Hands-on with the new OLED iPad Mini

It’s an iPad for sure, but the new OLED on the Mini looks exceptional, and the optional nano-texture matte finish is awesome. The “Pro and tell” event venue has soft lighting that’s not the most conducive to blinding glare on displays, but the matte finish pretty much squashes it entirely.

Moving the front-facing camera to the long edge is also a welcome change, matching other recent iPad models. (The shift means that the whole iPad line has the camera that way.) The reliance on Touch ID instead of Face ID is still a bummer, though.

The 8th-generation iPad Mini, revealed on Monday, has an 8.5-inch OLED screen, thinner bezels, and a higher peak brightness of up to 1,200 nits. The display still tops out at a 60Hz refresh rate instead of hitting 120Hz. It’s equipped with an A20 Pro chip, though the 128GB and 256GB models have five CPU cores, while the 512GB model gets six. Apple has also touted the new iPad Mini’s “Acoustic Display,” which includes woofers “paired through the display to produce punchier bass and more volume.”

The new iPad Mini starts at $699 and comes in two colors: starlight and midnight. It’s available to preorder now ahead of its launch on November 6th.