After 2 weeks reviewing the brand new iPad Mini (2024), I simply need a Pixel Pill Mini

I’m no stranger to iPads. I received the iPad Mini 2 in a contest in 2014, purchased the Air 4 in 2020, and used each extensively over a number of years. However my favourite tablets have and can all the time be Android tablets. From my Acer Iconia A100 to my Nexus Pill 7, HUAWEI MediaPad M5 Professional 10.8, and at last, the Google Pixel Pill, I’ve seen first-hand Android’s development on bigger screens, and I admire the place we at the moment are.

So when the most recent iPad Mini — a.ok.a. iPad Mini 7, iPad Mini A17 Professional, or iPad Mini (2024) — landed in my arms, I nearly had my thoughts made up. Prejudice is humorous like that. I knew I’d just like the {hardware} and I predicted the A17 Professional processor can be a bit a lot for my day by day wants, however a welcome bonus when modifying batches of pictures in Lightroom. I might’ve additionally signed and notarized a doc telling you that none of that mattered for my private use as a result of I nonetheless favor Android over iPadOS. Sure, the iPad has extra high-quality apps, extra polish, extra gestures — simply extra of all the pieces — however I really feel at dwelling with Android, and you may’t simply manufacture or purchase that.

However I digress. What stunned me throughout my two weeks with the iPad Mini wasn’t any of that. It was how a lot I loved and missed this smaller pill type issue. The primary and most distinguished thought on my thoughts each time I picked up this iPad Mini is, “Oh, I want this was a Pixel Pill Mini!” Mainly, simply take the Pixel Pill and shrink it to the dimensions of the smaller Nest Hub, and I’d be a cheerful camper. Enable me to elucidate.

From the second I unboxed the brand new iPad Mini and each time I picked it up and used it, I used to be struck by what Apple has achieved with this pill. Sure, it’s small, with its 8.3-inch show and measly 6.3mm thickness, but it surely feels excellent. There’s a fragile stability between show utility and single-handed use, and the brand new iPad Mini slots proper in.

After I made my husband pose to snap the photograph above, he rapidly complained about having to carry the Pixel Pill up with one hand. At 493g versus 297g for the Mini, the distinction is well felt, even for somebody who doesn’t have to make use of them daily. So, think about what it might be like for an hour or two of day by day use. Even with my wrist’s Carpal Tunnel irritation rearing its ugly head these previous weeks, I didn’t discover that holding the iPad Mini irritated me any greater than holding my Pixel 9 Professional XL. By comparability, I’ve to relaxation the Pixel Pill on my lap or on a desk to make use of it for greater than 5 minutes.

After all, this smaller measurement means a smaller show, but it surely’s a compromise I’m prepared to make. You might even see the 8.3-inch show determine and suppose that’s barely bigger than a modern-day flagship cellphone, however don’t let the diagonal measure idiot you! My serviette math says the iPad Mini has a show floor of 204cm², which is nearly double that of my 6.3-inch Pixel 9 Professional XL’s 109cm². That’s much more show and it’s very noticeable whereas watching movies or studying books.

It’s extra than simply the dimensions and dimensions, although; it’s the ability inside. Apple didn’t low-cost out on the processor right here, dotting the Mini with the identical chip as final yr’s iPhone 15 Professional and Professional Max. The A17 Professional goes toe-to-toe with the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, which suggests further headroom to run all my apps, rapidly swap between them, use them in multi-window, join the iPad to my iMac, and extra. I didn’t discover a single hiccup, whether or not I used to be streaming a soccer sport, watching our Android Authority YouTube channel, studying books within the Kindle app, wanting up Black Friday offers, or just looking. Even after I opened Lightroom and began modifying a bunch of pictures, all the pieces was clean as butter.

It’s been mentioned 1,000,000 occasions already, but it surely bears repeating: Apple is aware of what it’s doing with its processors. Google, not a lot. Certain, in my common use, I couldn’t inform you the distinction between my Pixel Pill’s Tensor G2 and the iPad Mini’s A17 Professional, however after I pushed these only a bit, it grew to become clear that certainly one of them can maintain chugging alongside properly, whereas the opposite begins exhibiting indicators of slowing down.

Oh, and the Mini now helps the Apple Pencil, too, which makes note-taking, screenshot scribbling, and detailed edits in Lightroom doable. If a Pixel Pill Mini had been to ever exist, I might need it to comply with in Apple’s footsteps and cram in a robust processor and high-end options that don’t make me really feel like I’m utilizing second-tier silicon or {hardware}.

The very first thing that irritated me concerning the iPad Mini was the truth that I needed to plug it in to cost it. I do know that’s the norm, however the Pixel Pill bought me accustomed to this concept of never-but-always charging. Each time I decide it up, it’s full, and each time I put it again on the dock, it begins charging. I don’t have to consider it, nor do I’ve to fiddle with an errant USB-C cable. I maintain discovering myself with the iPad Mini warning me a couple of low battery as a result of I all the time overlook to cost it. The Pixel Pill does that proper.

Moreover that, there’s the large matter of usefulness whereas idle. After I’m not utilizing the iPad Mini, its show turns off. A black sq. stares again at me from my bedside desk or my desk, ineffective and disappointing. As soon as once more, that is the norm with different tablets, however the Pixel Pill spoiled me with its rotating photograph album. I like that function. I like that the show isn’t lifeless and that I don’t have one other pointless black display screen in entrance of me after I’m not utilizing it. As a substitute, I get a rotation of all of my pictures and get to recollect random moments from journeys, occasions, and get-togethers.

I can’t inform you what number of occasions over the past yr I’ve seen a photograph of a buddy or relative pop up on the Pixel Pill and smiled, then snapped it and despatched it to them in a message. “It’s only a foolish photograph body!” I hear you say. Why, sure, but it surely’s additionally made me attain out to individuals out of the blue, meet up with them, and reminisce about that shared reminiscence. Some options transcend their utility and develop into important and priceless like that. The Pixel Pill faucets into my humanity and my life’s story in a method that the iPad Mini simply can’t. For that purpose alone, I’ve a connection to the Pixel Pill that I simply can’t construct with the empty black display screen of the iPad Mini.

Sufficient sentimentality — let’s concentrate on the information. And the actual fact is that whereas some apps are higher designed for iPadOS, there’s nonetheless an enormous variety of apps that look horrendous on it as a result of the builders by no means optimized them for the bigger display screen. Google eschewed that with Android 15, the place you possibly can merely toggle a fullscreen side ratio possibility in settings to indicate the app on the whole thing of the show, and since Android apps scale properly throughout a number of display screen sizes by design, they nonetheless look unbelievable on a 10-inch show. That is true for apps like Instagram, Threads, Bluesky, Roborock, AllTrails, and extra, which present up as a pixelated mess on the iPad however not on the Pixel Pill.

Add to that the superior Gboard expertise on Android (versus the default iPad keyboard and even Gboard on iPadOS), Android’s constant again gesture to navigate out of menus and submenus, the helpful Pixel At A Look widget, a greater Gemini expertise than Apple Intelligence (which is sort of restricted within the EU), and it’s clear why I nonetheless favor the Pixel Pill total.

Two weeks in, my first response remains to be the identical. I need this iPad Mini to run Android and dock into a sensible display-like type issue when not in use. Or, extra succinctly, I need a Pixel Pill Mini.

If Google may bottle up the magic of the iPad Mini’s type issue, its portability, and its highly effective efficiency after which combine that with the always-charged, idle photograph body, and sensible speaker side of the Pixel Pill, I’d have my superb digital companion round the home and outdoors of it. Mainly, take the present Nest Hub, make it an inch bigger, and break up the speaker from the show. Add the identical versatile case of the unique Pixel Pill with its easy hook design, and that’d be excellent.

I do know I’m asking for the unattainable now, although. Rumor has it that Google’s Pixel Pill plans are up within the air, with a canceled Pixel Pill 2 and a possible Pill 3 in 2027. That doesn’t bode properly for all the line-up, and, in fact, it doesn’t bode properly for my fever dream of a smaller Pill Mini. However I’ll maintain dreaming every time I decide up this iPad Mini; possibly I can will this into existence.

As for the iPad Mini (2024) itself, it’s an superior lil’ factor for individuals used to Apple and prepared to spend as much as $500 to get the very best small iPad up to now.