Apple used its YouTube channel to unveil something other than an iPhone this time — a redesigned iPad Pro, along with the Magic Keyboard and Apple Pencil Pro built to go with it. The new iPad Pro launches with a slim, lightweight design, and Apple has billed it as “the thinnest Apple product ever.” With the M4 chip on board, everyone’s curious just how far its performance can go, and it remains to be seen how much the new iPad Pro will be able to do for everyday users, artists, and creators alike.
Living up to the “thinnest Apple product ever” tagline, the new iPad Pro’s slim, lightweight design gives it a sense of portability unlike any previous Apple product. It comes in two sizes — a 13-inch model and a more portable 11-inch model. The 11-inch model measures just 5.3mm thick, while the 13-inch model is even thinner at 5.1mm. The new iPad Pro comes in Silver and Space Black, and is built entirely from 100% recycled aluminum.
The M4 chip debuting in the new iPad Pro is built on second-generation 3-nanometer technology, and comes with a more capable CPU and next-generation GPU compared to previous models, giving it a solid boost in performance. It also includes a next-generation Machine Learning (ML) accelerator CPU that’s 1.5 times faster than the M2 chip found in the previous iPad Pro. With this much horsepower under the hood, the new iPad Pro is well positioned to handle both current AI features and whatever new capabilities come next.
With the M4 chip on board, users will be able to run AI-based tasks noticeably faster on the new iPad Pro. Its Ultra Retina XDR display also means more accurate colors and sharper contrast and brightness. And it’s not just the iPad Pro itself that gets a performance and feature boost — the accompanying Magic Keyboard and Apple Pencil Pro have been built to unlock their own distinct capabilities too.
The Apple Pencil Pro brings improved features and powerful new interactions that make for a noticeably better overall experience. A new sensor has been added to detect how hard users are squeezing the pencil, a gesture that opens a small tool palette for quickly switching tools, line weights, and colors. The Apple Pencil Pro’s built-in gyroscope also lets you use your current tool with greater precision — twisting the pencil changes the shape of pens and brushes, giving you the feeling of holding an actual physical tool on paper. For anyone prone to misplacing their pencil, Find My support is built in too, making it easy to track down a lost or misplaced pencil.
Image: Apple
The Magic Keyboard designed to pair with the slim, lightweight iPad Pro has also been redesigned to be thinner and lighter. It keeps the magical floating design and now adds new controls for screen brightness and volume. A larger trackpad and an aluminum palm rest have also been added, which Apple says gives it more of a MacBook-like feel. The Magic Keyboard attaches magnetically, and no longer needs Bluetooth for power or data.
Image: Apple
Alongside the new M4-powered iPad Pro and the redesigned Apple Pencil Pro and Magic Keyboard, Apple also introduced new capabilities for Logic Pro and Final Cut Pro. The new iPad Pro, Apple Pencil Pro, and Magic Keyboard are available to order now, with in-store availability starting Wednesday, May 15. The iPad Pro comes in 256GB, 512GB, 1TB, and 2TB storage options, priced from $999 for the 11-inch model and $1,299 for the 13-inch model. The 11-inch Magic Keyboard starts at $299, and the 13-inch Magic Keyboard starts at $349. The Apple Pencil Pro costs $129. The 10th-generation iPad starts at $349.