iPad Pro 4 years with a 2018 A12X iPad Pro the M2 2022 iPad Pro is a game changer.

[TheRealAlex]

Wow just unboxed and setup the M2 iPad Pro, the faster storage and RAM are immediately apparent based on how fast Updates takes and how fast Apps install.
WiFi6E thanks to having a WiFi 6 (non E) router let’s me multitask even when my Gaming PC is doing a major update and so is my 11 M2 iPad Pro.
On paper there is No Increased Brightness but I’ll say Hands down after 4 solid years my 2018 iPad Pro was dimming and it was clearly not a vibrant as the new M2 11” even if I maxed out the brightness it would trigger some type of Auto dimming to preserve battery life that’s not happening on the M2 iPad Pro.

I’ll forgive last years M1 iPad Pro buyers there’s nothing here for you. This is from the perspective of an old 4 year old iPad Pro which I just traded in for $245 at the Apple Store (I was gonna sell it for $150)

If OLED is confirmed for 2024 I don’t want it. Period. And what’s on tap for 2023 IMO it’s a skipped year same as 2019 was.

 

[AlanLowe]

Some Tech Reviewers obviously bash the new M2 and say the M1 is a better deal. However, i was in the same boat as you and came from the 2018. I love my new M2, and I'm glad I spent the money. Every year, Apple always has minor improvements. These small improvements accumulate over four years; I think some reviewers forget that. Every model does not need to be a whole revamp. Yes, little bummed we didn't get the horizontal camera, but we got an M2 in a smaller form factor, and we know we will eventually get a revamp. It's a great tablet that compliments everything I do for my workflow. Cheers!

 

[Frankfurt]

I upgraded from a 2017 IPP 10.5 and equally enjoy the new M2 12.9” IPP. Critics forget that only few people upgrade their iPads annually. This year is an “S” upgrade and 2nd gen devices are what I prefer to buy anyways.

 

[TheRealAlex]

Some Tech Reviewers obviously bash the new M2 and say the M1 is a better deal. However, i was in the same boat as you and came from the 2018. I love my new M2, and I'm glad I spent the money. Every year, Apple always has minor improvements. These small improvements accumulate over four years; I think some reviewers forget that. Every model does not need to be a whole revamp. Yes, little bummed we didn't get the horizontal camera, but we got an M2 in a smaller form factor, and we know we will eventually get a revamp. It's a great tablet that compliments everything I do for my workflow. Cheers!

Yeah some of those are tech reviewers who are even sent free iPads. But this is a huge upgrade especially for Emulators and games.

 

[flur]

Thank you for posting this. I bought a new 11” M2 yesterday to replace my 2018 11” and haven’t unboxed it yet because of all the posts and reviews saying it’s not much of an improvement. I’ve been afraid I’ll be disappointed. You’ve made me feel more confident in my decision. Time to get this new M2 fired up.

 

[flur]

This year is an “S” upgrade and 2nd gen devices are what I prefer to buy anyways.

Same. I know lots of cool things will be coming in 2024 but I also know there will be some “gate” where they messed something up, and they’ll put out a more refined “S” version in fall 2025. So the next device I’ll want to buy is 3 years out.

 

[Digitalguy]

Oh man, so you are criticising the reviewers who said that M1 at a cheaper price was a better value than the M2, when this has just nothing to do with the fact that you are upgrading from a 2018 pro to a 2022 pro and seeing a significant improvement (which is obvious)?
M1 is a great device. M2 is a great device, somewhat better than M1 but M1 can be found for quite a bit cheaper in many places. What's wrong with that? Do you need to bash reviewers for saying M1 has more value to feel better about a M2 purchase?

 

[AlanLowe]

Oh man, so you are criticising the reviewers who said that M1 at a cheaper price was a better value than the M2, when this has just nothing to do with the fact that you are upgrading from a 2018 pro to a 2022 pro and seeing a significant (which is obvious)?
M1 is a great device. M2 is a great device, somewhat better than M1 but M1 can be found for quite a bit cheaper in many places. What's wrong with that? Do you need to bash reviewers for saying M1 has more value to feel better about a M2 purchase?

Correct me if I'm wrong. However, No one has mentioned the price factor when comparing M1 vs. M2. Yes, you can probably get a better "Value" from the M1 Ipad Pro, but now, M2 is the highest Spec Ipad Apple has to offer. If you want the best iPad, you buy the M2; if you want the best value, buy an M1. As you said, they are both great devices. Most of the issues I've seen from the reviewers are everyone bashes how the M1 to the M2 Ipads were very incremental, and they wanted a revamp. Coming from a 2018 model, I wanted the best tablet from Apple. The M2 landed, and that's what I bought. This whole conversation is encompassed, going from no Ipad or 2018 to M2. Cheers if you got the new model! M1 is still a fantastic option if you're looking to save—no harm, but just expressing my opinion. 🙂

 

[outlawarth]

I upgraded from… nothing. I bought the 12.9 M2 to complement the clunky windows laptop issued by my employer. What a pleasure it is to use this tablet.

And am I the only one that actually enjoys using the stage manger? I have several groups of apps organized, some for work some for personal and although not perfect it works like a charm for my needs.

 

[AlanLowe]

I upgraded from… nothing. I bought the 12.9 M2 to complement the clunky windows laptop issued by my employer. What a pleasure it is to use this tablet.

And am I the only one that actually enjoys using the stage manger? I have several groups of apps organized, some for work some for personal and although not perfect it works like a charm for my needs.

I'm still getting used to Stage Manager. A few times, I've gotten frustrated with the arrangement of applications, but I think it's a user error, not a software issue. 🤣

 

[HackMacDaddy]

Wow just unboxed and setup the M2 iPad Pro, the faster storage and RAM are immediately apparent based on how fast Updates takes and how fast Apps install.
WiFi6E thanks to having a WiFi 6 (non E) router let’s me multitask even when my Gaming PC is doing a major update and so is my 11 M2 iPad Pro.
On paper there is No Increased Brightness but I’ll say Hands down after 4 solid years my 2018 iPad Pro was dimming and it was clearly not a vibrant as the new M2 11” even if I maxed out the brightness it would trigger some type of Auto dimming to preserve battery life that’s not happening on the M2 iPad Pro.

I’ll forgive last years M1 iPad Pro buyers there’s nothing here for you. This is from the perspective of an old 4 year old iPad Pro which I just traded in for $245 at the Apple Store (I was gonna sell it for $150)

If OLED is confirmed for 2024 I don’t want it. Period. And what’s on tap for 2023 IMO it’s a skipped year same as 2019 was.

To me the big shocker is the ridiculous trade in price by Apple and even more OP’s intention of selling a 2018 iPP for 150bucks?!!!

 

[outlawarth]

I'm still getting used to Stage Manager. A few times, I've gotten frustrated with the arrangement of applications, but I think it's a user error, not a software issue. 🤣

Yes, it took me a little while but I think I finally got the hang of it.

 

[CharlesShaw]

If OLED is confirmed for 2024 I don’t want it. Period.

I guess I got lucky with my iPhone X then.

 

[Digitalguy]

Correct me if I'm wrong. However, No one has mentioned the price factor when comparing M1 vs. M2. Yes, you can probably get a better "Value" from the M1 Ipad Pro, but now, M2 is the highest Spec Ipad Apple has to offer. If you want the best iPad, you buy the M2; if you want the best value, buy an M1. As you said, they are both great devices. Most of the issues I've seen from the reviewers are everyone bashes how the M1 to the M2 Ipads were very incremental, and they wanted a revamp. Coming from a 2018 model, I wanted the best tablet from Apple. The M2 landed, and that's what I bought. This whole conversation is encompassed, going from no Ipad or 2018 to M2. Cheers if you got the new model! M1 is still a fantastic option if you're looking to save—no harm, but just expressing my opinion. 🙂

I have indeed seen the price mentioned most of the time.... especially here in Europe.
Regardless, I think it's fair, after the move from A12Z to M1, to be disappointed by the much smaller move from M1 to M2 after the same amount of time, just as some were disappointed with A12Z after A12X (in my opinion that was a even bigger upgrade as RAM matters more than CPU/GPU speed, but that's a different subject...)
Having said that, I haven't seen anyone say that M1 is better than M2 or that you should buy M1 instead of M2 at the same price. What you are probably referring to is some reviewers saying things like "nobody should buy M2" which is tipical of some clickbaity channels / websites. That's wrong.
But it would also be wrong to say that M2 is the best choice if you come from 2018 pro. It's unrelated... Want the better value? Get M1. Want the best device? Get M2. And value is subjective. If you feel that the M2 is worth the additional cost (if any depending on the place) it's totally ok and nobody should judge that.
Both M1 and M2 are reasonable choices coming from 2018 pro, it depends on what matters to each person most (assuming there is indeed a cheaper M1 alternative, otherwise M2 is clearly a better choice...)

 

[Delorean2006]

Thank you for posting this. I bought a new 11” M2 yesterday to replace my 2018 11” and haven’t unboxed it yet because of all the posts and reviews saying it’s not much of an improvement. I’ve been afraid I’ll be disappointed. You’ve made me feel more confident in my decision. Time to get this new M2 fired up.

I upgraded from the 11 inch A12Z update, the 2020 iPad to a 12.9 inch M1, it was a big ugrade. You won’t be disappointed going from the A12X to the M2.

 

[Jimmdean]

I don’t think it’s a bash to say the M1 is a better buy. At $599 (and possibly even lower in the next several weeks) to me it’s a no-brainer. If there were more upgrades to speak of it would be a different story, but that’s just not the case.

 

[Leo90]

I just upgraded from 4th gen iPad Pro to a 6th gen iPad Pro with M2 and the difference is night and day. M2 deals much better with stage manager than A12Z. Besides, the mini LED alone was worth the upgrade for me.

 

[Wags]

To me the big shocker is the ridiculous trade in price by Apple and even more OP’s intention of selling a 2018 iPP for 150bucks?!!!

Ridiculous. Trade in values worse than iPhones.

 

[jclardy]

To me the big shocker is the ridiculous trade in price by Apple and even more OP’s intention of selling a 2018 iPP for 150bucks?!!!

Yeah, cheapest Apple refurbs are going for $470. Easily still with $350 used so long as the battery isn’t trashed.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

I’ll just say that many of the things I thought were “smooth enough” actually appear to be recognizably smoother. Pinching to zoom a busy page in Safari (or MacRumors) isn’t an exercise in zooming and waiting for it to catch up. Again, it’s nothing I really noticed as a “problem” at the time, but looking at it now, it was dropping a few frames.

 

[Mystic-Micro]

I get it that going from the 2018 iPad Pro to 2022 is night and day, but what specifically is better? The 2018 seems plenty fast to my fairly pedestrian use case of browsing, email, photo editing, and general content consumption. I don’t game so the gpu benefits are lost in me. Wifi 6 throughout didn’t seem to benefit my MacBook Pro 14, but I do have a decent wifi setup. Not sure to jump the gun and get a new one or just wait it out.

 

[GuruZac]

Congrats! That’s a solid upgrade. My wife still uses her 2018 12.9 and when I use that, I’m still blown away how quick it is, at nearly everything. The M1/M2 iPad Pros are really evolutions of an incredible piece of hardware-the 2018 iPad Pro.

 

[Unregistered 4U]

It also doesn’t look like some apps are aware of what the M2 is. Genshin Impact doesn’t see the M2 iPad Pro of being capable of 120 FPS.

 

[Digitalguy]

I get it that going from the 2018 iPad Pro to 2022 is night and day, but what specifically is better? The 2018 seems plenty fast to my fairly pedestrian use case of browsing, email, photo editing, and general content consumption. I don’t game so the gpu benefits are lost in me. Wifi 6 throughout didn’t seem to benefit my MacBook Pro 14, but I do have a decent wifi setup. Not sure to jump the gun and get a new one or just wait it out.

Speed is not the main difference, and it's far from being night and day, you can see it if you look for it (just as you can see promotion if you look for it, but it's not like 60hz is slow), but the main difference is RAM.
With 4GB once you start moving from one app to the other and have several tabs open at some point your apps and tabls will start to reload. With 8GB that happens much less.
If you have 6GB the difference will be much smaller.
Software-wise, only M series will be able to support full extended monitor via Stage Manager
Other than for RAM A12X is plenty fast, if it had 8GB RAM you could barely see the difference with M1 (and to be honest when I compare it to my 1TB A12X which has 6GB RAM I don't see much difference, just as I don't see much difference between 60hz and promotion, or between a SATA SSD and a PCIe one, except in some specific use cases...)

 

[cupcakes2000]

It also doesn’t look like some apps are aware of what the M2 is. Genshin Impact doesn’t see the M2 iPad Pro of being capable of 120 FPS.

Well devs need to catch up. They should have already (all my favourite app devs are quick off the mark - that’s what dev betas are for). Ask the dev.