For the most part, iPad has dominated the tablet market – and that probably won’t be changing anytime soon. In recent years, though, I think many people have been struggling to come up with reasons to buy a new iPad – especially when the previous generations have been so good. While this likely isn’t a huge problem quite yet, I do think it raises some questions going forward.
The iPad lineup, with the exception of the OLED iPad Pro redesign, has remained extremely consistent. There’s iPad Air at $599 with a basic 11-inch LCD display and Touch ID, iPad mini with a smaller design at $499, and the cheap iPad at $349.
iPad Air, despite not changing much since its last redesign in 2020, has retained its $599 price point. Meanwhile, it’s only gotten cheaper to buy an older iPad Pro. If you want an M1 or M2 11-inch iPad Pro, you can easily score one for under $600, and those will have Face ID, 120Hz, Thunderbolt, better speakers, brighter screens, and so on – all for about the same price as iPad Air.
The stagnation of the iPad lineup most definitely won’t drive customers to competitors, but I do think it’ll eventually drive people to stop buying new iPads. Either they’ll be happy with their current one and take longer to upgrade (as has been the case for many people who own a 2018-2022 iPad Pro), or if they are buying a new iPad, they’ll be buying an older model.
With MacBook Neo, even the cheaper iPad has some harsh competition coming from within. Why would you buy a $349 iPad and a $249 keyboard when you can just get a MacBook Neo – with double the storage? It isn’t an apples-to-apples comparison for everyone, but there’s definitely a large amount of overlap there.
Outside of the iPad Pro and iPad mini (and even then, foldable iPhone will likely steal some appeal from the iPad mini) – it feels like a lot of the iPad lineup is lacking appeal. As stated earlier, the iPad Air has only gotten chip bumps over the years. It did gain center stage and eventually moved the selfie camera to the landscape orientation, but it’s been incredibly light on upgrades.
iPad Air could likely use some new features, like 120Hz, more base storage, and Face ID. iPad is probably fine, though the keyboard should almost definitely be cheaper.
If Apple wants its iPad sales to stay consistent, it should probably put a little more effort into making the hardware more appealing, both to new customers and existing ones.
My favorite Apple accessory recommendations:
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