**A Closer Look at the New iPad Air: Design, Display, and Performance**

When it comes to Apple's latest tablet offerings, there are several options to choose from, each with its own unique set of features and advantages. In this article, we'll take a closer look at the new iPad Air, exploring its design, display, and performance.

One of the key things that sets the new iPad Air apart from other devices is its sleek and premium design. The device boasts a larger bezel than the previous year's model, which some might find to be a bit bulky. However, this isn't necessarily a bad thing, as it provides a more stable platform for creating art or consuming media. In fact, the screen on the new iPad Air is bright with great colors, making it ideal for watching shows or playing games.

But what really sets the iPad Air apart from its competitors is its display. With no 120Hz refresh rate to be found, many might assume that this device is not suitable for gaming or other applications that require smooth motion. However, I'd like to challenge that notion. In my experience, high refresh rates are overrated – especially on tablets where the frame rate is typically capped at around 60 frames per second. The smooth, buttery animation of a high-refresh-rate display can sometimes feel unnecessary, and for most users, this isn't a critical factor in their device choice.

That being said, I do think that the high refresh rate would be beneficial for certain applications – such as graphic design or digital painting with an Apple Pencil. The smooth motion of these features is simply nicer to work with, and it's hard to put into words just how satisfying it feels to glide across a canvas or edit images on a device like this. For everyone else, though, I don't think the extra refresh rate is all that important.

**The Camera**

One feature that has been upgraded from last year's model is the front-facing camera, which now supports Center Stage – Apple's face-tracking feature. While this is a nice touch, it doesn't come with the added convenience of Face ID hardware, which I personally prefer to Touch ID for security reasons.

That being said, Touch ID does work well enough, and the slightly faster processing times this year are welcome. However, I do have to admit that I miss the seamless authentication provided by Face ID. If you're like me and use two-factor authentication frequently with your device, then face ID is absolutely a must-have feature.

**Storage and Performance**

One area where the iPad Air really shines is in its storage – specifically, the RAM. While other devices may offer more storage space, Apple's emphasis on 8GB of RAM this year sets it apart from competitors like the regular iPad. And for good reason: software updates can be a major bottleneck for older devices.

When you consider how long an iPad will receive updates, having more RAM really matters – as much as $100 or so might seem like a lot at first glance. By saving up on storage, Apple's device stays relevant for longer periods of time, and that's no small thing. With this year's model, I wouldn't be surprised if we see support all the way up to six or seven years down the line.

In contrast, the iPad Pro offers a 120Hz ProMotion display – but at what cost? The price difference between these two devices is substantial, with the Pro coming in at an extra $150-$200. While that's not necessarily a bad thing if you do need those features, for most people, the savings offered by the iPad Air make it a more attractive option.

**Conclusion**

In conclusion, while the new iPad Air has some limitations – particularly when compared to its bigger Pro counterpart – it still offers an impressive array of features and advantages. From its sleek design to its bright display, this device is well-suited for most users' needs. And with its generous storage and performance upgrades, I truly believe that this year's model is the best iPad Air Apple has released yet.

Ultimately, whether or not you'll choose the iPad Air over the regular iPad depends on your individual priorities – do you need those extra features, like ProMotion display and Thunderbolt connectivity? Or are you happy with the more affordable option of a 60Hz screen? Either way, this year's model is an excellent choice for most people.

"WEBVTTKind: captionsLanguage: enso the iPad Air for 2022 was loaded up with the infamous M1 chip it's the chip that's in their MacBooks and their iPad Pro lineup so for Apple to put it in here it was kind of surprising right it's like why is Apple giving the customer so much power without charging more money for it it's awesome but it's actually made the purchase decision this year between the iPads a little more complex because now this new iPad Air is arguably just as good as an iPad Pro which costs 200 more so this year the colors on these devices are more vibrant I have the blue here and I love this color if you pair this with like the white magic keyboard it's a whole look but last year the colors were more pastel they looked good but this year the more saturated anodization looks really nice to me the cellular model support 5G but it's not millimeter wave 5G the USBC Port is twice as fast this year but a lot of the device hasn't changed from the previous generation it's the same footprint the same 64 gig starting storage the same camera Hardware the same speaker array the same display the same battery life a lot hasn't changed but let's start off with that performance so M1 chip the performance on M1 is significantly better than what was in the previous iPad Air at least on paper but for me personally I've never found the performance on iPads to be lacking right any kind of recent iPad is a great performer but that being said I did notice a couple huge differences with this device so any kind of heavy photo or digital illustration work that's done on the iPad is so much smoother with this M1 chip than it has been in the past it's still a 60hz screen so there's still some kind of visual latency when you're working with the file but in terms of just performance it is so smooth the M1 chip handles it very well and also with games so genshin obviously runs really well on this device I think gentian runs better on the M1 iPads better than any other mobile device in the world it's just like a super capable chip but this is game I've been playing Pokemon United if you watch my videos you've seen I keep bringing this thing up because I'm obsessed with this game but on this device it never drops any signif African frames it honestly feels like it's pegged at 59 frames per second for the entire match even with the heaviest team fights it's such a good performer and this is the first time I've ever tested Pokemon unite on M1 Hardware because the game didn't exist back when the original M1 iPad Pros came out so to see it performing at this caliber is like it's kind of weird now I got to talk about the speakers for a second so there's two speakers on the iPad Air there's one left one on the right but there's actually four cutouts like four speaker cutouts and the sound predominantly comes out of the bottom set of speakers like the ones that are closest to your hands if you're using in-game controls for a game that you're playing now last year when I tested this device I had controllers connected up to the iPad right now I was testing it and like the speakers sound good they're actually really good they sound very similar to the iPad Pro but when you're playing a game and you're using on-screen controls and your hands are covering the bottom speaker grilles it really kills the volume and the overall sound quality like you're totally killing off the higher frequencies it's so strange how this device is built like this now a lot of you is like you're an idiot dude just flip it upside down and you've got the good speakers up at the top right you'd think that but the sleep wake button is down there and if you hold it in that orientation you just turn the screen on and off the whole time so there really is only one way to hold the device if you actually want to play a game with on-screen controls and when you hold it in that orientation you're just muting the speakers with your hands I don't think it affects me to consumption like if you're watching a show you tend not to grip the sides like that but when you're playing games it's something that I think a lot of people will do okay the screen so the screen hasn't changed from the last year's model it's a good screen it's bright with great colors slightly bigger bezels than the 11 inch iPad Pro but overall a very good bezel to screen ratio like there's no misclicks like you get with some of the thinner bezel devices out there it's a really good screen but there's no promotion it's a 60hz panel and I've talked about this in several of my videos but I think on phones the existence of higher refresh screens are are not super useful I think for most people but on a tablet especially if you're using an apple pencil or any kind of stylus based product is just so much smoother and Visually pleasing on a high refresh screen and that's not to say that you can't do awesome work on a 60hz panel right it has nothing to do with skill a skilled artists would be able to do amazing work on like a 12 Hertz screen but the visual experience is so much nicer when it's really smooth and the pen work that you're laying down just appears right as you touch the screen it's just a nicer experience so if that's what you do for a living I'd push you towards that 120 hertz panel but for everyone else I don't think it's all that important not even for gaming because most games on iPads do not go over 60 frames per second okay the cameras so the front facing cameras now support well camera there's only one of them now supports Center Stage which is that face tracking feature I think it's actually really cool but this device doesn't have face ID hardware and I miss it so it does have Touch ID and it's a little bit faster this year I think than the previous generation but I gotta say I much prefer face ID over Touch ID on a device like this so for me I use like two-factor authentication for passwords and any kind of time when you're using the device to log into websites or like checking your banking info now you gotta touch the device multiple times to get into the banking website it's just like it's so much more convenient with face ID but I feel like this is only a thing for people that use the autofill frequently with their device now I'm going to try to distill all this information into like a purchase decision of some sort so if you compare this product to the regular iPad like the 329 iPad this is a lot more money it's got nicer Aesthetics it's got a color options it's got access to the second generation apple pencil it's got access to the magic keyboard which is arguably the best keyboard you can get for a tablet experience it's got the new processor but I think the real value of the iPad Air over like the regular iPad is the ram so this year the new iPad Air has eight gigs of RAM and I'm not talking about like the extra Ram to do more stuff I'm talking about software updates because when it comes to Apple there's software updates like how long they'll support a device tends to be limited by how much RAM the device has and with this thing having eight gigs of RAM I wouldn't be surprised if this new iPad Air gets updates like six or seven years from now for real now in comparison to the iPad Pro that 120 hertz Pro motion display is really nice for artwork you get Thunderbolt support you got better speakers you got a better camera system if that matters to you but the storage is also bumped up to 128 gigs at the base but for a lot of people those extra features are not important and like they're looking at this device and like hey for another 150 or 200 more I could get it but unless you're actually using that screen or the storage and like you actually need to be aware like I'm gonna use it I'll just go for the iPad Air it's just such a good device this year and you're saving a significant chunk of money that's like 30 more money if you go with the pro okay hope you guys enjoyed this video thumbs if you liked it subs if you loved it I'll see you guys next timeso the iPad Air for 2022 was loaded up with the infamous M1 chip it's the chip that's in their MacBooks and their iPad Pro lineup so for Apple to put it in here it was kind of surprising right it's like why is Apple giving the customer so much power without charging more money for it it's awesome but it's actually made the purchase decision this year between the iPads a little more complex because now this new iPad Air is arguably just as good as an iPad Pro which costs 200 more so this year the colors on these devices are more vibrant I have the blue here and I love this color if you pair this with like the white magic keyboard it's a whole look but last year the colors were more pastel they looked good but this year the more saturated anodization looks really nice to me the cellular model support 5G but it's not millimeter wave 5G the USBC Port is twice as fast this year but a lot of the device hasn't changed from the previous generation it's the same footprint the same 64 gig starting storage the same camera Hardware the same speaker array the same display the same battery life a lot hasn't changed but let's start off with that performance so M1 chip the performance on M1 is significantly better than what was in the previous iPad Air at least on paper but for me personally I've never found the performance on iPads to be lacking right any kind of recent iPad is a great performer but that being said I did notice a couple huge differences with this device so any kind of heavy photo or digital illustration work that's done on the iPad is so much smoother with this M1 chip than it has been in the past it's still a 60hz screen so there's still some kind of visual latency when you're working with the file but in terms of just performance it is so smooth the M1 chip handles it very well and also with games so genshin obviously runs really well on this device I think gentian runs better on the M1 iPads better than any other mobile device in the world it's just like a super capable chip but this is game I've been playing Pokemon United if you watch my videos you've seen I keep bringing this thing up because I'm obsessed with this game but on this device it never drops any signif African frames it honestly feels like it's pegged at 59 frames per second for the entire match even with the heaviest team fights it's such a good performer and this is the first time I've ever tested Pokemon unite on M1 Hardware because the game didn't exist back when the original M1 iPad Pros came out so to see it performing at this caliber is like it's kind of weird now I got to talk about the speakers for a second so there's two speakers on the iPad Air there's one left one on the right but there's actually four cutouts like four speaker cutouts and the sound predominantly comes out of the bottom set of speakers like the ones that are closest to your hands if you're using in-game controls for a game that you're playing now last year when I tested this device I had controllers connected up to the iPad right now I was testing it and like the speakers sound good they're actually really good they sound very similar to the iPad Pro but when you're playing a game and you're using on-screen controls and your hands are covering the bottom speaker grilles it really kills the volume and the overall sound quality like you're totally killing off the higher frequencies it's so strange how this device is built like this now a lot of you is like you're an idiot dude just flip it upside down and you've got the good speakers up at the top right you'd think that but the sleep wake button is down there and if you hold it in that orientation you just turn the screen on and off the whole time so there really is only one way to hold the device if you actually want to play a game with on-screen controls and when you hold it in that orientation you're just muting the speakers with your hands I don't think it affects me to consumption like if you're watching a show you tend not to grip the sides like that but when you're playing games it's something that I think a lot of people will do okay the screen so the screen hasn't changed from the last year's model it's a good screen it's bright with great colors slightly bigger bezels than the 11 inch iPad Pro but overall a very good bezel to screen ratio like there's no misclicks like you get with some of the thinner bezel devices out there it's a really good screen but there's no promotion it's a 60hz panel and I've talked about this in several of my videos but I think on phones the existence of higher refresh screens are are not super useful I think for most people but on a tablet especially if you're using an apple pencil or any kind of stylus based product is just so much smoother and Visually pleasing on a high refresh screen and that's not to say that you can't do awesome work on a 60hz panel right it has nothing to do with skill a skilled artists would be able to do amazing work on like a 12 Hertz screen but the visual experience is so much nicer when it's really smooth and the pen work that you're laying down just appears right as you touch the screen it's just a nicer experience so if that's what you do for a living I'd push you towards that 120 hertz panel but for everyone else I don't think it's all that important not even for gaming because most games on iPads do not go over 60 frames per second okay the cameras so the front facing cameras now support well camera there's only one of them now supports Center Stage which is that face tracking feature I think it's actually really cool but this device doesn't have face ID hardware and I miss it so it does have Touch ID and it's a little bit faster this year I think than the previous generation but I gotta say I much prefer face ID over Touch ID on a device like this so for me I use like two-factor authentication for passwords and any kind of time when you're using the device to log into websites or like checking your banking info now you gotta touch the device multiple times to get into the banking website it's just like it's so much more convenient with face ID but I feel like this is only a thing for people that use the autofill frequently with their device now I'm going to try to distill all this information into like a purchase decision of some sort so if you compare this product to the regular iPad like the 329 iPad this is a lot more money it's got nicer Aesthetics it's got a color options it's got access to the second generation apple pencil it's got access to the magic keyboard which is arguably the best keyboard you can get for a tablet experience it's got the new processor but I think the real value of the iPad Air over like the regular iPad is the ram so this year the new iPad Air has eight gigs of RAM and I'm not talking about like the extra Ram to do more stuff I'm talking about software updates because when it comes to Apple there's software updates like how long they'll support a device tends to be limited by how much RAM the device has and with this thing having eight gigs of RAM I wouldn't be surprised if this new iPad Air gets updates like six or seven years from now for real now in comparison to the iPad Pro that 120 hertz Pro motion display is really nice for artwork you get Thunderbolt support you got better speakers you got a better camera system if that matters to you but the storage is also bumped up to 128 gigs at the base but for a lot of people those extra features are not important and like they're looking at this device and like hey for another 150 or 200 more I could get it but unless you're actually using that screen or the storage and like you actually need to be aware like I'm gonna use it I'll just go for the iPad Air it's just such a good device this year and you're saving a significant chunk of money that's like 30 more money if you go with the pro okay hope you guys enjoyed this video thumbs if you liked it subs if you loved it I'll see you guys next time\n"