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Apple's latest iPad Air might just make you think twice about an Android tablet
- The new iPad Air features the M4 SoC, providing a 30% speed boost and an increase in RAM to 12GB.
- Connectivity sees a major overhaul with the C1X cellular modem, Wi-Fi 7, and Thread support.
- Pricing remains unchanged: $599 for the 11-inch model and $799 for the 13-inch model.
Alongside the iPhone 17e, Apple has also refreshed the iPad Air, one of the best tablets for most users. In typical Apple fashion, this is a modest chip upgrade without any major changes to a formula that continues to sell like hotcakes. Thankfully, the price remains flat, making it a better option for anyone in the market for a new iPad Air, but an easy skip for people who still have a working iPad Air from a generation or two ago.
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The big upgrade on the 2026 iPad Air is the newer M4 SoC with an 8-core CPU and 9-core GPU. While the core count remains the same as the 2025 iPad Air (M3), the newer M4 SoC is said to be 30% faster than the M3. Apple is bumping up the RAM (unified memory) from 8GB on the M3 variant to 12GB on the M4 variant, and also increasing the memory bandwidth to 120GBps.
The next set of upgrades on the iPad Air M4 are the switch to the C1X cellular modem (away from the Qualcomm modem on the M3) and the inclusion of the N1 networking chip for Wi-Fi 7 and Bluetooth 6 support, up from Wi-Fi 6E and Bluetooth 5.3 on the iPad Air M3. The N1 chip also enables Thread connectivity on the iPad Air for the first time.
That’s about it for the upgrades. Everything on the iPad Air remains the same, which is great, as Apple isn’t trying to fix what isn’t broken. The iPad Air comes in 11-inch and 13-inch display sizes, and retains support for Apple Pencil Pro and Magic Keyboard.
The display is still a Liquid Retina (IPS LCD) with a 60Hz refresh rate, so you’ll still have to step up to the iPad Pro for that 120Hz ProMotion OLED display. The 12MP, f/1.8 rear camera and 12MP front camera are also retained. The iPad Air M4 comes with iPadOS 26 out of the box.
Apple iPad Air (M4) pricing and availability
The iPad Air (M4) retains its predecessor’s pricing, with the 11-inch variant starting at $599 and the 13-inch model starting at $799. Given the higher RAM, this makes it a better deal. Here’s the complete pricing breakdown of the model across screen size and connectivity variants:
iPad Air (M4) 11-inch WiFi:
- 128GB: $599
- 256GB: $699
- 512GB: $899
- 1TB: $1,099
iPad Air (M4) 11-inch WiFi + Cellular (5G):
- 128GB: $749
- 256GB: $849
- 512GB: $1,049
- 1TB: $1,249
iPad Air (M4) 13-inch WiFi:
- 128GB: $799
- 256GB: $899
- 512GB: $1,099
- 1TB: $1,299
iPad Air (M4) 11-inch WiFi + Cellular (5G):
- 128GB: $949
- 256GB: $1,049
- 512GB: $1,249
- 1TB: $1,449
Pre-orders begin on March 4, with open sales beginning on March 11. You can get the iPad Air in Blue, Purple, Starlight, and Space Gray colors.
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