Deal | Apple iPad Air M2 with 13-inch Liquid Retina display becomes much better value after latest price drop

Apple refreshed the 5th-gen iPad Air in May 2024 with the launch of two models, a smaller 11-inch at a starting price of $599 and a bigger 13-inch variant with an entry-level MSRP of $799. Both models pack Liquid Retina IPS panels, the powerful M2 chip, 8 GB of RAM, and up to 1 TB of storage.

The 13-inch iPad Air (2024) has now received a handsome 13% discount on Amazon. The discount brings the iPad Air 13 with 128 GB of storage down to only $699 (linked at the end). This $100 saving makes the iPad Air a much better deal than the full retail price, as you can invest the cash into a charging brick, the Apple Pencil, or an external SSD to increase the non-upgradable internal storage.

Aside from offering a larger 13-inch canvas, the biggest upgrade enjoyed by the 6th-gen iPad Air over its predecessor is the M2 SoC. With 8 CPU cores, the M2 SoC inside the iPad Air is, per our testing, 10% faster in Geekbench 5.5 single-core and 23% faster in the multi-core benchmark.

The performance delta in the GPU department is even bigger, as the iPad Air 6 boasts a 50% higher score in the 3DMark Wild Life Extreme Unlimited test. So, you can comfortably play intensive titles like Genshin Impact without a hitch. The games will also look good on the 13-inch display which covers 100% of the DCI-P3 gamut and features up to 600 nits of brightness.

Finally, despite providing tons of power, the M2 SoC is quite efficient and it shows in the battery life of the iPad Air (2024). We measured a WLAN runtime of just under 13 hours at 150 nits.

All in all, if you are upgrading from an older iPad Air or need a powerful tablet as a work companion, the 13-inch iPad Air (2024) on sale is a solid option.

Buy the Apple iPad Air 13-inch with M2 chip for $699 on Amazon