When it comes to portable devices, Tablet falls right between a smartphone and a laptop. They are more powerful and sizable than a smartphone and often cheaper and more portable than a laptop. Some even have magnetic keyboard support to assist you in productive tasks.
As more and more popular brands keep flooding the market with tablets of their own, it is quite overwhelming to get your hands on the right one that will serve you the best. In this article, we will compare Microsoft’s Surface Pro 8 and Apple’s iPad Pro 2021, which are currently two of the best tablets you can get your hands on.
Design
Starting off with the Surface Pro 8, we get to see some crucial design improvements since the launch of Surface Pro back in 2017. It boasts a new graphite color scheme, rounded edge corners, and much smaller bezels. The outcome? An aesthetically pleasing tablet that feels comfortable to hold, even for longer periods.
There is not much to say about the iPad Pro’s design as it is more or less the same. As always, it is an attractive tablet that looks premium and feels durable.
Screen
Both the iPad Pro and Surface Pro 8 have a 13-inch 120Hz display that feels super smooth and responsive while browsing, streaming content, or playing light games. Though these tablets are not specifically for gaming, it’s really hard to switch back once you get to experience what 120Hz feels like.
The difference relies on the panel. Surface Pro 8 brings along Microsoft’s much popular PixelSense display with a native resolution of 2880 by 1920p. On the other hand, iPad Pro features Apple’s high-end Liquid Retina XDR panel.
So in terms of screen, we gotta admit that the iPad Pro shines brighter than the Surface Pro 8. Well, with its 1600 nits of brightness, it literally does.
Keyboard & Pen Support
You need to pay extra for a keyboard and stylus bundle for both of these tablets. Which, although might be a bummer, but is necessary to get the full tablet slash laptop experience.
Surface Pro 8’s signature keyboard is made of carbon fiber. So it is lightweight and feels a lot stiffer compared to the previous ones. The coolest thing about this detachable keyboard is it now has a dedicated room for the Surface Pen. Talking about the Surface Pen, Microsoft has also introduced their brand new Slim Pen 2 that gives off haptic feedback when you write or draw with it. The bundle costs around 280 dollars.
Unlike Surface Pro 8, Apple Pencil and Magic Keyboard for the iPad Pro are sold separately and not in a bundle. The Second Gen Apple Pencil costs around 119 dollars, while the Magic Keyboard requires you to pay 280 dollars.
Specs
Under the hood, Surface Pro 8 is available with up to 11th Gen i7 Processor, 32 Gigs of RAM, and 1TB of Storage. You can configure this tablet with lower-tier components if you want to cut the cost down.
iPad Pro, however, houses Apple’s most powerful M1 chip, which makes it stand out from the Surface Pro 8 in terms of performance. In addition, storage availability starts from 128 gigs all the way up to 2TB. The Surface Pro 8 brings along a slightly improved front-facing camera, but it is nothing compared to iPad Pro’s Ultra-Wide camera with the much helpful Center Stage feature.
And Lastly, both of them have Thunderbolt connectivity because that is a pretty big deal.
So that was all about the Surface Pro 8 vs iPad Pro debate. IPad Pro takes the crown of the best tablet. It has an immersive display, a better set of cameras, and more powerful than the Surface Pro 8. However, In terms of practicality, Surface Pro 8 has so much to offer in a laptop setup when paired up with the Keyboard and Stylus bundle. If we are being honest, the operating system has a much important role to play here. iPad OS is suitable for mobile and tablet devices, while the Windows OS offers you the best of both Laptop and Tablet experience. Either way, the choice completely depends on what you will be prioritizing from these two tablets.
