iPad Pro with M5 chip
apple.com
apple.com
My M4 MacBook Pro is faster than my modern i9 desktop that work spent $$$ on...
iPad feels like a genie trapped in a bottle to me. It has that same M4 but there's so much less to use it for. Too bad I can't just set it by my PC and throw workloads at the processor or something. Continuity works well enough as a second screen but I'd love a second M4 CPU.
macbook air + multitouch + apple pen
Second CPU would be nice, too.
The built-in MacOS feature that does this called continuity… but I know it was renamed once (used to be sidecar). Maybe you’re referring to an old name? Or is it a product?
Edit: I looked it up and it appears that the app is continuity and “Sidecar” and “Universal Control” are features. IDT those names show up in the OS UX though.
PS: I don't think GPU continuity will work well over USB-C.
iPad OS limitations are artificially imposed to not canabalize the laptop sales.
Watch YouTube, casually browse web (I am yet to install VPN).
So far the most use I had with it was recording meetings, so that later I can relisten.
If I was able to run Ubuntu on it or even macOs - that would have been a different story...
I think someone deciding between an M4 and an M5 today should consider its value 5 years down the road, rather than its value today.
I don't know why Apple is putting full M series chips in their iPads but limit the software they can run. Either open it up to desktop apps or just put a cheaper A series chip in them.
https://github.com/albertquiroga/awesome-ios-game-ports?tab=...
Just trying to imagine the workflow :)
I personally prefer a ~32" 4k screen for main work but I could see the convenience of an iPad to quickly remote in and check on stuff or maybe it's enough on it's own and I can learn from ya'll!
Just dock your iPad in the office and get a desktop class experience. Pick it up and go and have your same apps and sessions and data anywhere.
Would be nice. It's the experience I had with a Surface but I get Windows isn't applicable to all users and workloads.
The fact that you can't turn off the iPad screen while it's docked drives me crazy.
I recall: using stage manager, plugging into monitor via USB-C, going into Settings to disable mirroring/enable as external display, ensuring you have a mouse/keyboard connected to the iPad, and then just clicking the iPad screen off with the lock/unlock button.
lmk if that works!
You can use this to fix bugs in iOS apps from the park and try new TestFlight builds within minutes.
Do you know whats better than an iPad? 2 iPads (yes, shredding code on 2 simultaneously).
Sure, it's great for that kind of (computationally) light work, but then what's the point of putting a monster like the M5 chip in it?
You put a bigger chip in so you can run it at lower power consumption levels. Essentially, there are two ways this can pan out:
* Overall utilization can remain lower, keeping it in a more power efficient band.
* Expensive actions complete faster, thus using less power (since they run for less time).
From an overall business perspective, there also doesn't really seem to be a reason to _not_ standardize the lineup on a single chip. I have to imagine is less overhead from a manufacturing standpoint and it's not like there's a particularly meaningful difference in manufacturing costs of these chips.
Terrible battery life by comparison. Worse display. Not as swift at video playback. And with LLMs on the rise, less locally capable.
Anyway my point isn't that people shouldn't buy iPads, my point is that it's silly that Apple has hardware that is incredibly capable and is held back entirely by terrible software policies.
If you use one program at a time, do not need an actual file system, have no need to install software from a variety of places (Github, Vendor sites, etc), have no problem installing multiple "apps" that only work behind paywalls or not at all and you don't care about replacing a functional device whenever Apple obsoletes it... iOS is the best thing since sliced bread.
If you need anything outside of iOS's limited list of abilities, its a trash operating system that has crippled amazing hardware.
Pen and paper are faster.
I've cycled through using an iPad Pro as my main device on and off over the years - particularly the cellular modem has been a draw. For coding, they're terrible, as they are for longer form writing. I've ultimately shrunk down to the small size and use it as a kindle/gaming replacement. I think with a foldable iPhone I'd probably skip buying one.
All that said there's a large market for them. I use mine enough that every two cycles I update just for battery reasons.
Apple earnings on Mac and iPads are in the same ballpark and if iPads cost half of a Mac its indeed a 2x.
https://www.macrumors.com/2025/05/01/apple-2q-2025-earnings/
iPads have way more common with phones than laptops. They are more prone to damage and many people treat them like fashion accessories, promptly buying new devices upon launch even if the old one is perfectly fine.
It think one of the points of popularity for the iPad is that it's the same (in most respects) as an iPhone, but bigger. The smartphone has become the default computing and communication device for billions of people. My wife can certainly use her iPhone, but she almost never does; the iPad fulfills that need for her. She plays Balatro, Simon's Cat, and Angry Birds, reads and writes email, reads, browses the web, watches video on her iPad.
>the iPad fulfills that need for her
This was it, entirely.
Key feature: she can sit on the couch and use it. She does that all the time. It's a much more approachable device. She does everything on it. She plays a lot of bridge both on the ipad and in real life. So, she's even playing online games. Really fun when she randomly starts swearing at some dumb witted random co-player on the internet.
I'm not into IOS myself but I appreciate it for what it is and does. Steve Jobs nailed that one. I have a mac book pro but I have an Android phone. For me a phone is dumb read only device. Typing on it sucks. The screen is to clumsy and tiny for properly enjoying content, the camera is alright but I don't use that a lot. It's a device for reading hacker news and a few other things. I actually take most calls via my laptop. It even fails its primary job as a communication device for me.
Anyway, the key thing with this ipad is the built in apple phone chips. No more qualcomm. They can just put this thing in any device now. I'm not sure what's holding them back with their laptops. I'm guessing there's some Qualcomm IP and patents that might make that a bit expensive. But it's 2025. Why can't my laptop not connect to 5G networks without dongles, thethering, or other nonsense? The key blocker was always Qualcomm. Problem solved you'd think. Apparently, they are not going there yet. Maybe next year.
I would like a full screen shell that's got a reasonable unix variant underneath it. But I do find other uses for it.
Leaving the 10% for those that actually play such games, assuming they happen to land.
I use mine for editing photos. But, I still have to start and end the process with Lightroom classic on my Mac because of stupid decisions by Adobe to rent-seek with cloud storage, offering no local-stroage workflow option with the iPad app (and deliberately leaving out some features only available in LR Classic).
Likewise, I would love to do all of my photoshop work on the iPad. It's a great immersive experience with the Apple Pencil vs. sitting down with a mouse and keyboard on a computer, but yet again, Adobe cripples the iPad app compared to the desktop app.
And those particular use cases aren't Apple's fault. I'm less and less frustrated with iPad OS as a whole, particularly with windowing in 26 (though it could use some polish). It's got external display support, a file manager, access to external storage, audio input select now, etc. But Adobe (and others) are still making crippled mobile applications for it instead of just doing work to port over the full desktop experience on a device that is now just as capable.
Sure you can't code on it (very well), but I feel like Apple should start putting some pressure on Adobe and the other creative-suite of software companies to beef up the iPad experience, maybe offer some incentive or something.
But I'm going to end up with a subscription anyway because of Photoshop so I've just always stuck with LR. That, and I used a LUT I built using Davinci Resolve, blended with the Camera Standard profile that I use as a slider in Lightroom (Classic) and I haven't found a way to do something similar in any other program yet (you can create these creative profiles in photoshop too but Davinci's color grading tools are so far superior). It's a key part of my look.
Also FWIW M1 and newer iPad Pros have thunderbolt 4
I use my 2018 iPad Pro every day, though. Ironically, that's the reason why I'm not replacing it - it works just fine.
But I had the use case before I bought it. If not for that, I wouldn't own one.
It's also very handy for running VSTs (well, AUs really) and jamming with keyboards or guitars (with something like iRig)
It beats the hell out of either laptops or phones, for me, for these tasks:
- Music. Excellent as a sheet music display; can record and edit midi quite well; play tutorial videos; act as a tuner, tone generator, or metronome (my phone beats it on that front due to portability, but still, if I already have the iPad out on the stand...); plenty good enough at audio recording and editing for my extremely-amateur purposes, plus its ability to play loops and beats and such.
- Reading. It's especially amazing for comic books (in landscape mode a 12.9 incher is almost the same size as an open comic book! You can read two-page side-by-side on it, no problem) and PDFs. I prefer iPad mini sized devices for prose books in ordinary ebook formats, but the 12.9" pro is damn near perfect for those two things. Laptops and desktop computers also work for comic books and PDFs, but are a pretty big downgrade, UX-wise.
- Drawing. Obviously.
- Long-form writing. Laptops work great for this too, of course, but you still need a separate keyboard if you want decent ergonomics. iPad doesn't have an attached keyboard taking up space that I could instead use for a separate keyboard.
It's also just as good as a laptop (to me) as a remote SSH terminal, VNC terminal, video/music player, web browser et c. I can't really think of much I do on my (personal! Not work-supplied) laptop that I can't do just as well on an iPad, maybe supplemented by a headless RPi hanging off my router, or a cheap VM rental (or just the Linux server in an old desktop workstation tower that I already have anyway).
The screen is still small. Also, for technical writing, I think a lot of software is missing. There are a lot of small tools that technical writers use to do diagrams, illustrations. Also, long-form writing can be in different file formats. I think support for LaTeX and typst is very limited.
If I could develop on the iPP, FOR the iPP --- build professional-quality apps on the iPP --- I would be happier. The Logitech detachable kbd is remarkably good, I have no complaints typing on it all day. iOS is a straightjacket.
I have a 2017 iPad Pro and once the battery finally dies will replace it with a non-Pro iPad.
That being said, _some_ people I know consistently seem to get lots of work use out of their tablets, and I can't quite put my finger on where we differ.
Goes without saying YMMV but it works for me.
I had to hand down my iPad Pro 3rd Gen (the one with A12x Bionic chip) to my daughter for her school use.
I got myself a 13" iPad Air (M2 chip) this time and Apple Pencil Pro (from Apple Refurbished store). The larger screen size isn't that much of a botheration as I thought it might be. On the flip side, the screen size is a lot closer to an A4 sheet and writing on it feels much better. I use Paperlike screen cover and pencil tips too.
I don't have Netflix or YouTube installed on it.
I only use it for Apple Books, Kindle, Notes and now Preview app is there as well.
I might this time even use it as Sidekick and remote access IDEs running on my MBP but not sure if I want to do that yet on the iPad.
Or if you aren't a music person, are you into making movies? Final Cut Pro does have a subscription, but it's only $5 / month and the subscription is easy to start and stop. If your needs are simple, the free iMovie is pretty good.
Or maybe video isn't your thing. Are you a writer or poet? There are a lot of great choices for writing apps and the battery life of the iPad means you can work away from your desk all day.
Or if you like writing software, Swift Playground is fun. I found this to be a great resource:
https://github.com/uraimo/Awesome-Swift-Playgrounds
If you are into photography, Affinity Photo is fun. It doesn't have the AI features that Photoshop has, but for amateurs, it can get you pretty far. Plug in an external drive to your iPad and you can use it with a huge photo library.
And those cheap/free things are only available after dropping $1000 on a new iPad
As for having a better time on the laptop, YMMV. My iPad is my most used computer by a mile.
If you have the disposal income, no need to justify it outside of "it's a cool gadget and I want to play with it."
Just borrow someone else's underused ipad if you want to give it a try.
Now it's just a YouTube device.
Just buy a sketch book and some colored pens and pencils.
I'm not sure what it is about the iPad -- maybe the physical ergonomics? It's kinda hard to position comfortably for focus.
Do agree with the ergonomics point though - it can be hard to spend a lot of time actually working on it.
Even with all that though, I do 99% of it directly in Logic on the iPad, sometimes 100%.
A tablet specific use case would be as portable writing machine on the go, for illustration, for audio units, or something like that, all the way to flight maps for recreational flying.
And as for paid software, almost everything a bloodys subscription even for things like note-taking apps, that or loaded with ads and microtransactions.
And anything touch-centric encourages dumbed-down limited-functionality software to begin with. More advanced software requires more precise input devices.
Please don't move the goal post to "I also want to compile and run code" because I got nothing for that. I just ssh to my home server and use my normal shell and neovim there.
also no local git
I don't find that experience good either, but I mostly write rust, so not having rust tool chain and its component is a dealbreaker for me.
I'm just saying you can write code and commit from iPad directly. I'd rather get the ability to use jetbrains IDEs via their remote client, but I don't think it will ever happen.
There are many other creative workflows possible on an iPad, but I'm not really interested in getting good at those when I have the one that I'm already working on, you know?
And I own exclusively Apple hardware; I'm not some contrarian anti Apple fanboy, I promise.
Devices usually have killer apps that determine their success. The iPad is conspicuously lacking one.
But none yet that will automate the essential task of posting the phrase "walled garden" on social media.
There could also be an in-app purchase which uses AI to grind ancient axes about butterfly keyboards and Snow Leopard.
but sure, just call me an NPC, you’re so unique and good at noticing patterns and not rude
Here ya go: https://panic.com/prompt/
There have been terminal programs for the iPad since at least 2017, when I started using the one above.
As for "custom bespoke software," why would you try to run that on an iPad in the first place? My company has plenty custom in-house programs, but I don't complain that they won't run on a toaster, or a Commodore 64, or a Cray. That's like saying you won't buy a speedboat because it can't carry all the iron ore that your company's dump truck can haul. It just makes no sense.
LOL, there are tens of us, I'm sure!
Fixed a production bug on my phone from the passenger seat of a friend's car, somewhere around 2013 or 2014.
In a perfect (from their pov) world Apple would prefer the internet didn't even exist, that way they could put up a walled garden AppleNet and take 30% of everything there too.
I chose your comment to respond to but there's a handful of you going to war in the comments, it's just wild to me.
1. Reading technical papers where I use the pen to make notes
2. Sketching household projects (a few of the apps are very nice for this).
Outside of that, I simply want a real, physical keyboard most of the time.
I got HumbleBundle with a bunch of Pathfinder 2e PDFs cheap but I'm still tempted to buy the physical copies.
I'd give my interest in Hell for there to be a tablet Mac w/ a Wacom stylus --- as it is, I'm seriously considering a Mac Mini and Wacom Movink 14 and a 3D printed shell.... (but first, I'm going to try out an rPi 5 w/ Wacom One 13 Gen 2 w/ touch).
My 4090 and m4 iPad Pro share this fate, with some occasional gaming.
like a filesystem ?
- Convert one file type to another
- Choose which application to use to open a file
- Inspect the details of files in a consistent manner
Do you expect to use Windows explorer or the Finder to “convert file types”?
Using iOS 26 on my phone, I held down a file and there is an “Open With” option that gave me a choice of how to open the file.
Across applications? Applications these days save files using the File dialog, they may by default store them in a folder accesible by Files. Yes I know some apps still store their data in their own sandbox. But that’s not the case generally for standard productivity apps.
I do frequently convert file types through the Finder. Bulk converting a bunch of photos, for example, is easier to do through a file browser. Even if I were opening a different app to do that, a standard file browser would be the interface I would want for that.
It’s great if more iOS applications are storing files as regular files on the filesystem now. Apple should have encouraged that in the first place. There was some goofy notion they were going to get rid of the idea of “files” with iOS, but that’s not actually a good idea.
As you would with the Files app…
> Even if I were opening a different app to do that, a standard file browser would be the interface I would want for that
Which iPad apps that allow you to work with files don’t use the standard files app interface when you open and save a file? How else would they work?
> It’s great if more iOS applications are storing files as regular files on the filesystem now. Apple should have encouraged that in the first place.
The Files app and the APIs were introduced in 2017.
Furthermore, "sharing" is broken. Does it copy the file? Does it move the file? Am I duplicating this 200mb pdf when I move it to books? How the ____ do I know? There is a dearth of information and I imagine most people, like myself, give up and use it to read before bed or watch a few videos on the couch. I am never going to by another iPad until the OS is useful beyond drawing, creating music or reading.
Moving files around works just like on Windows and Macs - cut and paste.
And it has the same semantics as Windows and Macs - if I drag a file from one place to another on the same drive - it moves it. If I drag it to another storage location - ie another hard drive on a computer or another storage provider in Files - iCloud, Google Drive, etc it copies it.
It never ceases to amaze me that when computer “experts” criticize people for not wanting to learn how things work - do the same.
The $1000+ iPad Pro isn't helpful for any of that.
Plus you get more longevity, I'll keep my M4 iPad Pro until doesn't get OS updates anymore. I still feel no impetus to update my M1 laptop despite it being 4 years old.
You probably have your iPhone with you every time you got an iPad with you, so just use that.
>inb4 buy a battery bank
I have a 20000mAh with me when I intend to work remotely though. Either way cheaper than paying for another plan for iPad and buying a more expensive iPad.
> The M5 chip is built on TSMC's N3P node and has a faster GPU that can deliver 1.6x more FPS in games, 20% faster multi-core CPU performance, and 1.7x quicker render times in Blender — all versus the M4.
https://www.tomshardware.com/laptops/macbooks/apple-launches...
What really are tablets for other than being a passive entertainment consumption device?
Another use case is in the kitchen. Recipes, YouTube, FaceTime, etc. I use my iPad Pro in the kitchen every day when I’m at home. Easy to clean up. Using a MacBook while cooking will make it gross very fast.
Pity that Apple doesn't agree for iPad.
I cannot even give it to my kids since I don’t have multiple accounts with it.
Kind of sad that the most interesting device Apple has will never show its true potential due to their greed.
I really dig that Oled screen
You can, but it's not advertised this way:
https://support.apple.com/guide/deployment/shared-ipad-overv...
There are ways to supervise besides get into a full MDM:
https://support.apple.com/guide/deployment/about-device-supe...
Yes
However, the YouTube Labs “Jump Ahead” feature is basically the same thing. When a sponsor segment starts, double tap the right side of your screen and a “jump ahead” button will usually appear (it’s algorithmic based on user viewing patterns). It skips the ad just about every time.
You’ll have to have Premium and enable this manually. And it might go away, it’s experimental.
But also, iSponsorBlockTV is a great project. But it only works on Apple TV and other streaming TV YouTube apps.
I have the feeling that everything one could do with the Pro could be done as well with the less expensive models. Apart from the handful of travel youtubers that might want to edit and render their videos in an airport terminal I think the use cases would be very niche. Yet a lot of people seem to prefer it over the other variants, I guess just because it exists and it is at the top of the line?
I know not everyone is as sensitive to this as I am, so I recommend going to the store and trying both the Air and the Pro. If you’re like me you will notice the difference immediately.
- Goodnotes w/ the apple pen during work
- YouTube during dinner
- Kindle App for technical books (and regular Kindle device for fiction)
- Browsing the internet
- Streaming games with Xbox streaming
I travel for work one week per month-ish, and I don't take a personal laptop anymore since getting my iPad.
Now.. do I really _need_ to upgrade? Probably not, my M1 still runs fine. Decisions Decisions :)
Having run Asahi Linux on an M1, it's obvious that a A and M chips were purpose built/designed together for the software Apple creates.
I have a 2018 MBP that dual boots to Windows. Everything from the color of the screen to the CPU performance is totally unrefined in Bootcamp on Windows compared to the macOS side. Same hardware. A lot of it comes down to how much effort is put into making the hardware and software work efficiently and well together.
EDIT: oh, the prices are much lower now than what I paid 3+ hears ago, that’s nice.
This is just a minor update for anyone with an older iPad/iPad Pro in case they want to upgrade.
Many of the people here complaining don't seem to understand they are not the target market.
Also, I love using my iPad as a social media / YouTube content consumption device. It's a fantastic experience. I also use it for a lot of home control (mostly audio but also lighting). It sure is an expensive device but it lasts forever and I get my money's worth.
Oh, and Lightroom on it is fantastic!
I’d choose the laptop every time as I can do all of that in addition to using a non-bullshit browser if I need to do something online.
Android can run Android Studio. Why can't an iPad run Xcode?
Xcode on my macbook doesn’t need 12GB. It is of course a different story if you need to also run clang-analyzer or rust-analyzer in addition to xcode/studio, but still, 16GB would be enough to get by for a sizeable chunk of devs.
I haven’t done mobile development for ages, but isn’t it always slower to have to update the app on the phone all of the time?
6GB is not plenty when you are expected to run an IDE and in the case of Android an emulator that is also emulating a phone with 4GB+ RAM.
iOS development has never used an “emulator”, when you ran in the simulator even on x86 computers, it compiled your code to x86 and ran against an x86 version of the iOS framework.
The only reason you can't run a full blown OS on an iPad is Apple doesn't want you to. It would eat into low-end Mac sales.
Why wouldn’t Apple rather you spend more on an iPad Pro + keyboard than a MacBook Air?
You have a good point. My guess is they'd rather you'd buy both. You can get an older M1 or M2 MacBook Air for cheaper than an iPad Pro + keyboard.
Who needs an emulator when running on device?!?
You would need an emulator if you wanted to run Android Studio or use the much flowery process of updating the phone every time you made a change.
As for Dynabook like experience, given our age, you can certainly find the difference on your own.
https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=45594747
> The ability to run Xcode? Maybe run Linux in a VM (no, emulation does not count). Maybe run nvim with python/node/rust/go/gcc toolchains on the iPad? How about Wireshark? I really liked using Nixdroid on my Pixel, why can't I have something similar on iOS/iPadOS? Android can run Android Studio. Why can't an iPad run Xcode?
How much of that could you do on your Dynabook? How was web browsing? The office suites? Video and audio editing? The office suites? Even the games?
https://www.microsoft.com/en-us/surface/devices/surface-pro
Think different.
https://www.pcworld.com/article/2795490/microsoft-surface-pr...
This compact tablet runs on a Snapdragon X Plus chip and is built for casual browsing and office work. It’s not high-end
The screen has a semi-high brightness IPS panel, 2196×1464 pixel resolution, and a 60 or 90 Hz frame rate. You’ll have to set it up manually; dynamic frequency is not supported. It’s not full pro quality on the screen,
With a 12-inch screen and 3:2 aspect ratio
The processor doesn’t even stack up well against the cheap base model iPad.
There is bigger things too. A proper web browser for example. Google Docs is barely usable in Safari on iPad with larger documents. The permanent banner at the top asking you to install the app is so annoying. The Google Docs app is somehow even worse. And it’s not just Google apps. Many iPad apps are just upscaled iPhone apps with lots of features missing compared to the web version. And don’t even think about support for multiple tabs or windows in apps.
For YouTube and Netflix my iPad Pro is great but anything beyond hurts. And this is the „Pro“ model. You can say maybe I’m too advanced for the „Pro“ but most users have _something_ besides of YouTube and Netflix they want to do and will feel these limitations sooner or later. It’s it not a laptop replacement and Apple wouldn’t want it to be.
I use GSuite on my iPad all of the time.
Edit: I realize that ordinary people might not yet care about exporting to AVIF, but they may receive such photos from other people.
Because I have to imagine very few people buy the iPad Pro (and for those who do, what use case are they buying it for).
I'll spend around $2k and I want to get at least 5 years of use out of it. That will make it cost me a little more than $1 / day which, fortunately, I can afford.
If the Smart Folio Keyboard was still available, I'd buy that too. It's not, so I'm going keyboard-less for now.
Apple M5 Chip
Maybe it's just my old eyes, but black background, black trim, dark grey device with dark grey keyboard.
What are they selling here?
Even a simplistic 2D game loads data, runs routines, and while the person is doing that they expect the phone to stay connected to a network, keep up with notifications... you act like Apple is doing something bad.
Intel/Chromebooks still are being sold in the USA at Best Buy with the Celeron N4000-series and Pentium-4200 series chips if you prefer to have zero performance overhead on your devices.
> what happened?
1978 was 47 years ago
To me this will be the kind of computers I'll tell my parents to use as soon as their crappy laptops die. They do not need literally anything else: sending emails, write a few ones, check Youtube and browse the web. For this use case, it's the most useful machine. Never breaks, infinite battery, no support needed.
And I hate Apple. So this says a lot.
I don’t have a use for the Pro model but I use my Air a lot.
Both are reasonable ways to make a decision.
It's a touch-first OS, for better and for worse. Anything else it was tacked onto a UI/UX made for a keyboard and mouse