Amazon must like what it sees from the brand-new M4 iPad Air. Not even 2 weeks into the shelf life of Apple’s remarkable new they’re jumping the competition — Apple included — with the very first price cut on the M4 iPad Air. It’s a smallish one — from $599 to $559 — but it’s a sign of things to come: The M4 iPad Air is going to be a major mover all year long.
The first-ever inclusion of the M4 chip into an iPad Air is the reason this new tablet hits differently than its predecessors. Apple previously reserved the M4 for the MacBook Pro and high-end iPad Pro configurations, and dropping it into the Air means the “middle tier” iPad now runs the same silicon as the Mac most people use for actual work.
Sky’s the Limit
The iPad Air’s performance ceiling for multitasking, creative apps, and AI-driven features just got considerably higher. The M4 processor handles complex workloads without negotiating which app gets priority, and all-day battery life means you’re not managing a recharge schedule alongside the work itself.
Apple Intelligence is baked in across the whole experience — writing tools, image generation, deeper app integration, and the kind of on-device processing that keeps personal data off external servers. Wi-Fi 7 with Apple’s N1 networking chip handles the connectivity side, which matters specifically for large file transfers — video footage, hi-res photo libraries, or large app downloads — where the speed difference over Wi-Fi 6 is most noticeable.
The 11-inch Liquid Retina display with P3 wide color and True Tone covers everything from color-accurate photo editing to casual content consumption, and the ultra-low reflectivity coating makes outdoor use more practical than it sounds on a spec sheet. The flexible windowing system in the latest iPadOS adds a genuine multitasking layer that earlier iPad software made difficult — running two apps side by side with independent controls feels closer to a laptop workflow than the original split-screen implementations.
Rarified Air
Apple’s Pencil Pro and Magic Keyboard for iPad Air are both compatible, which makes the Air a legitimate laptop replacement for people who lean toward the stylus or prefer the tablet form factor. That was a selling point formerly reserved for the iPad Pro, but the M4 iPad Air is making a serious effort to reshuffle the pecking order.
It’s been a year of surprises for Apple, with product upgrades and new drops coming on what seems like a near-weekly schedule. But this time the surprise belongs to Amazon, where they’re pulling the trigger early on the first-ever price break on the M4 iPad Air. It’s just $559 if you get there fast.