As expected, Apple has announced a mild update for the iPad family’s middle child today. The new iPad Air is a lot like the old one, but it replaces the Apple M3 chip with an M4. That M4 also comes with a less-expected upgrade: a jump from 8GB of RAM to 12GB, which should be helpful for those using iPadOS 26’s multi-window multitasking features.
The iPad Air still comes in 11-inch and 13-inch versions that start at $599 and $799, respectively; the only disappointment is that these entry-level models still come with 128GB of storage. A 256GB storage upgrade will run you $100, and 512GB (+$300) and 1TB (+$500) versions are also available. Preorders go live on March 4, and the tablet will be available on March 11.
The M4 iPad Air uses the same design as the M2 version from 2024 and the M3 version from last year. The M2 version of the Air was a gently tweaked version of the M1 iPad Air, but it was different enough not to be compatible with all the same accessories; most notably, the M2-and-later Airs use the Apple Pencil Pro accessory and aren’t compatible with the second-generation Pencil.
This version of the Apple M4 is slightly cut down compared to the version that ships in Macs or that came with the M4 iPad Pro. It has only 8 CPU cores—3 high-performance cores and 5 efficiency cores, down from a maximum of and 4 and 6. It also uses 9 GPU cores instead of 10, and there isn’t an Air variant with 16GB of RAM. A 16GB RAM configuration was available for M4 iPad Pros with 1TB or 2TB of storage.
Otherwise, very little has changed about the new iPad Air. It still comes in four relatively muted color options (space gray, blue, purple, and a pale gold “starlight”), still uses a regular 60 Hz LCD display rather than an OLED or ProMotion screen, still uses a power button-mounted TouchID sensor rather than FaceID, and still includes a single-lens 12MP rear camera with no flash. Apple continues to not offer its nano-texture display coating for the Air, either—that’s reserved exclusively for higher-end iPad Pro configurations.
The new iPad Air is part of a string of announcements that Apple is planning in the run-up to a “special experience” event on Wednesday morning. The company also announced a new iPhone 17e today and is widely expected to debut a new low-end iPad and a new MacBook that’s substantially cheaper than the MacBook Air.
This piece was updated at 11:15am on March 2 to add details about the M4 chip’s CPU core configuration.
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Posted Tuesday 3 March 2026 at 5:09 am AEST (my time).
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