T3 - UK (2020-12)

DECEMBER 2020 T3 83

Apple iPad Air

It’s an LCD screen, rather than an
OLED, which typically offer better
contrast. But the iPad Air is still
capable of fairly solid contrast, and
its 500 nits of brightness is quite
visible in any light condition.
The screen is 60Hz, rather than up
to 120Hz as on the iPad Pro. The latter
would not only make everything look
smoother when animated, but also
make the Apple Pencil as responsive
as possible, as you’d see the results of
your drawings quicker. But for casual
drawing or note-taking, the
responsiveness here is absolutely fine.
When you have the iPad Air in
landscape, speakers at each end give
you stereo, with impressive control
over the width of movies’ sound
especially. Sounds move around the
screen, or blast right out past your
ears depending on the action. The
actual sound balance is merely solid

• it can’t offer much in the way of bass


• but the precision is strong, so you
  can hear with clarity what’s going on.
  And it can go really damn loud.

Quick draw
The iPad Air was the first product
announced with Apple’s new and most

powerful processor, the A14 Bionic.

And benchmarks show just how

capable it is. The Geekbench 5

single-core score we measured is 40%

higher than the 2020 iPad Pro’s score.

Put simply, this is a small, thin beast

when it comes to performance.

In practice, most users won’t even

hit the limits of what the iPad Air can

do. We found everything we wanted

to do was handled incredibly quickly

and smoothly. Even things like

editing images with myriad layers or

multiple tracks of 4K video seem to

cause no appreciable slowdown.

Support for the Apple Pencil 2

makes using iPadOS 14’s new stylus-

friendly features more tempting, too.

Apple has made it possible now to

handwrite in any text field, with the

results understood by the system. You

can also make lengthy handwritten

notes and drawings in note-taking

apps, and manipulate what you’ve

written in various ways, such as

copying and pasting sections into an

email or document app as typed text.

The iPad Air has a single front

camera, and a single rear camera, and

neither is great, frankly. There is some

fancy tech on the rear camera, such as

4K video recording at 60fps with

Apple’s ‘cinematic video stabilisation’.

However, the quality on either cam –

whether shooting stills or video – is

fairly washed out, lacking the punchy

colours and contrast you get from

iPhones. Detail is similarly subdued.

The iPad Air is an excellent tablet,

with a beautiful design and ultra-

slick operating system, aided by bags

of power. Following the price rise, it

needed just a few extra boosts to feel

worthy of five stars, like a screen that

matches the iPad Pro or a rear camera

that matches the iPhone SE. But if you

think you won’t mind about the

screen and camera (and, let’s be clear,

it’s by no means a bad screen) then

the iPad Air is a slam dunk.

WE’RE IMPRESSED Sleek

design; detailed screen; so fast

and slick; Apple Pencil 2 support;

impressive spatial audio.

WE’D IMPROVE Mediocre

cameras; no 120Hz or OLED

screen; notable price jump.

THE LAST WORD The iPad Air

offers a great screen, powerful

processor, premium design and

great Apple Pencil support. It’s a

shame the price has risen, but it’s

excellent and the tablet to beat.

VERDICT

You can choose

classic colours for

the aluminium

back, but there are

three new fun yet

classy ones too

APPLE iPAD PRO
While it rocks a
slightly older CPU,
the iPad Pro offers
a brighter, bolder
120Hz screen,
four speakers for
stronger stereo and
an improved dual-lens camera, so it’s no slouch.
From £769, apple.com

SAMSUNG GALAXY TAB S7

Want a silky

smooth 120Hz

OLED screen? The

Tab S7 delivers –

and comes with

an S Pen so you

can really take

advantage of its impressive capabilities.

From £719, samsung.com

THE ALTERNATIVES

Find the best deals for the

iPad Air at: bit.ly/t3ipda20