As anticipation builds for Apple’s fall iPhone event featuring the iPhone 15 series and Apple Watch, the tech giant has another ace up its sleeve for next year: a revamped iPad Pro. Aimed at reigniting a stagnant tablet market, this will be the first major overhaul for the iPad Pro line since 2018, reports Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman in his Sunday PowerOn newsletter.
The current iPad Pro has received incremental upgrades in recent years, including new chips, cameras, display technology, and sensors. However, the upcoming models—codenamed J717, J718, J720, and J721 according to sources—promise more foundational changes.
Slated for a 2024 release, these next-gen models are set to switch to Apple’s next M3 chip and will be the company’s first tablets to feature OLED displays. This move aligns the iPad Pro with Apple’s iPhones, which have used OLED technology since the iPhone X model in 2017. OLED displays offer better brightness, sharpness, and colour accuracy.
The overhauled iPad Pro will reportedly come in 11-inch and 13-inch models, slightly increasing the size of the current largest model from 12.9 inches. Alongside the hardware improvements, sources have also revealed that a new Magic Keyboard accessory is in development. The enhanced Magic Keyboard is said to address customer complaints about its predecessor, which debuted in 2020, by featuring a larger trackpad and offering a design that makes the iPad Pro look even more like a laptop.
While the announcement of the revamped iPad Pro will likely boost sales in the long term, don’t expect to see the new models during next month’s product launch event. Apple’s September showcase will focus primarily on the iPhone 15 and the Apple Watch. Industry insiders predict the new iPad Pro won’t hit the market until spring or early summer of 2024. Minor updates to Apple’s other tablet offerings are also expected before the big launch.
Back in December 2022, we also heard a report of an OLED iPad Pro with 11 and 13-inch screen sizes.
It’s unclear if these major upgrades are enough for consumers to upgrade their existing iPad Pro models. We need more Mac-like features for the iPad Pro at this point—what do you think?
