Slightly under a year after upgrading its iPad Air with the M2 chip, Apple has announced an all-new successor, this time with the M3 chipset. It comes with a redesigned keyboard accessory.
The company appears to keep the momentum going for the iPad lineup, which saw a revenue bump of 15 per cent over the holidays. The Cupertino HQ-ed tech giant uses its chips to distinguish its hardware and has, in recent times, been keen to upgrade devices more rapidly.
Users have the choice between an 11-inch and 13-inch display sizes, both of which come with slim bezels, Touch ID integrated into the top button, a 12MP landscape selfie camera and a 12MP rear snapper.
The notable upgrades are under the hood, especially the M3 chip, which made its debut in 2023 with the 14-inch and 16-inch MacBook Pro and 24-inch iMac and then became a part of last year’s MacBook Air. It’s still considered a powerful chipset that can handle tasks easily.
The M3 chip is a significant improvement over M1 and previous-generation models. Featuring a more powerful 8-core CPU, M3 is up to 35 per cent faster for multithreaded CPU workflows than iPad Air with M1. M3 features a 9-core GPU with up to 40 per cent faster graphics performance over M1. M3 also brings Apple’s advanced graphics architecture to iPad Air for the first time with support for dynamic caching, along with hardware-accelerated mesh shading and ray tracing. For graphics-intensive rendering workflows, iPad Air with M3 offers up to 4x faster performance than iPad Air with M1, enabling more accurate lighting, reflections, shadows, and extremely realistic gaming experiences.
iPad Air with M3 delivers a speedy experience, and the new Magic Keyboard brings advanced features at a lower price.
Apple is promoting the iPad Air as supporting Apple Intelligence. With a faster Neural Engine in M3, AI capabilities are expected to shine in iPadOS. Compared to M1, the Neural Engine in M3 is up to 60 per cent faster for AI-based workloads.
Keeping the iPad Air company is a new lower-end Magic Keyboard (needs to be bought separately). The keyboard comes with a larger trackpad, a metal hinge and a row of function keys.
The new iPad Air is compatible with Apple Pencil Pro and Apple Pencil (USB-C).
iPad 11th gen
The company has also unveiled a next-gen version of its base iPad, which also has received a boost in the chipset department. The A14 chip from the 10th-gen model has been upgraded to an A16 chip (you'll also find it in the iPhone 15 and iPhone 15 Plus).
The company says it’s nearly 30 per cent faster than its predecessor and up to 50 per cent faster than the iPad with the A13 Bionic chip. But, there’s one difference: This iPad won't support Apple Intelligence (you'll need an M-series model for that or the iPad Mini with an A17 Pro chip).
The iPad no longer has a 64GB model and it now starts at 128GB.
Compared to the previous generation, iPad with A16 offers a jump in performance for apps like Morpholio Trace, while still providing all-day battery life.
Pricing and availability
The 11-inch and 13-inch iPad Air with M3 will be available in blue, purple, starlight, and space grey, with 128GB, 256GB, 512GB, and 1TB configurations. The 11-inch iPad Air starts at ₹59,900 for the Wi-Fi model, and ₹74,900 for the Wi-Fi + cellular model. The 13-inch iPad Air starts at ₹79,900 for the Wi-Fi model and ₹94,900 for the Wi-Fi + cellular model.
The new Magic Keyboard, available in white, is compatible with the 11-inch and 13-inch iPad Air. It is available for ₹26,900, and the 13-inch Magic Keyboard is available for ₹29,900.
The new iPad (11th gen) starts with 128GB of storage and is also available in 256GB and a new 512GB configuration. Available in blue, pink, yellow, and silver, Wi-Fi models of the new iPad are available with a starting price of ₹34,900, and Wi-Fi + cellular models start at ₹49,900.
Mathures Paul