Apple iPad Pro M5 review: This is peak iPad

I’ve long regarded the iPad Pro as the most impressive piece of hardware Apple makes. It has an amazing display, delivers desktop-class levels of performance, all in a chassis that’s only 5.1mm thick. And now, there’s a new version. It’s mostly a spec-bump update. Physically, it’s identical to its predecessor, but inside, it’s packing Apple’s newest M5 chip. As usual, Apple promises the new iPad Pro to be faster and more efficient, and I have no doubts it will be. But things are more interesting now that Apple has finally released iPadOS 26, which brings significant changes to the way an iPad works and what you can do with it. Surely, this makes the new iPad Pro is much more compelling device for customers?

What’s new

This new iPad Pro is a spec-bump upgrade, which means most of the changes and improvements are on the inside. What you need to know first is that the new iPad Pro is physically identical to last year’s models. Their dimensions and weight are completely unchanged. This means they are extremely slender. In fact, the 13-inch iPad Pro, which is a mere 5.1mm thick, is the thinnest Apple device ever – slimmer even than the iPhone Air.

The big updates are under the hood, and they are:

• New M5 chip
• N1 wireless chip
• C1X cellular modem

Though the new M5 chip is the star, what I find more interesting is that the iPad Pro is also getting Apple’s new N1 wireless chip and C1X cellular modem. These wireless solutions made their debut in the iPhone 17 series. Clearly, Apple intends to use them in more of its products. The N1 chip supports Wi-Fi 7, Bluetooth 6, and Thread home networking. This is great to see, because one of my complaints about the last-generation iPad Pro was that it only supported Wi-Fi 6E, which has its limitations. As for the C1X modem, Apple claims it offers 50% faster cellular data performance. It’s worth pointing out that this iPad Pro, like its predecessor, is eSIM-only.

A primer on M5

The M5 chip is built using a third-generation 3nm process, and Apple claims it’s more powerful and efficient. There are improvements to the CPU, GPU, as well as to the memory and storage subsystems.

The core configuration is unchanged, so it still comes in two variants depending on the amount of storage. iPad Pros with 256GB and 512GB of storage have chips that come with 9 CPU (3 performance cores, 6 efficiency cores) and 10 GPU cores, whereas the models with 1TB and 2TB of storage get chips with 10 CPU cores (4 performance cores, 6 efficiency cores) and 10 GPU cores. It’s unlikely there will be a great difference in performance, but it’s worth keeping in mind if you want the best-performing iPad.

There are significant upgrades to the GPU. Apart from upgraded shader cores and math rates, each GPU core now has a neural accelerator (just like A19 and A19 Pro) to speed up AI workloads. Together with the 16-core Neural Engine, Apple claims M5’s AI performance is up to 3.5 times faster than M4 and up to 5.6 times faster than M1. Apple says it’ll speed up the performance of local LLMs, as well as tasks like summarising notes and image generation.

The M5 chips also get more and faster memory. The 256GB and 512GB models now get 12GB of memory, whereas the 1TB and 2TB come with 16GB of memory. Memory bandwidth is also up by around 30% to 153GB/s. Speaking of which, Apple says M5 also supports the latest storage technology for read and write speeds that are twice as fast.

Using our usual suite of benchmarks, the M5 delivered 10% better CPU performance than last year’s M4 iPad Pro. Its GPU performance was even more remarkable. On Geekbench’s GPU workload, the M5 outperformed its predecessor by nearly 40%. In 3DMark, the new iPad Pro was 40% faster in the older Wild Life Unlimited workload, and about 30% faster in the more intensive Solar Bay workload, which uses ray-tracing. In short, the new M5 chip is markedly more powerful than its predecessor.

Performance and the user experience

If you have a fairly recent iPad, it’s unlikely you’ll notice the performance improvements that the new M5 chips claim to deliver. Especially if all you ever do on your iPad is browse the web, watch videos, and edit the occasional photo or even video. The new iPad Pro is fast, but so was the last one, and even the one before it. Heck, even an iPad Pro from 2021 with the M1 chip still feels snappy today.

But performance was never the issue with iPad Pros. The main limiting factor was iPadOS. Happily, the latest version, iPadOS 26, fixes quite a bit of it. iPadOS 26 gives users a lot of the features that they’ve been asking for. The most notable being a new windowing system that mimics macOS, so you can resize windows and place them wherever you want. It may appear trivial, but it’s so much more intuitive than whatever Apple has come up with before. Stage Manager, anyone? Apps also get menubars, and the redesigned Files app makes it a lot easier to manage files.

That’s not to say iPadOS 26 is perfect. Some apps still don’t quite measure up to their Mac counterparts, and there are apps that are still missing. But by and large, iPadOS 26 takes a great leap forward in making the iPad more instinctive to use and more useful.

The rest of the iPad Pro is mostly stellar. The display, which is a tandem OLED, is gorgeous. My review unit comes with the nano-texture glass, and it significantly reduces reflections and glare, even if it seems to sacrifice some sharpness and contrast. Still, I found myself rewatching shows just to see how they would look. Battery life is great for a device this thin, but it does seem to drain quickly if you keep the display’s brightness high. Keep it at more reasonable levels, and it’s entirely possible to get over 8 hours of screen time with the 13-inch model.

A quick word on accessories

To get the best out of the iPad Pro, you’ll likely need some accessories. Creative professionals or anyone who wishes to take notes and doodle will need either the Apple Pencil Pro (S$199) or Apple Pencil USB-C (S$119). The former is the obvious choice if your budget allows because it supports more gestures, plus it attaches and charges magnetically to the side of the iPad Pro.

The Magic Keyboard (S$529) was updated last year along with the iPad Pro redesign, and I would argue it’s a must-have accessory, especially if you intend for the iPad Pro to be a productivity tool. The palm rest is aluminium, and the trackpad is made of glass. It has haptic feedback and feels every bit as good as the trackpads you find on MacBooks. The keys feel tactile, well-sized, and are a joy to type on. Yes, the price is almost outrageous, but it works exceedingly well.

Final thoughts and buying advice

In the past, this was the part of the review where I praised the iPad Pro’s hardware and then pointed out that iPadOS holds it back in some ways. Happily, iPadOS 26 changes that. There’s certainly room for improvement, but it unquestionably enhances the iPad Pro’s utility and user experience, and makes it a more useful device.

For longtime iPad users who can use all of the firepower that the M5 chip can deliver, the choice is clear. The iPad Pro is the one to have. Its excellent performance, display, and slender form factor will surely delight its owners.

The only caveat is that all of this tablet excellence comes at a high price. Prices start at S$1,499 for the 11-inch model and S$1,999 for the 13-inch model. Once you start adding storage and accessories, the price starts to balloon quick. My review unit, which is the 13-inch model with 1TB of storage, cellular connectivity, nano-texture glass, and comes with the Apple Pencil Pro and Magic Keyboard, is a staggering S$4,077.

Perhaps what makes this decision more difficult is that the MacBook Air starts at S$1,499, while the new M5 MacBook Pro starts at S$2,199. There’s no need to get accessories to get the most out of these machines, and few would disagree that, even with iPadOS 26, MacBooks can do more than iPads.

But then, no MacBook can match the iPad Pro’s versatility. If you can master iPadOS 26, the iPad Pro is a device with unparalleled flexibility and portability. You can use an iPad Pro on a desk with an external monitor, but you can also whip it out and start using it while waiting in line to board a plane. For many people, that is a very compelling proposition. One that only the iPad offers. And if you want an iPad, the iPad Pro is the best there is.

Note: You can find the iPad Pro on Amazon, Lazada, Shopee, and the Apple Online Store.