick up the 2018 iPad with a much better processor and, frankly, a better future ahead of it. It's not hard to see the iPad Mini line living on borrowed time, and that means it's likely to drop off the future iOS upgrade pathway before the new iPad does.

Then there's the iPad Pro family. They have still got their space for those who want better colour accuracy in their image representation, or for those who need the screen space of the massive 12.9 inch iPad Pro. However, for the iPad Pro 10.5 inch it's a somewhat tough sell when so many of its features are now found in the regular and much cheaper iPad.

If you're a heavy iPad user looking to use the 10.5 inch iPad Pro as your only computer, the more effective multi-tasking might be enough of a draw on its own, as might the improved display. Still, you might be better served waiting until Apple announces a 2018 iPad Pro refresh, at which point a larger performance gap to justify the price bump should occur.

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