Near the start of 2024, Apple's more expensive iPads got an update. The iPad Pros debuted the M4 chip, which was quite shocking and exciting — the M4 hadn't even made an appearance on any Mac, nor was there any mention of it. In fact, it took 6+ months for the Mac lineup to be refreshed with M4 models.
But the iPad Air series also got exciting updates. For one, yes, they adopted the older (yet completely overkill and powerful) Apple M2 chip. But we also got a new size model — the iPad Air now comes in 11" and 13" variants, cementing its place as "An iPad Pro killer". Or the "not super-expensive iPad Pro", if you will
All the while the iPad 10th gen is still sitting in the corner — no upgrades and aging hardware. It's powered by the A14 chip from the iPhone 12 generation, and that's getting a bit long in the tooth now. But the basic iPad still supports an Apple Pencil, the regular USB-C one with no squeeze functions, and it has a Magic Keyboard folio accessory. So, if you squint, it also looks like an iPad Pro replacement for less money.
Is it a good idea to buy an iPad 10th gen right now? We'd wager not, since Apple is probably thinking about updating it rather soon. Will it get Apple Intelligence? Well, to get there, it'll need a major hardware upgrade, which could mean that a potential iPad 11th gen would jump in price. Either that, or the base iPad will not get AI features.
In any case, let's not go off on a tangent. Let's assume you find a great deal on iPads and are wondering whether you should grab an iPad 10th gen or spend some more cash towards an iPad Air M2 (2024). Well, here's where we compare the two:
iPad Air M2 vs iPad 10th gen differences explained:
The Air screen sure is prettier (Image credit - PhoneArena)
On the outside, the base iPad 10th gen looks like it belongs in the family. The same flat slab with an all-screen front as you can see on the Air and the Pro, granted the bezels on the base units are slightly thicker.
And both the iPad Air M2 and iPad 10th gen come in a variety of fun colors. The base iPad's color options are more saturated, a bit candy-like, whereas the Airs are a bit more muted and "mature", but the fact remains that these are the "fun" iPads. If you move to Pros — your choice is black and silver, that's it.
Of course, we can't ignore the big difference — the iPad Air comes in a 13-inch flavor as well as a more portable 11-inch option. If you are specifically looking for a large tablet, the comparison ends here — the base iPad can't offer that.
It goes without saying that if you are the kind of person that'd buy a 13-inch tablet, you probably have your mind set on it already and would be more interested in an iPad Pro M4 vs iPad Air M2 comparison. But, to give you our take on it, a 13-inch tablet is simply too big for the tasks you get a tablet for. It's not very portable, you can't prop it up just about anywhere while doing chores, and finding a spot for it to use it as a second display becomes trickier. We find the size of the 11-inch iPad Air or the 10.9-inch iPad 10th gen to be a perfect balance here.
The 13-incher does excel, however, at media consumption as well as specialized work, be it graphics, video, or audio-related. Obviously — you get more room for toolbars, tracks, controls, plugins, or simply a bigger canvas.
As for the displays — none of these screens have a high refresh rate, nor are they fancy OLED panels. We've got 60 Hz LCD screens, though, the iPad Air does have a laminated panel. What this means is that the display glass is fused with the touch digitizer, eliminating extra layers between the outer glass and the screen itself. It feels "gapless", as if the icons are right on the surface in front of you. It's a premium feel thing — the iPad Air looks and feels better when using, especially when writing and drawing with an Apple Pencil.
After using it for a while, you do get used to the "old" 60 Hz, and iPadOS is very smooth and responsive, so it's not a huge issue. But your eyes will notice it if you are swapping from the 120 Hz of a modern smartphone to use the iPad for a bit.
Also, the iPad 10th gen does not have an anti-reflective coating like the Air does, and it's noticeable in well-lit rooms.
The CIE 1931 xy color gamut chart represents the set(area)of colors that a display can reproduce,with the sRGB colorspace(the highlighted triangle)serving as reference.The chart also provides a visual representation of a display's color accuracy. The small squares across the boundaries of the triangle are the reference points for the various colors, while the small dots are the actual measurements. Ideally, each dot should be positioned on top of its respective square. The 'x:CIE31' and 'y:CIE31' values in the table below the chart indicate the position of each measurement on the chart. 'Y' shows the luminance (in nits) of each measured color, while 'Target Y' is the desired luminance level for that color. Finally, 'ΔE 2000' is the Delta E value of the measured color. Delta E values of below 2 are ideal.
The Color accuracy chart gives an idea of how close a display's measured colors are to their referential values. The first line holds the measured (actual) colors, while the second line holds the reference (target) colors. The closer the actual colors are to the target ones, the better.
The Grayscale accuracy chart shows whether a display has a correct white balance(balance between red,green and blue)across different levels of grey(from dark to bright).The closer the Actual colors are to the Target ones,the better.
That said, the colors of the base iPad screen are still pretty good — Apple is great at tuning.
For biometrics, both of these tablets use Touch ID sensors in the power button for fingerprint scanning.
Performance and Software
Apple M2 crushes all
And the A14 Bionic is old (Image credit - PhoneArena)
The iPad Air (2024) inherited the good old M2 chip from the iPad Pro (2022). The M-class chips are powering MacBooks, iMacs, Mac minis, and are basically desktop-class. Even if the M2 is technically "two years old", it's still an overkill chip for a mobile platform. And it ensures that you will be able to play console games as they start hitting the App Store — Assassin's Creed: Mirage and Resident Evil 4, plus the new AC: Shadows that's coming out later.
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That's pretty intense. Admittedly, the pro apps on iPads don't really utilize that power to its fulles. Specifically, most people complain that even though you can render beautiful video with Final Cut for iPad, you have to make extra sure that you don't minimize or split-screen the app, because that could cause issues. Logic for iPad was also updated with fancy new features and AI "musicians" to jam with.
We do try to use an iPad Pro as a "main" device from time to time — for graphics, for audio, web research, and so forth. In our experience, Apple's tablets are pretty good for the text-based work. But heavy apps with complex workflows are still a bit restrained as window-switching on iPadOS is still clunky. Also, as mentioned above, some processes will just not work in an app is minimized, which leaves you staring at the screen while waiting for it to render. That said, yes, pro apps are usable and incredibly so on the portable iPads.
Well, we should say the iPad Air and up. Some specialized apps will not run on the iPad 10th gen. For example, Apple's own Logic Pro for iPad is available for the iPad 10, but Final Cut Pro is not.
And that makes sense — the iPad 10th gen is a few steps behind in terms of raw power. It will be slower than an M2 chip, for sure, even when rendering with apps that are compatible. Plus, a base iPad 10th gen starts at 64 GB storage, which is barely enough if you plan to use it for big, "serious" projects. If you want to update to the next step — 256 GB — that'll cost you $500. At that point, it makes more sense to buy an iPad Air M2 (2024) with 128 GB for $600.
Also, the upcoming Apple Intelligence features will require an iPad with at least an M1 chip (or A17 Pro, which is what the new iPad mini has). Meaning, the iPad 10th gen is out of the cool kids' club.
Speaking of AI, iPadOS 18.2 is now out. Yes, you can upgrade to it on the iPad 10th gen, but you won't get the meat and potatoes of its features. Which are the Apple Intelligence suite. Well, 2/3rds of it taht is. iPadOS 18.1 brought about the text-based features, like formatting and editing text with AI, getting notification summaries, as well as the Clean Up tool in Photos, which is like Google's Magic Eraser. Then, iPadOS 18.2 brought about the deep ChatGPT integration — you can now query the popular AI bot to generate text or images through Notes, the keyboard, or Siri. Image Playground and Genmoji are also now live, allowing you to generate funny images with simple prompt and Magic Wand will transform your Apple Pencil scribbles into drawings or images. iPadOS 18.3 should come out around March and give us a much upgraded and AI-ified Siri as well.
No surprise there, the M2 is classes above the old A14 Bionic.
Battery Life and Charging
All-day battery (Image credit - PhoneArena)
iPads always aim to deliver about 10 hours of screen-on time with mixed usage — browsing the web, emails, and YouTube. Of course, if you launch a game or binge high-fidelity Netflix movies, the battery drops faster.
Now, the 13-inch variant of the iPad Air M2 does have more room for a bigger cell inside — which is why it scored so well on our benchmarks below. But the iPad 10th gen is no slouch!
Our tests simulate regular usage with a mid-level screen brightness throughout. The browser test reloads and scrolls through multiple pages, the 3D Gaming test ensures that the tablets are running an environment that's constantly rendering lights and 3D objects.
We benchmarked the 13-inch iPad Air M2 and it clearly does a lot with the huge battery it has room for. However, the base iPad 10th gen is also pretty dependable for non-demanding tasks — 10 hours of browsing means you can spend an entire day windowshopping on the web, reading books, or chatting with little concern for battery life.
Like the iPhones, iPads don't really have fast charging on board. So, it takes a while to juice them up to 100%. Thankfully, those batteries drain pretty slowly throughout the day! Still, it's noticeable that the iPad Air M2 13", even with its huge battery, does get juiced up much faster.
Audio Quality
Both the iPad 10th gen and iPad Air M2 have dual speakers — they are set up in "landscape stereo", so when you prop them horizontally, you get a left and right channel. They sound very close to each other, but the iPad 10th gen is just a bit more muffled, maybe compressing a bit more. The iPad Air M2 sounds just a bit better, but then — if you do go for the 13-inch model — that one has some more room inside, so it's a noticeable improvement.
9.72 x 7.03 x 0.24 inches (247 x 178.5 x 6.1 mm) or 11.05 x 8.46 x 0.24 inches (280.6 x 214.9 x 6.1 mm)
9.87 x 6.85 x 0.30 inches (248.6 x 179.5 x 7 mm)
Weight
462 g or 618 g
477 g
Screen
11", LCD, 60 Hz, 2360 x 1640 or 13", LCD, 60 Hz, 2732 x 2048
10.9". LCD, 60 Hz, 2360 x 1640
Processor
Apple M2
Apple A14 Bionic
RAM, Storage and Price
8 GB / 128GB for $599
4 GB / 64 GB for $349
Cameras
12 MP main 12 MP front
12 MP main 12 MP front
Battery Size
7,670 mAh
7,606 mAh
Which one should you buy?
Very few reasons to go for the iPad 10th gen (Image credit - PhoneArena)
There are very few situations where we can outright recommend the iPad 10th gen. Its hardware is long in the tooth, its base storage option is kind of stingy by 2024 standards, and if you buy the Magic Keyboard Folio — it can't follow you to a bigger iPad model, it only works with the base iPad. And, if you want to upgrade from 64 GB to 256 GB, it will cost you $500 — that's $100 short of the 128 GB iPad Air M2, which is infinitely better in terms of screen and performance.
Then, if you simply want a bigger, 13-inch model — the base iPad is not even an option there.
Situations where we might recommend the base iPad 10th gen? If you find it at a discount, if you are looking for a solid tablet that's only going to be a Netflix / FaceTime machine, if you really, really want to try out working with the Apple Pencil but don't want to spend Apple money. Yeah, it's good in those situations.
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Preslav, a member of the PhoneArena team since 2014, is a mobile technology enthusiast with a penchant for integrating tech into his hobbies and work. Whether it's writing articles on an iPad Pro, recording band rehearsals with multiple phones, or exploring the potential of mobile gaming through services like GeForce Now and Steam Link, Preslav's approach is hands-on and innovative. His balanced perspective allows him to appreciate both Android and iOS ecosystems, focusing on performance, camera quality, and user experience over brand loyalty.
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