Artist Review: M4 iPad Air (2026)

Not a sponsored review

Apple has just released the M4 iPad Air on 11 March 2026, almost one year after the M3 iPad Air from 12 March 2025.

Prices for the 11-inch and 13-inch models with 128GB storage and 12GB RAM are USD 599 and 799 respectively. Apple Pencil Pro is USD 129.

Listed below are the upgrades.

Upgrades

Bottom line

The M4 iPad Air is still a well made tablet that does not have the extra features as the iPad Pro, but will still get the job done.

The M4 iPad Air is a good tablet that provides good value for money simply because the M5 iPad Pro is really or too expensive. There's a USD 300 and USD 400 difference for the 11-inch and 13-inch models with 256GB storage. But if you don't mind refurbished models direct from Apple, an 11-inch M4 iPad Pro is USD 850 and and the iPad Air is USD 700.

For drawing purposes, there isn't any functional or perceivable difference between the iPad Air and iPad Pro. The extra features with the iPad Pro are the 1000 nits OLED display, thinner and lighter designs, 4-way speakers, Face ID, 120Hz refresh rate and 60W fast charging. Whether to spend the extra money to get more features is just personal preference.

The M4 iPad Air's most substantial upgrade is probably the increase in amount of RAM from 8GB to 12GB. The M4 iPad Air has the same amount of RAM as the M5 iPad Pro, and more RAM than the M4 iPad Pro.

If you're considering getting the M4 iPad Air, I would highly recommend you check out the refurbished M3 iPad Airs from Apple to save even more money. Main difference is the older model has 8GB RAM which is still plenty.

SPECIFICATIONS

PRICE

• Wi-Fi + Cellular models of iPad Air (M4) cost $150 more than the equivalent Wi-Fi models.
• Wi-Fi + Cellular models of iPad Pro (M5) cost $200 more than the equivalent Wi-Fi models.

Things included

• Tablet
• 20W USB-C charger (depends on country)
• USB-C to USB-C charging cable
• Quick start guide

Design

Design of the iPad Air is just like the previous model, and just like the iPad Pro from 2018. It's still a good looking design so I have no complaints.

Bezels are thin and uniform on all sides. Corners for the body and LCD are rounded off.

The tablet has 6.1mm thickness, thicker than the 5.3mm and 5.1mm of the 11-inch and 13-inch M5 iPad Pro. But this tablet is definitely not considered thick.

The front camera unfortunately does not support face unlock. There's an auto-brightness sensor which works effectively.

The tablet has True Tone technology that can sense the ambient colour temperature to adjust the white balance of the tablet, to make the white look more like paper-white, and it's a feature that works really well.

Power button has a fingerprint scanner that works fast and effectively. There's a front landscape 12MP camera that does not support face unlock. There's a sensor for auto brightness and true tone and both features work well.

Four colours are available: Space Gray, Blue, Purple and Starlight (above). The back camera is 12MP but there's no flash.

There are four sets of speaker grilles but there are only two speakers, on the side nearer to the landscape camera. Audio is loud and clear, stereo sounds fine but definitely does not sound as full compared to the four speakers on the iPad Pro.

The USB-C port supports USB 3.1 gen 2 transfer speed (10Gb/s) and can output video.

Display

The iPad Air uses a glossy IPS LCD display with 60Hz refresh rate. There is anti-reflective coating which works well, but obvious reflections will still be obvious. The iPad Air does not have the nano-texture matte glass option.

Resolution of the 11-inch and 13-inch tablets are 2360 × 1640 and 2732 × 2048 pixels respectively. Visuals are sharp and pixelation is not noticeable.

The 11-inch tablet has 500 nits brightness and the 13-inch tablet has 600 nits brightness.

There really isn't much difference with latency when comparing a 60Hz vs 120Hz display. The gap as the line chases the pen tip looks the same. The main difference is the line will appear more instantaneous on a 120Hz. But you really need two tablets side by side to compare to see the difference.

120Hz difference is more obvious when there are many things moving on the screen. E.g. Maximising and minimising windows, pan, zoom, rotate, and scrolling web pages. For drawing purposes, 120Hz doesn't really provide much advantage. Apple Pencil latency performance is already good even with a 60Hz display.

Display is laminated so there's no parallax gap between the line and the pen tip. Pen tip glides smoothly on the display but is not considered slippery so you can still get good control over the pen.

Performance

When Apple M1 chip made its debut in the iPad Pro, it was revolutionary as it was a powerful chip, a desktop chip fitted into a tablet. The M4 chip is even more powerful and the processing power is definitely good enough to last for at least 10 years.

The more significant upgrade is actually the increase in RAM from 8GB to 12GB. There's now more RAM in the M4 iPad Air than the M4 iPad Pro which starts with 8GB RAM.

More RAM is great for multi-tasking, and you can create more layers too when creating artworks.

Below are the number of layers you can get for an A4 sized 300 DPI canvas in Procreate.

OS and software

iPadOS has too many features to list.

Main selling point is iPadOS will be updated for many years. My 2018 iPad Pro is still getting updates in 2025 but it's really sluggish now as the hardware can no longer keep up with the latest OS.

The M4 processor is way more powerful and there's even more RAM now so I expect the tablet to remain responsive for many years far into the future.

Another key selling feature of iPadOS is iCloud Backup will backup the whole tablet, 100% of the tablet, include the last webpage you browse. In the event that the tablet gets damaged, stolen or lost, you can get a new tablet, enter your Apple ID, and restore everything effortlessly. I don't know of any Android tablet that can back up 100% of the tablet.

Apple Pencil Pro

The Apple Pencil Pro is compatible with the M4 iPad Pro and M2 iPad Air. This is a separate purchase of USD 129.

Apple Pencil Pro attaches to the side of the tablet for charging and pairing.

All of Apple Pencil 2 features are still around, namely cursor hover (only for M2 or newer iPads), double tap shortcuts, magnetic pairing and charging.

Shown above are double tap shortcut options available for customisation.

New features are haptic feedback, squeeze to show shortcuts, barrel roll with the new gyroscope and lost location finder with Find My app.

Haptic feedback: This provides a phyiscal confirmation for an action you made, and this is better than looking for visual cues on the display for confirmation. E.g. When you double tap to switch from brush to eraser, you don't have to look at the brush and/or eraser icon.

Squeeze: At the time of review, squeeze can be used with Apple Notes to call up a mini palette with brush options. Shown above are squeeze shortcut options available for customisation. Hopefully squeeze feature can be customised by third party apps in the future.

Barrel roll: The pen has a new gyroscope to detect pen rotation and adjust the brush shape accordingly. E.g. You can adjust the angle/direction of the brush shape with both direction and rotation of the pen. Apple Pencil 2 only allows you to adjust angle of shape with direction of the pen. This new feature makes it easier to create certain brush effects or strokes.

Find My: This lets you find your misplaced Apple Pencil Pro.

Creative and visual apps

iPads have a huge selection of feature-rich drawing, graphic design and video editing apps.

Below are non-exhaustive lists for some of the popular creative apps:

Drawing

• Procreate
• Medibang Paint
• Medibang Pro
• Clip Studio Paint
• Sketchbook Pro
• Tayasui Sketches Pro
• Concepts
• PaintStorm
• Infinite Painter
• Affinity Photo
• Adobe Photoshop
• Adobe Fresco
• ArtStudio Pro

Graphic design

• Affinity Photo
• Affinity Designer
• Vectornator
• Amadine
• Adobe Photoshop
• Adobe Illustrator
• Affinity Publisher

Photo and video editing apps

• Adobe Photoshop
• Adobe Lightroom
• LumaFusion
• DaVinci Resolve

Drawing experience

Drawing experience of the Apple Pencil Pro on the iPad Air is fantastic. Tilt, pressure sensitivity and palm rejection work really well. Pen performance is predictable and consistent. Lines come out exactly the way as expected.

Even though the display is glossy, Apple Pencil Pro is not too slippery and can be controlled quite well.

Countless artists have created careers from drawing on iPads, and for some the iPad is their only drawing device. iPads have been used to create professional art for years.

Battery life

Battery life is around 9 to 10 hours with auto-brightness.

If you use the tablet outdoors under bright conditions, you can expect the battery to drawin 20% per hour. Sometimes the tablet may even be too hot until the display will dim, and in worst case scenario there may be an overheating warning pop-up box that appears.

If you're using the tablet indoors, you don't have to worry about battery life or overheating.

Battery can last for many years, and if your battery health drops under 80%, you can go to an Apple Store to pay for a battery swap.

Conclusion

The iPad Air may not have all the extra features of the iPad Pro, but it's also not as expensive. It's still a good tablet and it's a dependable tablet with consistent performance. It's a well made tablet that works great. Pen performance is fantastic and hence I can be recommend this easily to artists who may not want to spend that much money to get the iPad Pro.

Sure the iPad Pro is the better tablet, but the iPad Air provides more value for money because of its much lower price point. All the extra features of the iPad Pro are nice to have but come at a much higher proce.

Pros and cons at a glance

+ Beautiful design
+ Tablets are thinner, lighter and hence more portable
+ Effective anti-reflective coating on display
+ Good colour accuracy
+ Auto-brightness works well
+ True tone looks great
+ Apple Pencil Pro has many features
+ Apple Pencil Pro have great drawing and writing experience
+ 10 hours battery life
+ Many drawing, graphic design, creative apps
+ iPadOS has many features
+ iPadOS will have many years of updates
- No face unlock
- Stage Manager multi-tasking's usefulness is mainly for switching between apps
- Stage Manager external display usefulness depends a lot on third party app implementation
- Apple Pencil 2 is not compatible
- Rear camera has no flash
- No nano-texture glass option
- Display can still dim with overheating under extreme bright conditions
- No water resistance

Availability

If you're interested to get the M4 iPad Air or accessories, consider supporting my blog by buying through the affiliate links listed below at no extra cost.

Here in Singapore they are available from Lazada SG and Shopee SG.

They can be found on Amazon too via these links
Amazon.com | Amazon.co.jp

For matte screen protectors, I recommend SuperShieldz for 11-inch and 13-inch because you can get three pieces for less than USD 10. These are cheap and good. Just make sure you're getting for the correct tablet model.