Apple's first tablet since 2022 is worth the wait. The iPad Pro2024 has been significantly upgraded over its predecessor, with its ridiculously thin design, stunning OLED panels and unprecedented power thanks to an all-new M4 chipset, making it one of the best tablets you can buy right now.1

However, there seems to be 1 key upgrade under the surface that Apple hasn't trumpeted: the battery is easier to replace than ever.

iFixit's repairability guru is a fairly simple sailing to reach the battery after disassembling the new 13-inch model and passing through the glued OLED panel. Just a few screws and brackets stand between you and 38.99Wh cells for relatively easy repair.

"This is a bigger improvement than the previous generation ipad, where the logic board and kitchen sink were removed before the battery was accessed," Shahram Mokhtari of ifixit wrote in an attached blog post.

But that 1 big win comes with some disappointment. According to Mokhtari, in the competition to make "size zero" devices, Apple prefers thinness over repairable in other respects, with daughter boards, speakers and various coax cables glued together. 

"That is, if you try to remove the speaker, the speaker will be destroyed, if you look in the wrong way, the daughter board will be out of shape, the heat-sensitive camera will be subject to dangerous prying operations, and all other types of penanigans will occur," he explains.  

Interestingly, the teardown also reveals that Apple is repeating the disappointing design choices made with the m2MacBook Air, the base 256GB model will feature a single NAND chipset, whose read and write speeds will be slower than the large capacity model. Apple fixed it with the M3MacBook Air. So while it's strange that the same courtesy isn't applied to entry-level iPad Pro, iPadOS is less likely to run into the same performance bottleneck as macOS for most people. 

Still, the increased accessibility of the battery is a great thing. "This is the thinnest 'size zero' device Apple has ever manufactured, but it still prioritized battery replacement in its design," Mokhtari wrote. "If it's not a victory, I don't know what.

Unfortunately, the same can not be said for the newAp129Apple Pencil Pro, which is designed to use until the battery can not take any more, and then discarded.

To reach the battery requires an ultrasonic cutter, a whole host of tools and, in the case of Mokhtari, a bit of spilled blood. When you finally get to it, you are left with a destroyed piece of electronics.

"It may be better than the epoxied first generation pencil, but this is still an irreparable pile of e-waste," mokhtari concludes in the video.