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In a period of flagging tablet sales, Apple's iPad brought it roughly $7 billion in revenue in the first quarter of its 2024 fiscal year. That is a whopping 25% slump from the $9.4 billion its slates generated year-on-year, and a rather ominous sign for the iPad tablet sales going forward.
People seem to simply prefer Macs, as Apple's computer division notched an increase in sales. Something about the added value of a touchscreen on a smallish iPad that has to be outfitted with a keyboard and case to catch up with the usability of a thin and light MacBook Air just doesn't seem to add up.
Apple needs to do something about the iPad line, and fast, but what are these rumors for an iPad Pro (2024) price increase in times when sales are slumping and 2022 iPad Pro prices are dropping?!
128GB 12.9-inch 2021 iPad Pro
mini-LED screen| M1 chip | Dual rear cameras | Face ID | LiDar scanner | USB‑C Thunderbolt | 10 hours of battery life
New iPad Pro is the best way to boost Apple tablet sales
Apple didn't release any new iPad last year. Not a mini, not a regular iPad, not an Air, not a Pro. Nada! The last time that happened was in 2010, now fourteen years ago, and Apple then experienced the same slump in iPad sales due to having nothing new on the market.
Say what you will about the fastest mobile processors and superior display quality with per-unit calibration, but people are just used to buying the latest and greatest from Apple. If there is nothing to upgrade to, be it only for bragging rights, they simply don't, as Apple is a victim of its own success when it comes to future-proof devices that are updated for years on end.
Apple must have looked at the dropping iPad sales numbers, and then looked back on the shipments' timeline to gauge which are the periods where iPads enjoyed the best sales.
Apple iPad shipments
According to Statista's chart here, the last time Apple enjoyed a huge bump in iPad sales was when the iPad Pro (2022) series was released. The previous big bumps were the iPad Pro families before it in the spring of 2021 or 2020, and so on.
Historically, Apple has managed to revive its iPad sales not with the introduction of cheap mass market tablets, but rather its high-end iPad Pro models that carry the latest and greatest in display and processor technology, along with numerous other unique features, despite their higher price.
From Mercedes Hyperscreen to iPad Pro (2024)
Besides a raging M3 chip more akin to what Apple puts in its MacBooks, a landscape FaceTime camera, and MagSafe wireless charging, the 2024 iPad Pro line will offer a unique feature that no tablet before it has even attempted!
Back when electric cars were the future, when Tesla had over a $1 trillion valuation, and when its second-hand cars did cost more than new ones, i.e. in 2022, Mercedes one-upped everybody with a new pillar-to-pillar display it called the Hyperscreen.
The automotive display market was growing leaps and bounds at the time on the wings of electric cars, and the Mercedes EQ-series Hyperscreen was made by LG as the leader in large and mid-size OLED display production.
Tandem OLED FTW
Why did Mercedes choose LG and not Samsung? Well, LG is the only OLED display maker that can supply meaningful quantities of the unique dual-stack technology that is also called tandem OLED.
It consists of two OLED layers deposited in tandem so that the display's brightness doubles. Not only that, but the dual-stack method also quadruples the screen's lifespan, especially when it comes to those pesky blue diodes that deteriorate much faster than the red and green ones.
Fusing two OLED display layers extends the longevity of the panel significantly and increases its peak brightness, but also brings a drastic 40% drop in power consumption, compared to the 10-15% decrease of LTPO panels. Given that displays are the chief consumer of energy, the dual-stack tech could significantly increase the battery life of the devices equipped with them, too.
The longevity of dual-stack OLED screens is at least a decade, during which the dreaded burn-in phenomenon of the blue diodes is guaranteed not to appear, unlike the current single-stack OLEDs on most phones. Phones are usually not used for 10 years, though, so the tandem OLED method was developed for devices with much longer life cycles, like tablets, laptops, monitors, and, yes, cars.
In fact, as you can hear in our 2024 iPad Pro podcast, the new Honor 6 Ultimate is supposed to be the first phone with a dual-stack OLED screen and Honor teased a 6x increase in lifespan with 40% decrease in power draw:
Its panel is made by the Chinese BOE, so if tests show that it is indeed with 5,000 nits of brightness as Honor advertises, and still an excellent battery life, we can only drool about an iPad Pro with tandem LG display.
Dual-stack OLED might be behind this breathtaking 5,000 nits peak brightness
Apple took notice, and, according to Korean media, asked LG and Samsung if they can supply it with OLED screens for future iPads, Macs, and even monitors. Samsung reportedly demonstrated an LTPO iPad OLED display to Apple, but it declined, as its preference went with the higher brightness and longer lifespan of LG's dual-stack technology.
Samsung then started work on developing its own T-series of tandem OLED displays, since Apple is expected to eventually move its Macs to long-life OLED panels, too. The iPad Pro (2024) order, however, will go to LG, and even then it got delayed by two months, as the tablet was supposed to launch in March instead of on May 7th.
In short, LG has traditionally supplied iPad screens, and now has an ace up its sleeve with the dual-stack method that will increase the lifespan of the tablet, and will make it way brighter, suitable even for outdoor use. At the same time, it will consume less power and may drastically prolong the 2024 iPad Pro battery life.
Those features alone would be worth the rumored $160-$200 iPad Pro (2024) price increase, apart from its numerous other virtues that should resurrect Apple's tablet line sales yet again.
Daniel, a devoted tech writer at PhoneArena since 2010, has been engrossed in mobile technology since the Windows Mobile era. His expertise spans mobile hardware, software, and carrier networks, and he's keenly interested in the future of digital health, car connectivity, and 5G. Beyond his professional pursuits, Daniel finds balance in travel, reading, and exploring new tech innovations, while contemplating the ethical and privacy implications of our digital future.
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