{"menuItems":[{"label":"The best drawing tablets in Australia","anchorName":"#the-best-drawing-tablets-in-australia"},{"label":"Methodology","anchorName":"#method"}]}
Finder's team looked into dozens of drawing tablets to select the best ones for anyone from beginner drawers to professional animators. We carefully looked through product information and read heaps of customer reviews to determine which options fit best in each category.
Wacom has set the standard in the drawing tablet space and it's clear to see why with the Intuos Pro. With heaps of customisable features and a stellar pro-grade pen packed into the one appealing package, the Intuos Pro is the best overall drawing tablet on the market.
The pen is arguably the most important part of any drawing experience, and luckily you won't be disappointed by Wacom's included Pro Pen 2. You'll find 8,192 levels of pressure sensitivity on the pen, which is just about the highest amount you'll find with these consumer-grade graphics tablets. It'll also recognise when you've got it on an angle for extra precision.
Connecting your devices to the Intuos Pro is a breeze. It's easy to go old school and hook the tablet up via its included 2-metre USB cable, or you could choose to work wirelessly with Bluetooth instead. Some users found the Bluetooth connection was a little laggy at times, so you might want to avoid that where you can. Still, once you're connected, you'll be able to set up the tablet exactly how you like it. It's got several customisable keys (called ExpressKeys) that let you quickly adjust settings and activate tools like the eraser.
The Intuos Pro is available in 3 sizes, giving you plenty of flexibility to choose an option that best suits your set-up. The small version starts at a relatively reasonable price of $399 and the medium model is only an extra $150. The large version is pretty costly at $799, double the cost of the small.
The Intuos Pro is loved by many, earning itself a 4.6 out of 5 rating from more than 400 reviews on Google. Customers praised the device for its overall quality and usefulness for photo editing. Some ran into app compatibility issues.
Making your own art doesn't have to be expensive, a fact proven by Huion's popular HS64 tablet. With a super-portable design and customisable keys built into the tablet, it's the best cheap drawing tablet on the market.
Plenty of drawing tablets have customisable buttons, but they're mostly reserved for more expensive devices. Despite being the cheapest tablet on the list, the HS64 has 4 different customisable buttons that you can set to help speed up your workflow.
The HS64 is super small, and that makes it easy to move around your workspace or even take with you when you're on the go. It weighs just 258 grams, which is almost the same weight as an iPhone 13 Pro Max, and it's easy to stow in a bag since it's just 8mm thick.
The downside of such a portable tablet is you've got seriously limited room for drawing. It's one of the tiniest tablets on this list, with a working space that covers an area of 6.3 x 4 inches. That's pretty much the standard for small-sized tablets and is great for anyone limited in desk space, but it might make drawing a little cramped at times.
You'll be able to connect the HS64 to your devices with the included USB cable, but unlike some other graphics tablets, there's no wireless or Bluetooth connectivity here. On the plus side, it's pretty easy to connect to Android devices thanks to an included adapter.
Despite its affordable price point, the HS64 received a high rating of 4.5 out of 5 from more than 2,200 users on Amazon. Buyers loved its ease of use, but several customers ran into issues connecting the tablet to their devices.
Everyone has to start somewhere, and the One by Wacom (not to be confused with the Wacom One) is a stellar pick if you're starting on your creative journey. With a quick and easy set-up process, plenty of features and a low price, the One by Wacom is the best drawing tablet for beginners.
Getting started with the One by Wacom is simple. All it takes is plugging in the tablet, installing its drivers and restarting your system. Once that's done, you'll have all the tools you need to begin your drawing adventure.
The One by Wacom is a top pick for those just starting with graphics tablets since it's affordable. Retailing for just $89, it's one of the cheapest picks on this list, and that means if you decide digital drawing is just not your thing, you haven't thrown hundreds of dollars down the drain in the process.
The pen included with the One by Wacom is hardly the best the company has to offer. It's got just 2,048 pressure levels, which is a quarter of the 8,192 found on Wacom's Pro Pen 2. That shouldn't be as much of a concern for beginners, but as your skills get more advanced, you might find yourself being held back a little by the tablet and its pen.
Customisable buttons are nowhere to be seen on the One by Wacom. That means you'll have to resort to using another input device, like a mouse or keyboard, to change settings. That's probably not too concerning for beginners, but like the pen's shortcomings, it certainly could make life difficult as time goes on.
Wacom's cheapest tablet is loved by its users, earning a review score of 4.7 out of 5 from more than 400 customers on Google. Buyers appreciated the tablet's compact size and simple design but thought it felt a little cheap.
Despite its status as a newcomer to the drawing tablet market, Xencelabs sure knows how to make a remarkable product. With flexible connectivity and customisation at your fingertips, the Xencelabs Pen Tablet is the best mid-range drawing tablet on the market.
Like most tablets, you can connect it via USB, but there's also a wireless mode if wires aren't your thing. Cutting the cord switches you to the tablet's battery, but you won't run out of juice during your workday since Xencelabs says it'll last 16 hours on a single charge. Unfortunately, wireless connectivity requires a separate dongle to work, so you can't save yourself a USB port by switching to wireless like you could if the tablet supported Bluetooth.
The included pen is fantastic, with a full 8,192 pressure levels and 3 customisable buttons that'll let you quickly and easily adjust settings as you work. If you want extra buttons, you'll have to splash a bit more cash. Xencelabs offers a Quick Keys remote that allows users to add up to 40 customisable keys, but it's not exactly cheap. It's available separately for around $179.99, or you can get it in a bundle with the tablet for $499.99.
Regardless of the company's age, Xencelab's Pen Tablet is well-reviewed by users. It's got a 4.2 out of 5 rating from more than 20 reviews on Amazon, where buyers say they get excellent battery life from the tablet. Others ran into a few issues with the way the pen registered some strokes.
Pro-grade devices are often quite pricey, but it's often worth the expense when you're working at such a high level. Wacom's Cintiq Pro 24 Touch commands a high price, but its roomy 4K display and stellar included accessories make it the best pick for professionals in need of a new drawing tablet.
The main appeal of a device like this is the screen, and it's a big one. The IPS panel is 23.6 inches diagonally across, giving you plenty of real estate for sketching. It also boasts a 4K resolution, 10-bit colour and 99% coverage of the Adobe RGB colour gamut. All of that screen adds a lot of weight. The Cintiq Pro 24 weighs 7.2kg, so you can't exactly move it around all that easily, and you certainly can't travel with it.
While the Cintiq Pro 24 is great, its asking price is alarmingly high at $3,999. At least you get a little more in the box than just a tablet. The most advanced pen in Wacom's line-up, the Pro Pen 2, is included alongside an ExpressKey Remote. The pen has almost everything you could ask for, with 8,192 pressure levels, great tilt recognition and a battery-free design. And the remote? That's got 17 customisable buttons and a touch ring so you can set up your tablet to suit your workflow. If 17 buttons aren't enough, you can buy extra ExpressKey Remotes and connect up to 5 at a time.
Wacom's top-of-the-line pen display earned a 4.2 out of 5 rating from more than 90 reviews on Google. Users said the tablet felt high quality but complained that the touch functionality was a little lacking.
Kids are full of creativity, and Wacom's Intuos can help them bring their dreams to life. With an excellent (and colourful) design and relatively low cost, the Small version is the best drawing tablet you can buy for your young ones.
The design of the Intuos is masterful. It takes up very little space, with a total size of just 20 x 16 centimetres. That'll make it easy to store whenever it's not being used, and its 230-gram weight means it won't be a pain to move around either. There are even multiple colours, so your kids can choose whether black, berry or pistachio suits their style best.
While the compact nature of the Intuos makes it super convenient, it means you're a little limited for space when drawing. The tablet's active area is just 15.2 x 9.5 centimetres, far smaller than an A4 sheet of paper.
The small version of the Intuos costs $129 at retail, which is pretty cheap as far as great quality drawing tablets go. If you fancy a larger drawing space, the medium model will cost you a whopping $170 extra. Bluetooth is also an added expense, setting you back an extra $50 on both models.
Plenty of people use the Intuos, and based on its 4.5 out of 5 rating from more than 1,400 reviews on Google, it's safe to say most of them love it. Buyers praised the tablet for its sleek design and easy customisability, but several customers said the included instructions weren't clear.
You don't need a massive device to make great art. With a lightweight design and high-end performance, Apple's iPad mini is the best compact drawing tablet you can buy.
Even though it's a tablet, the iPad mini is absurdly light. It's so light that it's pretty close to matching the weight of the iPhone 13 Pro Max. It's just 55 grams heavier than the top-of-the-line phone in Apple's line-up and is an astonishing 389 grams lighter than the 12.9-inch iPad Pro.
The small size of the iPad mini is deceiving when it comes to performance. On the inside, it's rocking an A15 Bionic processor, the same chip that powers the iPhone 13. That's more than enough power to run basically anything you like without getting close to the limits of what it can handle.
Like all of Apple's other iPads, there are no special accessories to be found in the box. That means you'll have to go out and spend another $199 on the Apple Pencil 2 if you're going to make the most of the tablet's artistic potential.
The base model iPad mini comes with just 64GB of storage space and, as we mentioned in our review, that is not exactly ideal for a tablet. There is a 256GB option, but that drives the price up to $979. Ouch.
The tiny tablet has a lot of fans, earning a 4.7 out of 5 rating from more than 600 reviews on Google. Buyers loved that the iPad mini now uses a USB-C port instead of the Lightning jack many used to see on Apple devices, but others took issue with the screen's "jelly scrolling" issues.
If you need a drawing tablet and a fully functioning laptop all in one, it's hard to go past one of Microsoft's Surface devices. With its phenomenal new PixelSense Flow screen and a flexible 2-in-1 design, the Surface Pro 8 is the best PC drawing tablet on the market.
The Surface Pro line-up is iconic for its 2-in-1 design, and it's just as good as ever on the Surface Pro 8. The detachable keyboard allows you to transform the device from a conventional laptop to a tablet in seconds, and the solid kickstand gives you almost 180 degrees of flexibility to set up your device comfortably and conveniently for drawing.
Even when you're not drawing away, you'll be able to appreciate the Surface's phenomenal new screen. In our review, we found the new PixelSense Flow panel to be a cracking upgrade over the old 60Hz affair that was standard for countless generations, with the faster 120Hz refresh rate providing for much smoother animations.
While all of that is great, both the keyboard and pen are sold separately. So if you want to be drawing and typing, you'll need to give Microsoft even more money. The Surface Pro 8 wasn't a cheap device to begin with, given the base model costs $1,649. If you want the model with all the beans, you'll be looking at a $3,299 price tag before you buy accessories.
It's still a fairly new device, but the Surface Pro 8 is doing well for itself in the user reviews department. It's got a 4.5 out of 5 rating on Google from more than 100 reviews, and we gave it 3.5 stars in our review of the device. Buyers loved the Surface's gorgeous new display but complained about its price.
Animating anything can be a long and arduous process, but Wacom has a tool to help you perfect each frame. With a remarkable and highly sensitive pen at a significantly lower price than the company's other pen displays, Wacom's Cintiq 16 is the best drawing tablet for animation.
Having a top-notch pen is essential for an artist, and luckily Wacom bundles its best with the Cintiq 16. The Pro Pen 2 is the same one included on Wacom's top-of-the-line products and features 8,192 pressure levels and fantastic tilt recognition. It's battery-free, so there's no need to worry about charging, and it's super lightweight, preventing discomfort during long drawing sessions.
The screen on the Cintiq 16 isn't the best you'll have ever seen. It earns points for being an IPS panel, which should theoretically give it more vibrant colours, but it's only 1080p, lacks touch support and doesn't quite cover 100% of the sRGB colour space. While the screen isn't winning any awards for its resolution and colour accuracy, it'll still do the job for most people. And unlike Wacom's higher-resolution pen displays, the Cintiq 16 fits in a more reasonable price bracket. At its retail price of $999, it's a whole $1,200 cheaper than the same size Pro model.
Wacom seems to have nailed it with the Cintiq 16, with the device earning a 4.6 out of 5 rating from more than 500 reviews on Google. Buyers complimented the tablet for its subtle texture and overall quality but expressed concerns with the lower resolution display.
If you unleash your creativity in Photoshop, Apple's largest iPad will work wonders for you. With a blisteringly quick processor and a jawdroppingly pretty Liquid Retina XDR display, the 12.9-inch iPad Pro M1 is the best drawing tablet you can buy for use with Adobe Photoshop.
Powered by the rapid M1 chip made famous by the MacBook Pro, the new iPad Pro is a mobile performance machine. With all that grunt, you can do things that are impossible on many other tablets, like run the full version of Adobe Photoshop. It's not a stripped-down version of the program like many of Adobe's other mobile apps are; it's the real deal. And it runs like a dream.
The iPad Pro's screen is a showstopper. We extensively praised the Liquid Retina XDR display in our review because of its fantastic contrast and stellar sharpness, something you'll notice as soon as you pick up the device for the first time. It's ideal for any situation, from scrolling in bright environments to drawing late into the night.
The iPad Pro is by no means a perfect device, though. It gets points for using a USB-C connector rather than Apple's Lightning port, but it's only got one of them. This limits how much you can hook up to it without dongles. Dongles aren't cheap or included, and neither is the Apple Pencil, which is a must for any artist.
There's no doubt that Apple's high-spec iPad Pro is one of the most loved devices on this list, especially considering its 4.8 out of 5 rating from more than 4,000 reviews on Google. Users celebrated the device's super bright display, but some were disappointed with its battery life.
Apple has long had a strong reputation for all things creative, and that extends to drawing. While it wasn't made with art in mind, the latest iPad Air is a large and powerful device without the eyewatering price tag associated with the iPad Pro, making it the best Apple device you can use as a drawing tablet.
The iPad Air packs a punch in the performance category. It uses the A14 Bionic processor, the same one found in the iPhone 12, which was (and still is) one of the most powerful chips found on mobile devices. It's speedy enough to run essential apps like Adobe Photoshop, and like the other iPads on this list, it supports the second-generation Apple Pencil. That does cost extra, though.
The iPad Air is let down by its included storage, which for the base model is just 64GB. As we found in our review, that's simply not enough room for a tablet. If you're in dire need of a tablet with more space, you'll have to splurge and grab the 256GB model for significantly more cash.
If you've gotten used to using Face ID on an iPhone, you'll have to adapt to unlocking the iPad Air differently. Unfortunately, facial recognition is only available on the iPad Pro, so you'll be forced to use a standard password or use the built-in fingerprint scanner instead. Still, the iPad Air is $750 cheaper than the 12.9-inch iPad Pro, so you can see why Apple has had to cut corners somewhere.
Like most Apple products, the iPad Air is a very highly rated product. It's got a 4.6 out of 5 rating from more than 12,000 reviews on Google, with customers praising the device for its slim design and pretty colour options, but some weren't happy that the device doesn't come with Face ID.
Android tablets aren't your stereotypical drawing machines, but Samsung is trying to change that. With a massive, responsive display and Samsung's fabulous S Pen included in the box, the Galaxy Tab S7+ is the best Android drawing tablet on the market.
Samsung has always included stunning screens on its tablet, and it's no different this time around. The 12.4-inch display runs at a super crisp 2800x1752 resolution, supports HDR10+ for vivid colours and has a 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio which produces true-to-life dark tones. It also runs at 120Hz, so motion is always fluid.
Despite being a remarkable tablet, the Tab S7+ gets let down by Android. It's simply not as complete for artists and creative types as iPadOS and lacks heaps of apps you might want to use. The big killer here is the lack of Photoshop. That's only available on Windows, MacOS and iPadOS.
While it might not have the same calibre of apps as Apple's tablets, Samsung does include its pen with the Tab S7+. The S Pen is simply great, offering users plenty of features both in and out of drawing applications. It'll magnetically attach to the back of the device when it's not in use, too.
The Tab S7+ isn't exactly a more affordable alternative to Apple's offerings, with the device starting at $1,449. It's even more expensive if you want the 5G version, with the top-of-the-line configuration costing a whopping $1,949.
The Galaxy Tab S7+ is one of the most popular options on this list, with a superb 4.8 out of 5 rating from more than 6,600 reviews on Google. That rating puts it on par with the iPad Pro, with users praising the S Pen for its usefulness and versatility. Some felt limited by Android, both in terms of how it runs on tablets and app compatibility.
Amazon prices last updated on 1 December, 2023 at 01:01 pmeBay prices last updated on 1 December, 2023 at 05:21 am
Methodology
8 Brands considered
45 Products compared
12 Best products chosen
We checked out 45 drawing tablets and displays on store shelves here in Australia to pick the best options for artists of all sorts.
Each device was chosen based on its key specifications and user reviews.
The products on this list are chosen by our editorial team and are not selected based on commercial relationships.
We looked into dozens of drawing tablets available right here in Australia to determine which were best for drawing, checking out options ranging from dedicated drawing displays to the iPad Pro. All of the tech we assessed was manufactured by the brands listed below:
Apple
HP
Huion
Microsoft
Samsung
Wacom
Xencelabs
XP-Pen
When it was time to decide which devices to include on this list, we carefully put a range of essential details under the microscope. More specifically, we checked out each device's connectivity, size, display resolution, app support, included accessories and value for money.
After examining each device and reading through hundreds of customer reviews (as of November 2021), we picked out the 12 best drawing tablets for anyone in need of a new artistic companion.
We value our editorial independence, basing our comparison results, content and reviews on objective analysis without bias. However, Finder may receive compensation when you click some links on our site. Learn more about how we make money from our partners and why you can trust our guides.
Jack Baker was a freelance content writer with Finder. Over his time, he worked across a wide range of niches including technology and gaming issues. Jack is keen on PC gaming hardware and peripherals and Android phones, and he's always hunting down the best deals. Before joining Finder, he was the Editor of Tech Snack Media Group, where he spent 2 years running the technology and gaming site. Jack is studying a Bachelor of Business/ Arts majoring in journalism and digital media.
Apple’s 10th generation iPad has marked improvements over the 9th generation model, but the serious price hike and weird technology decisions Apple has made
The Apple iPad Air M1 mostly hits it out of the park with attractive colour choices, the peerless power level of the M1 processor and good battery life
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