iPad Air (2025) review: The M3 chip with plenty of power

Discover the iPad Air (2025) review featuring the powerful M3 chip. Uncover performance, design, and features that elevate your experience!

Few products are as established in the market as the iPad. Not tablets, no. iPads. Over time, Apple has managed to make its iPads a mature product, so mature that analyzing the annual iterations poses a real challenge. And it's not because it's a groundbreaking or radically innovative device, but because the previous generation was already good, as was the one before it. It has reached a point where the annual improvements are only significant for the most enthusiastic users, and that is precisely what happens with the iPad Air with the M3 chip.

Over the past few weeks, we have been using the 13-inch model to browse, write, play, read... for what a tablet is used for, in short. The summary? It's an iPad. One that stands out and falls short in exactly the same areas as its predecessors, only now it's more powerful and has Apple Intelligence.

iPad Air M3 (2025) Review: A Mature Product Awaiting a Software Leap

iPad Air M3 (2025) Technical Specifications

iPad Air M3 (2025), Our Experience

Design: It's an iPad Air. We could copy and paste what we said in the iPad Air with the M2 chip review because the sensations are exactly the same. It is a device that feels premium to the touch, with a very good finish, surprisingly light for its size, and only 6.1 millimeters thick. We continue to miss Face ID, which would be much more convenient than the fingerprint reader located on the top edge, but it is a "first-world problem" as it was in the previous generation.

Screen: Mixed Feelings. Does the screen look good? Yes. Is it the best screen on a tablet? Not by a long shot. While the panel responds well to touch and looks perfect indoors, its 600 nits of brightness are insufficient for outdoor use in strong sunlight. Furthermore, for the 949 euros that the base 13-inch model costs, one would expect at least a 120 Hz OLED panel, something that Apple continues to reserve for the Pro models.

And it's not just a matter of watching a movie better. It's a matter of the iPad Air being compatible with the Apple Pencil and Pencil Pro and aimed at creators, designers, etc., so a 120 Hz OLED screen would be perfect for it. But no. At this point, for the price it has and being a good screen, the panel of this iPad Air M3 does not live up to expectations.

Sound: It Sounds Good. What has delivered is the sound system. Again, while not the best we've tested on a tablet, the speakers reproduce bass with power and offer good resolution of mids and highs. Very suitable for listening to music, playing games, watching content on YouTube, or using VOD platforms. There is also compatibility with codecs such as FLAC and Dolby Atmos, as well as Apple Lossless, so no complaints in this regard.

The Importance of Accessories. The big problem with the iPad is that part of its raison d'être depends on paying extra for accessories. This iPad changes radically if we use it alone or with the new Magic Keyboard and the Apple Pencil Pro. The Apple Pencil Pro has a good handful of interesting functions focused on design (which not all users will take advantage of), such as hover or opening the tool suite of an app by squeezing the pencil. It is a very good pencil, but except for specific cases (if we are designers), it may be more dispensable.

What the iPad does not forgive is the keyboard. The new Magic Keyboard has a row with function keys (thank you, Apple), a larger trackpad, and a USB-C port for charging. This port frees up the iPad's port so we can connect accessories, such as an SD card reader or a mouse. The floating support design is sensational and ideal for working or watching content on the go. The problem is that it costs a whopping 349 euros, and without it, the iPad loses quite a bit of its purpose.

The M3 Can Handle Everything. Remember when we talked about coffee for the very enthusiastic? Well, that's what happens with the M3 chip. The performance of this processor is outstanding in each and every section we look at, whether it's editing video, photos, or playing games. It doesn't overheat excessively even after long gaming sessions, much less with multimedia consumption. I think it's reasonable to say that whatever use we give it, the iPad Air will offer us top-tier performance. For those who like to compare benchmarks, here are the figures.

*These tests were performed with Geekbench 5.

Now, there is an undeniable reality, and that is that we are only going to squeeze this processor in very specific cases: 3D design, management and editing of heavy files, triple-A games, etc. If this is our case, this device will more than fulfill its purpose. I don't design in 3D, but I do edit video and play games, and the iPad Air has proven to be a very versatile device.

This iPad Asks for Different Software. I can't help but feel that iPadOS is not up to par with the iPads. While it is a system that works perfectly, with outstanding performance and a very large and well-adapted app ecosystem that Android would envy, I have the feeling that a system like macOS would add many more options to the device. iPadOS performs wonderfully with the M3 chip, but it still lacks options like being able to use multiple apps in windows.

It still seems like something from the past not being able to open any app in a floating window while using others, or only being able to have two apps open on screen at once. That is, although iPadOS is a mature system capable of replacing a computer in several workflows (to write this, for example, it would be more than enough), I think it is time to take the leap and present the iPad as a real substitute for a laptop, not as a device with a large screen. In any case, all the good things about iPadOS are still here: simplicity, efficiency, good performance, and the guarantee of Apple updates.

About Apple Intelligence. This technology was not available during the time I was testing the iPad Air. I am writing this paragraph on April 2nd, and AI arrived yesterday with iPadOS 18.4. During the time I have been able to tinker with it, I haven't found much use for it.

It doesn't offer anything that other much more powerful (although less private) proposals don't offer, and although writing assistance may be useful in a professional context, I agree with the conclusion of the tests we did a few weeks ago: Apple Intelligence is like catching a student with their homework half done. As of today, Apple Intelligence does not offer a differentiating value, and the new Siri, which is somewhat smarter courtesy of ChatGPT, still has room for improvement.

A Few Words for the Camera. The iPad camera is once again placed on the top bezel if we use the iPad horizontally, which is undoubtedly the best position. This iPad begs to be used horizontally, and it makes perfect sense to have the camera in the same position as we would on a laptop. Its quality is very good, among the best in its segment, so we are guaranteed a good image in video calls, as long as the light is good.

Worry-Free Battery. We finish by talking about the battery, a section that has never been a problem on iPads and is not one on this new model. The 13-inch iPad Air with the M3 chip is capable of lasting more than a workday. I have been able to use it for work, writing, editing some photos and even a video, and it has lasted the day without a problem. If we push it a bit with games and heavy editing, the autonomy suffers, but the overall experience is very positive.

The charging power, for its part, remains at 20W, which means it is slow. The device takes just over two hours to charge completely, which is not a problem if we are going to charge it at night and if we take advantage of the charging port on the Magic Keyboard during use. Be that as it may, it is one of the major points for improvement.

iPad Air M3 (2025),  Opinion

The iPad Air with the M3 chip is not a device for everyone, and that must be clear from the beginning. It is an iPad for those looking for the virtues of the iPad Pro with the M4 chip without paying the price of an iPad Pro with the M4 chip, especially if we consider the 13-inch model, which starts at 1,549 euros. The iPad Air is versatile, powerful, and more accessible, within the fact that it is not a cheap device, and even less so if we consider how necessary the accessories are.

It is also proof that the iPad is a mature gadget that asks for software capable of going beyond mere app execution. It happens to the iPad Pro, and it happens to the new Air. It is so mature that the improvements over the previous generation are only noticeable in certain use cases, and it is so mature that the shortcomings that were already striking before (the IPS panel, the refresh rate, the base memory...) are even more striking now.

Be that as it may, it remains a balanced device that will fulfill all aspects with plenty of margin. We return to the same old thing: without being the best tablet in anything (with the permission of the excellent integration with the Apple ecosystem, obviously), it is a good tablet in all aspects.