I had to decide between m1 iPad Pro and m1 MacBook Pro based on screen.

[Scott Sherman]

I bought a M1 iPad Pro from Amazon with magic keyboard and was not as impressed as the many reviewers who drooled over the screen brightness and massive amount of led's. Not that it isn't a great screen, it is. But I ordered a M1 MacBook Pro to compare for myself. I put the two side by side in a well lit room with the window behind them. I adjusted the white balance on the MacBook down to be more blue which was to my eye equal to the white balance of the iPad both set on maximum brightness without, night shift, True Tone and screen darkness off.

Ironically, to my eye, the two were almost identical. The blacks on the MacBook were inky black as were the those of the iPad and the brightness indoors in a well lit room was about equal. I downloaded the Spiderman movie and the Meg and a few tv shows on Apples TV website in high def. Again, the results were remarkably similar. I was shocked because the reviews Made it seem like the iPad was the best screen of all time on any portable electronic device. And it really is amazing. But based on my own real life eyeball test, I could not justify buying the iPad. A large part of my reason for having a portable is for the ability to watch tv, movies, YouTube etc.

There was nothing I could not do that I wanted to do on the MacBook. I don't use the pencil or the back camera. I really love the Touch Bar for it's versatility and the touchpad is far superior. I love the weight distribution of the MacBook vs the top heavy iPad for lap use. The MacBook can take advantage of all 16 gb of ram today on many more apps than the iPad.

I was willing to forsake all those things if the screen on the iPad was as superior as I was led to believe, but it just wasn't. I would love to hear your experience and thoughts if you have one or the other and did any kind of first person comparison.

 

[AxiomaticRubric]

One thing to keep in mind with all things Apple is that their marketing tends to overhype some things. I'm sure mini-LED is amazing for some use cases, but it probably doesn't make a dramatic difference for most daily tasks.

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

I bought a M1 iPad Pro from Amazon with magic keyboard and was not as impressed as the many reviewers who drooled over the screen brightness and massive amount of led's. Not that it isn't a great screen, it is. But I ordered a M1 MacBook Pro to compare for myself. I put the two side by side in a well lit room with the window behind them. I adjusted the white balance on the MacBook down to be more blue which was to my eye equal to the white balance of the iPad both set on maximum brightness without, night shift, True Tone and screen darkness off.

Ironically, to my eye, the two were almost identical. The blacks on the MacBook were inky black as were the those of the iPad and the brightness indoors in a well lit room was about equal. I downloaded the Spiderman movie and the Meg and a few tv shows on Apples TV website in high def. Again, the results were remarkably similar. I was shocked because the reviews Made it seem like the iPad was the best screen of all time on any portable electronic device. And it really is amazing. But based on my own real life eyeball test, I could not justify buying the iPad. A large part of my reason for having a portable is for the ability to watch tv, movies, YouTube etc.

There was nothing I could not do that I wanted to do on the MacBook. I don't use the pencil or the back camera. I really love the Touch Bar for it's versatility and the touchpad is far superior. I love the weight distribution of the MacBook vs the top heavy iPad for lap use. The MacBook can take advantage of all 16 gb of ram today on many more apps than the iPad.

I was willing to forsake all those things if the screen on the iPad was as superior as I was led to believe, but it just wasn't. I would love to hear your experience and thoughts if you have one or the other and did any kind of first person comparison.

There are two version of the iPad M1: 11" version is not equipped with mini-LED screen, only the 12.9" version has mini-LED screen.
Overall, their difference are not significant.
The scenario which shows their biggest difference is screen with high contrast objects, like a fullmoon on dark sky.

 

[Scott Sherman]

Thanks for your responses. This is not me complaining that the iPad has a bad screen, it doesn't. I am just curious why there is so much hype regarding how much better it is than the MacBook Pro. It should be much brighter with mini led's, which I haven't really seen in a real world comparison, but to listen to all the online reviews it should jump out and grab you with an OMG look how much brighter it is. Do you see that. I wanted to but just did not and honestly, the blacks on the MBP screen were incredibly black to my untrained eyes.

 

[JBGoode]

Did you download the the 4K HDR versions of these shows/movies? You stated high def only. The difference would be noticed with HDR content v. SDR in dim or dark environment as would the much better black levels which on the Mac would appear as murky gray in the dark. The iPad also has a much higher peak brightness than the Mac which is also necessary for a proper HDR presentation. I agree that in a well lit room the difference is probably negligible and mostly those that use this as a consumption device in the dark will reap the full benefit of the display.

 

[Nguyen Duc Hieu]

Thanks for your responses. This is not me complaining that the iPad has a bad screen, it doesn't. I am just curious why there is so much hype regarding how much better it is than the MacBook Pro. It should be much brighter with mini led's, which I haven't really seen in a real world comparison, but to listen to all the online reviews it should jump out and grab you with an OMG look how much brighter it is. Do you see that. I wanted to but just did not and honestly, the blacks on the MBP screen were incredibly black to my untrained eyes.

You will need a side-by-side comparison to feel the difference.
Mini-LED displays are considered to be matched with OLED displays in black level and high contrast control, especially on TV, while they are less prone to burnt-in issues.