iPad Pro
Ranked 2 of 9 tablets by recommenders
Recommended for its fast chip, excellent display, long lifespan and keyboard-plus-pencil versatility, though many say iPadOS restrictions keep it from truly replacing a laptop.
Recommended for its fast chip, excellent display, long lifespan and keyboard-plus-pencil versatility, though many say iPadOS restrictions keep it from truly replacing a laptop.
175 people gave an opinion
- recommend it
- 95
- criticize it
- 80
- approval share
- 54%
Recommended in 12 of 13 months
- November 2025: recommended
- December 2025: recommended
- January 2026: recommended
- February 2026: recommended
- March 2026: recommended
- April 2026: recommended
- May 2026: recommended
- June 2026: recommended
- July 2026: recommended
- August 2026: recommended
- September 2026: recommended
- October 2026: recommended
- November 2026: not recommended (month in progress)
Owned for 8 years
Median of the 30 owners who said how long they have had it.
Each square is one year.
Why it doesn’t carry the badge
- 95 people recommend itNeeds 10 or more, met.
- 1.1 recommenders for every criticNeeds 2 to 1 or better, not met.
- Recommended in 12 of 13 monthsNeeds 4 or more, met.
The same three rules apply to every product, and the badge can’t be bought. How the badge works
What people say about it
The reasons people give, with the number of comments that give each one. Open a reason to read what they said.
Why people recommend it
Each mark is one comment
Laptop-class processor speed
“I'm acutely aware that it both has a larger display and significantly more powerful processor than the laptop”
Comment from 8 Mar 2026 in “The New Apple Begins to Emerge” “My iPad Pro has a plenty big screen, a touch screen, and a processor that's faster than my M1 Air...by a lot.”
Comment from 28 Oct 2026 in “MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display and Touch” “That’s quite impressive for a tablet and faster than most laptops available today.”
Comment from 5 Dec 2025 in “I Tested the M5 iPad Pro's Neural-Accelerated AI, and the Hype Is Real” - Comment from 2 Mar 2026 in “Apple introduces the new iPad Air, powered by M4”
- Comment from 21 Aug 2026 in “How to compromise your system with a job interview”
Best-in-class display
“fingerprints have never once bothered me. The cleaning cloth works great. I love the nano screen as reflections are just not a problem any more.”
Comment from 19 Jan 2026 in “Notes on Apple's Nano Texture” “everyone considers the iPad Pro to have probably the best display available at any price point”
Comment from 10 Jan 2026 in “OLED Not for Me” “the big difference why I would go for a pro if I ever replace my mini is ProMotion”
Comment from 2 Mar 2026 in “Apple introduces the new iPad Air, powered by M4” - Comment from 23 Apr 2026 in “MacBook Neo and How the iPad Should Be”
- Comment from 23 Jul 2026 in “Writing by Hand is Good for your Brain”
Lasts for many years
“I still have the 2017 pro and i can't imagine a good enough reason to buy almost 10 years later a new gen.”
Comment from 2 Mar 2026 in “Apple introduces the new iPad Air, powered by M4” “It's been my regular gym buddy for years, and is showing no signs of needing to be replaced.”
Comment from 2 Mar 2026 in “Apple introduces the new iPad Air, powered by M4” “It still works perfectly fine, and having invested in the nice keyboard case for it”
Comment from 2 Mar 2026 in “Apple introduces the new iPad Air, powered by M4” - Comment from 2 Mar 2026 in “Apple introduces the new iPad Air, powered by M4”
- Comment from 2 Mar 2026 in “Apple introduces the new iPad Air, powered by M4”
Keyboard, pencil and touch versatility
“an iPad Pro with keyboard and trackpad would generally be preferable to a Macbook Pro or Air or Neo”
Comment from 14 Mar 2026 in “Your Phone Is an Entire Computer” “If you do any drawing then it's a no brainer, and that's why I got it in the first place.”
Comment from 2 Mar 2026 in “Apple introduces the new iPad Air, powered by M4” “I find the combo of keyboard, pointer, touch, and pencil interfaces very useful.”
Comment from 25 Apr 2026 in “MacBook Neo and How the iPad Should Be” - Comment from 9 Sep 2026 in “iPhone Duo”
- Comment from 27 Dec 2025 in “Quill OS: An open-source OS for Kobo's eReaders”
- Comment from 12 Mar 2026 in “MacBook Neo Is a 'Shock' to the PC Industry: Asus Co-CEO”
What people warn about
Each mark is one comment
iPadOS is too limiting
“such an amazing device especially with the 5G. only downside is obv the iPadOS, it's still very limiting”
Comment from 26 Aug 2026 in “New Mac Studio with M5 Max and M5 Ultra” “After a couple years of use of trying to use the iPad exactly as you stated here (it's lived 24/7 on my kitchen island, I've realized iPadOS is not that great to use in this way).”
Comment from 13 Oct 2026 in “Apple HomeView” “They've taken so many swings at the iPad Pro (both hardware and software), and it has never been as good as the MacBook.”
Comment from 5 Oct 2026 in “Apple and a hacker's future” - Comment from 20 Oct 2026 in “Apple broke an essential presentation feature of iPads”
- Comment from 5 Nov 2025 in “Cheaper MacBook powered by iPhone chip coming in 2026, per new report”
Apple locks out macOS, VMs, browsers
“Of course Apple prevents this even though it's entirely possible to do it, because Apple is going to do Apple things.”
Comment from 4 Nov 2025 in “Cheaper MacBook powered by iPhone chip coming in 2026, per new report” “It's frustating knowing that the ipad _could_ run mac os but won't due to intentional market segmentation by Apple.”
Comment from 23 Apr 2026 in “MacBook Neo and How the iPad Should Be” “There is no excuse for making people pay a premium price for an iPad Pro that can't run a third party web browser”
Comment from 12 Dec 2025 in “Epic celebrates "the end of the Apple Tax" after court win in iOS payments case” - Comment from 18 May 2026 in “I turned a $80 RK3562 Android tablet into a Debian Linux workstation”
- Comment from 19 Dec 2025 in “The M5 is an ARMv9 marvel, but iPadOS acts as a 5.1mm cage”
Pricey with too little RAM
“My much more RAM efficient M2 iPad Pro with the non-desktop OS and 8GB of RAM frequently has to page out apps I had open two minutes ago”
Comment from 12 Mar 2026 in “MacBook Neo Is a 'Shock' to the PC Industry: Asus Co-CEO” “wildly overpriced for its specs -- m4 pro has half!! the ram that the cheaper m4 macbook air has”
Comment from 2 Mar 2026 in “Apple introduces the new iPad Air, powered by M4” “even with 16G shared memory on a iPadPro, I can only run local models in a chat-style app”
Comment from 18 Nov 2025 in “People are using iPad OS features on their iPhones” - Comment from 20 Oct 2026 in “Apple broke an essential presentation feature of iPads”
Power goes unused by software
“why release an M4 iPad Pro when essentially no software can make use of the processor power improvements since 2018?”
Comment from 2 Mar 2026 in “Apple introduces the new iPad Air, powered by M4” “My old M1 iPad Pro remains severely underused eating dust because I'm never carrying that thing around with me”
Comment from 29 Oct 2026 in “MacBook Pro with PROLED XDR Display and Touch” “Quite overkill for a content consumption tablet and too limited to be a full laptop replacement.”
Comment from 5 Nov 2025 in “Cheaper MacBook powered by iPhone chip coming in 2026, per new report”
Other tablets people recommend
The four most recommended other tablets, with the same counts for each, so you can compare like for like. The tick on each bar marks the 2 to 1 line the badge needs.
| Product | Recommend | Criticize | Approval | Months | Owned | Badge |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Apple iPad | 268 | 302 | 47% | 12 | 5 yrs42 owners | — |
| iPad ProThis page | 95 | 80 | 54% | 12 | 8 yrs30 owners | — |
| Apple iPad Air | 61 | 69 | 47% | 9 | 6 yrs8 owners | — |
| iPad mini | 53 | 76 | 41% | 10 | 11 yrs8 owners | — |
| Apple iPad with Magic Keyboard | 14 | 5 | 74% | 8 | — | Approved |
What people said
40 of the 212 comments that mention it, newest first. Each links to the original comment.
“My old M1 iPad Pro remains severely underused eating dust because I'm never carrying that thing around with me”
“My iPad Pro has a plenty big screen, a touch screen, and a processor that's faster than my M1 Air...by a lot.”
“Sometimes it's just nice to hold some tech in your hand that feels like it's from the future.”
“is a desktop grade processor sold with a "pro" moniker being able to perform some basic PowerPoint and screensharing worth the $1000 asking price?”
“all these limitations blocking the iPad from its potential have been there since the first iPad Pro”
“After a couple years of use of trying to use the iPad exactly as you stated here (it's lived 24/7 on my kitchen island, I've realized iPadOS is not that great to use in this way).”
“They've taken so many swings at the iPad Pro (both hardware and software), and it has never been as good as the MacBook.”
“my iPad Pro + Magic Keyboard case has fully replaced my Mac for everything”
“such an amazing device especially with the 5G. only downside is obv the iPadOS, it's still very limiting”
“An iPad Pro M5 is faster than most laptops, perfectly good for coding”
“having a display about the same size as a sheet of A4/letter paper is nice”
“Unlock the virtualization support to let me have a debian/ubuntu VM with a complete development environment”
“I find the combo of keyboard, pointer, touch, and pencil interfaces very useful.”
“The ipad is incredible for reading pdfs that are meant to be letter/a4 sized.”
“It's frustating knowing that the ipad _could_ run mac os but won't due to intentional market segmentation by Apple.”
“an iPad Pro with keyboard and trackpad would generally be preferable to a Macbook Pro or Air or Neo”
“I use my iPad for casual CAD with 3d printing in mind, it works great.”
“My much more RAM efficient M2 iPad Pro with the non-desktop OS and 8GB of RAM frequently has to page out apps I had open two minutes ago”
“I'm acutely aware that it both has a larger display and significantly more powerful processor than the laptop”
“Even at 9 years old, I don't see myself upgrading in the foreseeable future.”
“It still works perfectly fine, and having invested in the nice keyboard case for it”
“I would absolutely carry an iPad Pro with a dev environment with me on the holidays for emergencies”
“I still have the 2017 pro and i can't imagine a good enough reason to buy almost 10 years later a new gen.”
“the big difference why I would go for a pro if I ever replace my mini is ProMotion”
“Everything's so fast and fluid I doubt I'd notice if the CPU were twice as fast.”
“why release an M4 iPad Pro when essentially no software can make use of the processor power improvements since 2018?”
“If you do any drawing then it's a no brainer, and that's why I got it in the first place.”
“wildly overpriced for its specs -- m4 pro has half!! the ram that the cheaper m4 macbook air has”
“8 years later the local apps still run fast, but it struggles with web browsing.”
“It's been my regular gym buddy for years, and is showing no signs of needing to be replaced.”
“fingerprints have never once bothered me. The cleaning cloth works great. I love the nano screen as reflections are just not a problem any more.”
“everyone considers the iPad Pro to have probably the best display available at any price point”
“that is extremely sticky and has become my primary workstation somehow”
“Some iPad Pro limitations can be worked around by sideloading apps that Apple won't distribute”
“There is no excuse for making people pay a premium price for an iPad Pro that can't run a third party web browser”
“That’s quite impressive for a tablet and faster than most laptops available today.”
“even with 16G shared memory on a iPadPro, I can only run local models in a chat-style app”
“in my personal experience does very well even on shorter legs due to its weight distribution”
“Quite overkill for a content consumption tablet and too limited to be a full laptop replacement.”
“Of course Apple prevents this even though it's entirely possible to do it, because Apple is going to do Apple things.”
Counts come from 1,795,640 Hacker News comments, November 2025 to November 2026. How we count. Report a mistake.