Apple announces new 9.7-inch iPad for students

Apple introduced a new iPad for students at its education event in Chicago. The newer iPad sports a 9.7-inch screen with Apple Pencil support. The updated iPad will be available in silver, space grey and a new gold finish.

The iPad 2018, as it is being called comes with an aluminium shell and features Apple’s A10 Fusion Chip which also powers the iPhone 7, iPhone 7 Plus. The processor from Apple is built on a 64-bit architecture and 16nm process technology. It’s a quad-core processor but only two of them are high-performance cores, reaching a clock speed of 2.34GHz.

The tablet will include Touch ID, an HD FaceTime camera, 10 hours of battery life, an 8-megapixel rear camera and LTE option. In order to attract schools, Apple is offering 200GB per iCloud account instead of 5GB of free storage.

The newer iPad will cost $329 for regular customers, while schools can buy it for $299. The optional Apple Pencil will be priced at $89 for schools and the regular $99 price for consumers. Apple is also releasing new versions of its Pages, Numbers, and Keynote apps that support the Apple Pencil, which means iPad owners will be able to use the Pencil to write within these apps.

In addition to the new hardware, Apple also launched a new app called Schoolworks, through which teachers will be able to provide handouts (class lessons in PDF etc) and specify activities for students. This app will be rolled out in June. For teachers, Apple has built another app called Apple Teacher, which will help teachers improve professionally.