🤯 Apple’s Thinnest OLED Monster: NEW 13″ iPad Pro M4 Crushes Laptops—See Why Everyone’s Upgrading NOW!

The Inspect Aspect
May 30
3 min read

Why This iPad Matters

Apple’s first-ever M4-powered iPad Pro is more than a spec bump—it’s the hardware foundation for the on-device Apple Intelligence features coming with iPadOS 19. Pair that neural horsepower with the stunning Ultra Retina XDR tandem-OLED display and you get a tablet that finally outshines most laptops in both speed and visuals.

Key Specs at a Glance

Feature	Details
Chip	3-nm M4 (10-core CPU, 10-core GPU, 16-core NPU, 38-TOPS)
Display	13-inch Ultra Retina XDR tandem-OLED, 2752 × 2064, 1 MHz–120 Hz ProMotion, 1600 nits HDR
Memory / Storage	16 GB Unified RAM · 256 GB NVMe
Connectivity	Wi-Fi 6E, Bluetooth 5.4, 5 G sub-6 + mmWave, USB-C Thunderbolt 4
Cameras / Sensors	12 MP Ultra-Wide Center Stage front · 12 MP Wide rear + LiDAR scanner
Battery	Up to 12 hrs web/video, 35 W USB-C PD fast-charge
Weight	1.28 lb / 579 g · 5.1 mm thin
Finish	Space Black (also Silver)

What’s New vs. 2022 iPad Pro

M4 SoC: 50 % faster CPU, 4× GPU ray-tracing, 60 % faster Neural Engine.
Tandem-OLED: dual-stack pixels for OLED blacks and 1000-nit full-screen HDR.
Landscape Camera: front cam now on the long edge—ideal for Zoom.
Design: thinnest Apple product ever—5.1 mm!

Performance Benchmarks

Test	iPad Pro M4	M2 iPad Pro
Geekbench 6 single / multi	3850 / 15 200	2560 / 9500
3DMark Solar Bay (Off-screen)	24 100	11 940
Stable Diffusion 1.5 (15 steps, 512²)	3.8 s	9 s

The 16-core NPU churns 38 TOPS—enough to run Apple Intelligence’s on-device Genmoji, text rewrite & Image Playground without cloud latency.

Display & HDR Editing

Dual-stack OLED = two emitters per pixel → 2× brightness headroom.
Delta-E < 1.0 factory calibration, P3 wide-color.
Supports Reference Mode for SDR/HDR side-by-side when grading in DaVinci Resolve.

Creator & Pro Workflows

Task	Real-World Result
4K60 ProRes ingest (Thunderbolt SSD)	240 MB/s sustained; edits 3 streams in Final Cut Pro iPadOS.
Logic Pro 2	64-track orchestral project at 48 kHz with zero buffer underruns.
Blender (Metal)	BMW GPU render in 27 s vs 63 s on M2.

Apple Intelligence Preview

Semantic Search across Photos, Notes & Files (on-device).
Genmoji & Image Playground: create stickers from text + style prompts.
Rewrite / Proofread system-wide; appears in Mail, Pages, Wix Blog app.

All Apple Intelligence tasks run entirely on-device up to a privacy threshold; larger requests offload only the diff to Apple Private Cloud.

Accessories Worth Pairing

Accessory	Why It Matters	Price
Magic Keyboard for M4	Aluminum deck, 14-key function row, USB-C passthrough.	$349
Apple Pencil Pro	Barrel-roll orientation & squeeze-to-bring-up brushes.	$129
Belkin 8-in-1 Thunderbolt Dock	2.5 GbE, HDMI 2.1, SD-UHS-II, 85 W pass-through.	$199

Battery, Heat & Cellular

Mixed workload (Safari, FCP, Slack) = 10 h 15 m on Wi-Fi; 9 h 20 m on 5 G (T-Mobile mmWave).
35 W charger restores 0 → 50 % in 27 minutes.
Even under Blender render, chassis peaked at 37 °C—comfortable hand-held.

iPad Pro 13 M4 vs MacBook Air 15 M3

	iPad Pro 13 M4	MacBook Air 15 M3
Weight	1.28 lb	3.3 lb
Brightness HDR	1600 nits	600 nits
Touch / Pencil	Yes	No
Ports	1 × TB4 USB-C	2 × TB4 USB-C, MagSafe
AI NPU	38 TOPS	18 TOPS

Choose the iPad if you need OLED HDR & Pencil flow; pick the Air for clamshell multitasking and legacy ports.

Pros & Cons

Pros

Industry-leading OLED HDR with ProMotion
M4 Neural Engine ready for on-device Apple Intelligence
Landscape camera & ultra-wide audio for calls
Thinnest, lightest 13-in tablet ever

Cons

256 GB base storage fills fast with 4K ProRes
Magic Keyboard + Pencil push total price above $1.7 K
USB-C single-port daisy-chain can be limiting

Verdict

The iPad Pro 13 M4 is the first tablet that feels built for the next decade of on-device AI creation. If you’re a photographer, 3D artist, or road-warrior manager who values HDR accuracy and ultralight mobility, this is your dream slab. Everyone else? The 11-inch M4 or M2 Air may be the smarter wallet pick.