From the Nexus 7 to the iPad mini, I’ve always preferred smaller tablets you can hold in one hand and easily slip into a bag, which is why I was so surprised when I found myself reaching for an absolutely massive 14.3-inch slate instead.

Unlike other tablets where specs and sheer power are the main draw, the screen itself is why you’d choose a device like the TCL NXTPAPER 14 over something more conventional. Its specs are nothing to scoff at either though, with 8GB of RAM, 256GB of storage and a whopping 10,000 mAh battery under the hood. However, the paper-like feel of its matte display and how you can go from a dedicated black and white ink mode to color paper mode with the push of a button is the kind of thing you truly have to see for yourself.

Although I tested out its smaller, more powerful sibling the TCL NXTPAPER 11 Plus, it was the NXTPAPER 14 that first caught my eye. Even under harsh direct lighting, its larger screen remained completely glare and reflection-free. Now, I finally had a chance to use it in the real world and not just at a mall in Taiwan.

I’ve been using the NXTPAPER 14 for the past few months and while it may not end up being my daily driver, there’s certainly a place for larger tablets like this one — especially if you’d rather carry something more substantial under your arm.

From tablet to portfolio

One thing I immediately appreciated about the NXTPAPER 14 is how TCL provides you with everything you need right in the box. You get a folio-style case with a magnetic cover, a lengthy charging cable and more surprisingly, a pressure-sensitive, active stylus with a USB-C port on the side for charging.

Even with many of the best tablets, you often find yourself hunting for accessories like a case or screen protector after the fact. TCL takes the guesswork out of protecting and making full use of its NXTPAPER tablets, so you can instantly go from unboxing to enjoying them. And while there isn’t a screen protector in the box, I wouldn’t recommend using one since that would mean missing out on the paper-like feel of the NXTPAPER 14’s matte display.

I’m no digital artist but I like having a stylus on hand for scrolling and signing the occasional document. TCL’s T-Pen is quite capable too with 4,096 levels of pressure sensitivity and around 100 hours of battery life on a single charge. What I like most about using it though is how the combination of its active tip and the matte texture of the NXTPAPER 14’s display feels. You don’t get that same drag when using a stylus like the Apple Pencil or the Surface Pen on a glass tablet.

Another thing I really enjoy about the NXTPAPER 14 is how it feels under my arm when carrying it from room to room around my house. With a screen slightly larger than your standard sheet of printer paper and an aluminum back, it really feels like I’m holding a clipboard folio that’s ready for any task.

Made to scroll

As someone who’s constantly checking the news, it almost feels like I scroll for a living when I’m not hammering away on my keyboard. With 7.9 inches from top to bottom horizontally or an even larger 11.9 inches vertically, the NXTPAPER 14 just feels great for scrolling. It’s almost like going from a budget laptop to one of the best laptops with a much larger trackpad.

TCL doesn’t let the NXTPAPER 14’s extra screen real estate go to waste either. Not only can you have two apps running side by side, but you can also have one app in floating window mode while another runs full-size behind it—great for having a calculator or a quick chat window just a tap away.

Going all the way back to your app drawer can be a hassle on a massive tablet like this one, which is why TCL added its Edge Bar feature. By swiping in from the edge and briefly holding, you bring up a customizable mini dock with useful shortcuts and tools, but you can also add your own apps to the mix.

As an avid reader, using the NXTPAPER 14 in portrait mode feels even better, at least for me. Whether I’m scrolling through a Google Doc or even the recently redesigned Tom’s Guide home page, I still can’t get over how much I can see at a time on this tablet’s larger display.

Though I covered this in more depth with the NXTPAPER 11 Plus, don’t forget that you aren’t limited to your standard reading modes here either. With a push of its namesake NXTPAPER Key, you can switch from the default Regular Mode to either Color Paper Mode or Ink Paper Mode. Both have their upsides, but I particularly like how using Ink Paper Mode on the NXTPAPER 14 extends its battery life significantly. There’s just something about seeing your remaining battery estimate jump from double to triple-digit hours with the push of a button.

If reading isn’t your thing, you’re still in luck because at 14.3 inches, the NXTPAPER 14 is around the same size as a portable monitor.

A smarter portable monitor

You won’t have any trouble running the respective apps for any of the best streaming services on the NXTPAPER 14. However, when I first used it to stream video content, I did so a bit differently. I was wrapping Christmas presents in the sitting room where we don’t have a TV and wanted to put on something in the background. Instead of Netflix, I opened the app for the Ugreen NAS I recently added to my home network and watched one of my favorite holiday movies to help deal with the fact that I’m terrible at wrapping presents.

As I recently had a chance to test out Genki’s new Covert Dock 3 with my Switch 2, I wanted to see if I could get some more demanding games running on the NXTPAPER 14. With its octa-core MediaTek MT8781 processor, you can play some simple games, but you won’t be playing the mobile version of Red Dead Redemption anytime soon. That’s where Genki’s ShadowCast 3 Pro comes in.

I hooked up the Covert Dock 3 under my desk, but instead of plugging in an HDMI cable to go out to my TV, I used the ShadowCast 3 Pro to get the video feed from my Switch 2 on the NXTPAPER 14. I did have to buy and download the Noir Pro: USB Camera app for $9, but that’s a small price to pay to play my Switch 2 on a tablet.

As I recently had a chance to test out Genki’s new Covert Dock 3 with my Switch 2, I wanted to see if I could get some more demanding games running on the NXTPAPER 14. With its octa-core MediaTek MT8781 processor, you can play some simple games, but you won’t be playing the mobile version of Red Dead Redemption anytime soon. That’s where Genki’s ShadowCast 3 Pro comes in.

I hooked up the Covert Dock 3 under my desk, but instead of plugging in an HDMI cable to go out to my TV, I used the ShadowCast 3 Pro to get the video feed from my Switch 2 on the NXTPAPER 14. I did have to buy and download the Noir Pro: USB Camera app for $9, but that’s a small price to pay to play my Switch 2 on a tablet.

Not quite prime real estate

The NXTPAPER 14 remains just as impressive after using it for several months now as it did when it literally stopped me in my tracks while walking through that mall in Taiwan. I always thought smaller was best when it comes to tablets, but after spending some quality time with its massive display, I now appreciate all that extra screen real estate.

Compared to more premium tablets like the Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra or the iPad Pro, the NXTPAPER 14 does struggle at times with more demanding tasks. However, not only are you paying half or even a third less than those flagship prices, but you also don’t have to budget for the extra cost of accessories like a case or a stylus — TCL gives you the whole "clipboard folio" kit right in the box.

Given that TCL was kind enough to send over both the NXTPAPER 14 and the 11 Plus, I’m going to use the latter when I need portable power and the former when sheer screen size is most important. Still, you can’t go wrong with either of these more affordable tablets, especially as they pack in plenty of unique features you just won’t find anywhere else.

Who knows? Maybe TCL will go even larger with its next NXTPAPER tablet. Even if it doesn’t, though, I’d love to see a second-generation NXTPAPER 14 with just a bit more power under the hood to match its massive potential.

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Most Android malware is spread through dodgy apps and sideloaded programs, meaning that you can slightly control what gets on your device. However, researchers at Kaspersky have discovered a new Android backdoor, dubbed Keenadu, that is embedded in the firmware of tablets from several manufacturers.

The new report indicates that Keenadu can be distributed via compromised firmware images, other backdoors, embedded in system apps or modified from third-party sources or even the Google Play Store.

The firmware version is the most potent and has infected more than 13,000 devices mostly in Russia, Japan, Germany, Brazil and the Netherlands. Keenadu apparently does not activate if the language or time zone is associated with China, which indicates a potential clue as to its origin.

How it works

Kaspersky researchers noted that it's mostly being used for fraudulent ads, but that it's capabilities go far beyond that. It can inject itself into the Android "Zygote" process, a core system process that launches every app on your device.

This means it can give bad actors broad control and visibility over your system.

“Keenadu is a fully functional backdoor that provides the attackers with unlimited control over the victim’s device,” Kaspersky told BleepingComputer. "It can infect every app installed on the device, install any apps from APK files, and give them any available permissions.”

The researchers also found the malware in several apps that were available on the Google Play Store, including a smart home camera app that had over 300,000 downloads.

In a confirmed example, firmware images on the Alldocube iPlay 50 mini Pro tablet were compromised, including in tablets released after the vendor was informed of the malware. The firmware has valid signatures, meaning that it's a supply-chain issue where malicious code was injected during software development or even the manufacturing process.

Here's the silver lining: if you have one of the best tablets from a flagship brand like OnePlus or Samsung, you likely won't be affected by this malware. However, lesser-known Android manufacturers or knock-off ones seem to be more dangerous, and affected vendors haven't been totally named. This is quite similar to how malware was found on millions of budget Android TV boxes last year.

How to stay safe

If you have a budget Android tablet, especially from a smaller or knock-off brand, it's worth checking for software updates. You can also try installing fresh firmware from a reliable third-party. Kaspersky did say that vendors have been notified and hopefully are working on clean firmware updates.

Beyond that, it may be safer to invest in a tablet from a trusted manufacturer. We can help you with choices of the best tablets under $500 and the best Android tablets overall.

A Google spokesperson told Android Authority that "Android users are automatically protected from known versions of this malware by Google Play Protect." The spokesperson added that Play Protect will warn you and disable apps known to exhibit Keenadu behavior.

Google Play Protect is on by default, but if you want an extra layer of protection, you can run one of the best Android antivirus apps alongside it for scanning and defending your tablet or phone.

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I didn’t expect to love the OnePlus Pad Go 2 ($399) this much. Sure, I’m a fan of the company’s tablets, but none of the units I’ve tested or reviewed would make me consider them over one of the best iPads. And while Apple continues to have a stranglehold over the tablet industry, I wouldn’t mind using the OnePlus Pad Go 2 as my daily driver.

What’s so great about this mid-range slate? For starters, its vivid 12.1-inch display does a phenomenal job of delivering sharp and clear images when you’re browsing the web, playing games, or reading comics. Though an OLED option would have been nice, everything looks quite nice on this screen.

The snappy and user-friendly OxygenOS is arguably the Pad Go 2’s secret weapon, since it makes finding and launching apps so seamless. Open Canvas provides one of the best multi-tasking experiences for tablets, as it lets you have up to three apps in a flexible interface. The user experience here is virtually identical to the OnePlus Pad 3, only for $200 less.

While the OnePlus Pad Go 2 doesn’t have a distinctive design like its sibling slates and its fast-charging isn’t all that fast, its virtues more than make up for any shortcomings. If you’re looking for one of the best Android tablets, this is the one to get. Find out more in my full review.

OnePlus Pad Go 2 review: Cheat sheet

• What is it? The OnePlus Pad 2 is a 12.1-inch mid-range tablet that runs on OxygenOS.
• Who is it for? This is a tablet for anyone who wants a reliable productivity and gaming machine at an affordable price.
• What does it cost? The OnePlus Pad 2 costs $399 on OnePlus’ website. Right now, you can select either the OnePlus Pad Go 2 Folio Case or Pad Go 2 Stylo as a free gift. Separately, the former costs $44 while the latter sells for $79. However, at time of writing, these add-ons cost $31and $59 (respectively).
• What do we like? We like the bright and colorful display, snappy, user-friendly operating system, and easy portability.
• What don’t we like? The somewhat boring design compared to other OnePlus Pads and slow charging.

OnePlus Pad Go 2 review: Specs

OnePlus Pad Go 2 review: The ups

The OnePlus Pad Go 2 is a fantastic mid-range Android tablet thanks to its bright and colorful display, fast performance, and fluid operating system. Its long battery life is another major bonus.

Vivid display

The 12.1-inch 2800 x 1980 LCD panel delivers a fine viewing and reading experience. The oversaturated colors help comics pop off the screen, while the sharp resolution makes it easier to read text.

Watching videos like the X-Men-focused Avengers: Doomsday trailer is just as enjoyable, as I’m able to see all the different shades of red in Cyclops’ optic blast. Everything runs buttery smooth thanks to the variable 120Hz refresh rate.

Our lab tests confirm my anecdotal experience. As you can see in the table below, the OnePlus Pad Go 2 does indeed have oversaturated color representation (sRGB and DCI-P3), along with good color accuracy (Delta-E). While the brightness doesn’t exactly hit the advertised 900 nits in high brightness mode, the average 554 nits of HDR brightness is more than enough for outdoor watching.

How does the OnePlus Pad Go 2 compare to the iPad 11? The display on OnePlus’ slate can get brighter and has more vivid hues. While the numbers might favor the Pad Go 2, the iPad offers more naturalistic tones. Color accuracy is also just slightly better on the iPad.

Lightweight design

You’d be forgiven for mistaking the OnePlus Pad Go 2 for an iPad. The design isn’t identical, but it’s very close. Though some folks aren’t fond of the large rear cameras on OnePlus’ tablets, no one can deny they give the slates a distinctive look. Losing that aspect is a bit of a bummer.

Even if the Pad Go 2 has a fairly basic shape, it’s a design that makes it easy to use and carry around. At 10.47 x 7.59 x 0.27 inches and 1.32 pounds, you can comfortably hold this slate for extended periods. It’s also lightweight and thin enough to slip into your backpack and forget it’s there.

One unique aspect that the Pad Go 2 retains is the display’s 7:5 aspect ratio, which makes it taller and wider than many tablets. The display’s proportions are closer to a laptop’s. This aspect ratio is perfect for novels and comics, so I’m glad OnePlus didn’t change that.

Even if the OnePlus Pad Go 2’s design isn’t that distinct, it’s still functional, portable and comfortable to use — exactly what you want in a tablet.

Good performance

The OnePlus Pad Go 2 runs on the MediaTek Dimensity 7300-Ultra processor and packs 8GB of RAM. While these aren’t high-end components, they provide this slate with enough power for smooth multitasking and running relatively demanding apps.

Playing a YouTube video while multitasking across various apps didn’t present a problem for the OnePlus Pad Go 2, as everything ran smoothly and without slowing down. I saw some stuttering and frame rate drops in Genshin Impact, but it wasn’t enough to kill the experience.

On the Geekbench 6 CPU test, the OnePlus Pad Go 2 performed decently, though it’s clearly outmatched by the iPad 11 with its more powerful A16 chip. Apple’s tablet also lapped the Pad Go 2 on the 3D Mark graphics test.

Though the iPad 11 outclasses the OnePlus Pad Go 2 in our performance tests, you’ll find it performs surprisingly well under real-world conditions. This is impressive for a mid-range Android tablet.

Epic battery life

The OnePlus Pad Go 2 is one of the longest-lasting Android tablets we’ve tested. In our battery life test, which involves continuous web surfing over Wi-Fi with the display set to 150 nits of brightness, the OnePlus Pad Go 2 lasted for an epic 16 hours and 39 minutes. As you can see below, that’s basically seven hours longer than the iPad 11.

During my own testing, I watched YouTube videos, browsed the web, and played games for about two hours, and the battery dropped to 80%. If you forget the tablet’s charger at home, you won’t be worried at all.

Snappy Oxygen OS

OnePlus’ OxygenOS 16 is one of my favorite things about the Pad Go 2. There’s a taskbar with your most recently used files, a built-in app drawer that helps with navigation, and a two-pane view that also facilitates navigation. Features like this make using the tablet feel very intuitive.

Speaking of productivity, Open Canvas is a fantastic multitasking tool for those who want to use this tablet for work. You can have up to three apps in an interface that allows you to keep said apps at your preferred size. Like with Open Canvas on the OnePlus Pad 3, the Pad Go 2 makes suggested pairings if you frequently switch between apps. I find these suggestions pretty handy. Performing the gestures required for this sort of splitview is pretty seamless.

As expected from a modern computing device, the OnePlus Pad Go 2 has built-in AI features. This includes summaries, text generation, and translation — all of which you can access by swiping the side of the screen whenever you need these features. You’ll also find dedicated buttons for them in relevant apps. I didn’t find much use for these features, but they could be useful to you.

Though I still prefer iPadOS 26 over OxygenOS 16, the latter is an excellent skin for Android that functions wonderfully.

OnePlus Pad Go 2 review: The downs

The OnePlus Pad Go 2 is an almost perfect Android tablet. Unfortunately, it has one flaw that can be frustrating if you’re in a hurry.

Slow charging

While the OnePlus Pad Go 2 offers incredible endurance, charging its 10050 mAh battery takes an inordinate amount of time. The tablet is supposed to have “fast” 33W charging, but in my experience, charging is anything but fast. It took me a little over two hours to fully charge the slate from zero percent battery, which can feel like an eternity.

I bring up slow charging because I know this could be a point of contention for some. While I wish charging didn’t take as long, the trade-off is that you get exceptional battery life. Because of that, you won’t always have to keep charging this tablet. It comes down to whether you want a long-lasting battery or fast charging.

OnePlus Pad Go 2 review: Verdict

The OnePlus Pad Go 2 proves that Android tablets can be just as enjoyable and functional to use as Apple’s iPads. Granted, those already deep in the Apple ecosystem likely won’t be swayed to buy this slate, but if you’re platform agnostic, OnePlus’ tablet is a fantastic alternative.

If you need a mid-range tablet that delivers better overall performance, offers greater app compatibility, and has an OS that will be supported for many years, then the iPad 11 is your best bet. However, if you’re into Android tablets or want a slate that plays nice with your OnePlus phone, you should give the OnePlus Pad Go 2 a shot. I promise you won’t be disappointed.

It’s not every day I’m walking through a mall and end up stopping in my tracks to play with a tablet, but that’s exactly what happened last summer in Taiwan.

After a week of checking out the latest gadgets at Computex, I headed to Taipei’s legendary electronics market, Guang Hua Digital Plaza for some last-minute sightseeing. While I usually prefer smaller tablets like the iPad mini or the Lenovo Legion Tab 3, the TCL NXTPAPER 14 immediately stood out. Maybe it was the massive 14.3-inch screen or the chance to finally see and feel TCL’s innovative NXTPAPER tech in person, but I was hooked.

Late last year, TCL sent over that same tablet along with its smaller, more powerful NXTPAPER 11 Plus and even a smartphone with the same paper-like display for me to test out at home. While its larger sibling hooked me initially, the NXTPAPER 11 Plus quickly became my go-to device. Its 11.5-inch screen makes it easy to slip into a bag and it’s also the perfect size for reading.

Unlike with other tablets I’ve tried in the past, I didn’t feel compelled to put a screen protector on this one and I’m glad I didn’t, as doing so would ruin my favorite thing about it: the paper-like feel of its matte display. I also didn’t have to worry about finding a case for the NXTPAPER 11 Plus since TCL includes one in the box along with a fully equipped stylus.

Here’s what it’s been like using TCL’s NXTPAPER tech for the past two months and why the NXTPAPER 11 Plus is easily one of the best tablets on a budget, especially if you’ve flirted with the idea of picking up a reMarkable Paper Pro over a standard Android tablet.

Surprisingly equipped right out of the box

At a time when you’re lucky to get a USB-C cable in the box, I was instantly impressed by everything TCL manages to cram into the box with both the NXTPAPER 14 and the NXTPAPER 14 Plus.

Unlike with one of the best iPads, it can be hard finding a case or other accessories for some Android tablets. TCL takes the guesswork out with its tablets so instead of shopping for the right case, you can get right to using your new device.

I really like the included folio case for a couple of reasons. For starters, it’s magnetic and instantly turns off your tablet’s screen when closed. However, there are also plastic feet on the bottom side that, in addition to turning the case into a very sturdy stand, provide you with a place to store the included stylus.

I’m no digital artist by any means but I’m quite partial to having a stylus for each of my tablets. I find using a stylus makes it a lot easier to scroll through the news each morning without accidentally opening stories I wasn’t planning on reading. The same goes for poking around a device’s settings menu and quickly making changes like not having new apps added to my home screen for instance.

I also really like how this is an active stylus that’s pre-paired with the NXTPAPER 11 Plus. After powering it on, I was able to start using it right away and surprisingly, I haven’t even had to charge it yet, though it does get up to 100 hours of use on a single charge. There are also two up and down keys on the stylus that you can program to do things like instantly take you back to the home screen or open TCL’s Sidebar.

Speaking of which, the Sidebar is a collection of customizable shortcuts that you can access by swiping with your finger (or the stylus) to go back and holding it there for an extra second or so. You can add actions like taking a screenshot as well as shortcuts to your favorite apps. I found this feature to be both pretty clever and well implemented.

The included case and stylus are useful extras but it’s the display itself and TCL’s proprietary screen technology that kept me going back to the NXTPAPER 11 Plus again and again.

An almost instant transformation

The NXTPAPER 11 Plus has your standard USB-C port on the side as well as a power button and volume rocker up top. However, across from those two buttons is the device's namesake NXTPAPER Key. This is where the device’s magic happens and on this newer tablet, it’s also equipped with a backlight that you can turn on or off. When enabled, the light “breathes,” perhaps to help you remember that a total display transformation is just a button press away.

The NXTPAPER Key is also customizable and you can choose what a single press, double press and long press does. By default, a single press lets you switch between its three different modes: Regular Mode, Color Paper Mode and Ink Paper Mode. The animation that accompanies this switch is pretty neat too, especially when going from the black and white Ink Paper Mode back to the full color Regular Mode and vice versa.

After owning a Kindle for years now to read ebooks, I was really taken aback by how closely TCL’s NXTPAPER is able to mimic ePaper even though it uses an LCD display. This gives you the best of both worlds since you have that easier to read black and white look but with the much faster refresh rates of LCD over ePaper.

My favorite part of using either of the non-standard NXTPAPER modes though is that your entire device along with all of the apps you use are instantly transformed. Whether I was scrolling through Google News or browsing Reddit, everything – including pictures – was either in black and white Ink Paper or Color Paper.

There are plenty of health benefits like reduced eye strain and less blue light when using a tablet equipped with TCL’s NXTPAPER, but I found the matte display — technically nano-matrix lithography etching — was the most useful for me day to day as someone that can’t stand the glare of a glossy display, especially when taking pictures.

Glare-free versatility

Although most of my time testing the NXTPAPER 11 Plus was spent in the comfort of my own home, I decided to bring the tablet with me to a doctor’s appointment followed by a trip to IKEA to see how it handled the real world.

Right from the get-go, I was impressed by how usable it remained even in direct sunlight. Most tablets struggle in this situation, but thanks to that matte display, I wasn’t squinting just to make out what was on the screen.

Even outside on a table, the NXTPAPER 11 Plus was just as functional in the great outdoors as it was at home. This is the kind of device you can comfortably use while sitting in the grass — say, on a college campus — and since the case has a built-in stand, you really don't need to pack anything else.

Once my appointment was over, I headed to IKEA and, after polishing off some Swedish meatballs, I spent a few minutes using the tablet in the food court. At first glance, you might think I was just reading an ebook on a normal tablet. However, I actually had Ink Paper Mode enabled, which really made the text pop. Since the display isn’t working as hard to render a full spectrum of colors in this mode, switching to black and white is a clever way to stretch its already impressive 8,000 mAh battery even further during long days out.

Then, when it was time to check out IKEA’s new smart home accessories — namely its Matter-equipped buttons — I just closed the folio case and slid the tablet back into my backpack, knowing it would be perfectly safe without an extra sleeve.

Although the NXTPAPER 14 wowed me initially, I’ve found that 11.5 inches is the perfect middle ground for both portability and screen real estate. It’s a large enough screen to multitask with two apps side-by-side, yet in portrait mode, it’s ideal for reading both books and news articles.

Since this tablet is only $370 full price and is often found for under $300 on sale, it’s the kind of device you can take everywhere without constant worry. If I were using an iPad Pro or a premium Samsung tablet, I might be tempted to leave it at home to keep it safe. With the NXTPAPER 11 Plus, however, I wouldn’t think twice before throwing it in my bag for a weekend trip or a long flight.

Consider me in-matte-uated

I have to admit, what initially enticed me about TCL’s NXTPAPER was how photogenic this display tech is. As part of my job, I often have to snap pics of a particular app or service running on a smartphone or tablet. While direct sunlight pretty much always looks great in photos, glare absolutely doesn’t. Back at that mall in Taipei, I wondered what it would be like having a device I could easily photograph even in less than ideal conditions and those few quick pics I took in IKEA prove that TCL’s NXTPAPER is perfect for this.

Glare-free photos did draw me in at first, but I wasn’t expecting to love the way a matte touchscreen felt on my fingertips. That little bit of resistance you get from a non-glossy screen really makes simple actions like swiping or scrolling feel a whole lot more premium. Add to this how I can instantly switch between full color or black and white system-wide while still running what is essentially stock Android, and I couldn’t be happier with both of the tablets and the smartphone TCL sent over.

After getting a taste of the all-matte life with these devices, I found myself wondering if TCL would ever bring its NXTPAPER tech to one of the best monitors or even one of the company’s TVs. Swiping my finger up and down or even using the included stylus felt entirely different than it normally does. Not because TCL is also partial to matte screens, but because a display like that is required for the company's NXTPAPER to work its magic.

I don’t plan on putting down the NXTPAPER 11 Plus anytime soon, but the jury is still out on whether or not I’d be willing to switch to one of TCL’s smartphones to have this same premium-feeling sensation whenever I take my phone out of my pocket. I guess only time will tell.

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Update: See our top 11 gadgets of CES 2026 from day 2!

There’s nothing quite like CES, and the huge consumer tech showcase is off to a flyer with some fantastic products already on display across the show floor.

Tom's Guide has been on the ground in Vegas for the first day of the event and we've rounded up our 10 favorite products. These examples of upcoming tech are worth a look for enthusiasts or anyone curious about wallpaper TVs, wild lighting, or even having a robot at home, all from the likes of Samsung, LG, and more.

Here are our picks of the best new products at CES 26 on day one, with more to come in our ongoing CES 2026 live blog.

LG Wallpaper TV

LG is no stranger to TVs, but this one is particularly incredible. It’s a panel so thin that you literally can’t see it from the side, with no physical inputs.

It’s a glimpse at the future, but it’s more practical than previous models, too. It’s an improved panel from the prior version, using a handy breakout box to wirelessly beam your set-top box or game console, and it’s slated to launch at a price comparable to LG’s more standard OLED models.

The usual caveats about input lag will no doubt apply, but if LG can minimize that potential downside, it could be a great showpiece for your home.

Dreame X60 Range

Dreame already has a great range of robot vacuum products, but the new X60 Series will kick things up a notch.

This is the new flagship robot vacuum from the company and boasts 35,000 pa of suction and an AI-enhanced "Omnisight" system. Which, we hope, means it'll be even better at navigating past obstacles in your home.

Elsewhere, the clever Cyber X vacuum (pictured above) has a base station with four legs that means it'll be able to clamber up stairs like some kind of robot pet to continue its cleaning. It's also got a carry-on water tank, so it doesn’t need to keep revisiting its base station to fill up. Which will probably help prolong the battery life too.

Paper Android tablet

Global Editor in Chief Mark Spoonauer said that the world’s thinnest tablet, from China-based Haining Toall Technology, doesn’t feel real — and he’s not wrong. It’s called ‘Paper’, and it really does earn that name.

It’s somehow a whole 2mm thinner than the iPad Pro M5, measuring at just 3.1mm, but still sporting a 13-inch AMOLED display, two USB-C ports, and a mini-HDMI. It’ll start at $1,500, though, and come in 256GB and 512GB versions with specs to be revealed at a later date.

It’ll run Android, but the battery life is just three hours, so it might be more of a gimmick than something you’d use day-to-day, at least for now.

Govee Ceiling Light Ultra

Govee is going big on AI with its new lineup of Ultra lighting for your ceiling, with the company letting users sync their lighting to sun cycles.

You’ll also be able to use more natural language to shift the lighting, which will use a LuminBlend+ technology to allow for no fewer than 281 trillion color options and a wide color temperature range that runs from 1000K to 10,000K.

Not only can the ceiling option produce slick patterns when you look up, but there’s a new Floor Lamp 3 model that takes advantage of these new features, too.

SwitchBot AI MindClip

The AI wearable trend is continuing with smart home company SwitchBot revealing the AI MindClip wearable that will help you keep track of your conversations.

It’ll record your spoken conversations, summarise work calls, or save personal audio to a database, and supports more than 100 languages. It’s intended to work as a “second brain”, but many of its features will be tied to a cloud service which is, as yet, unannounced.

If that ends up being reasonably priced and easy to access, we can definitely see the potential here.

Samsung S95H OLED

Samsung was at CES to show off its new range of screens that run from 55-inch to 95-inch models. The lineup included the Samsung S95H, the brand's newest flagship OLED and the successor to the Samsung S95F, one of the best OLED TVs we reviewed in 2025.

Meanwhile, the all-new Samsung S90H replaces the Samsung S90D at the mid-range level. Unlike last year's S90D, the S90H features Samsung's glare-free display, so you don't need to spring for Samsung's flagship for glare-free display on a mid-range OLED TV.

Elsewhere, Samsung’s QLED models will now go to a 115-inch screen size, which at some point must be close to being cinema-sized.

Finally, the company's latest Micro RGB TV will arrive in 55-, 65-, 75-, 85- and 100-inch screen sizes. They won't be cheap, but anyone looking to upgrade to this cutting-edge TV tech will have several size options to choose from in 2026.

Xreal 1S smart glasses

Our Computing Editor Jason England found a lot to like with these nifty AR glasses, saying they’re ideal for gamers on the go.

They’re $50 cheaper than the previous model, with improved build quality and a new Real 3D feature that makes 2D content feel three-dimensional via a sort of upscaling technique that truly does work better than you’d expect.

Hook ‘em up to your Nintendo Switch 2, and you can be playing on a massive virtual screen wherever you go.

LG CLOiD robot

Fancy a robot to help out at home? LG’s CLOiD could be your new best friend. It’s a head unit and torso with two arms and a wheeled base that you can ask to tackle chores around the house.

The base is devised from LG’s robot vacuums, so it’s ideal for avoiding collisions, and each arm has independently actuated fingers. That allows the CLOiD to fold laundry, operate in a kitchen, and more.

Will it get around the inherent sci-fi spookiness of having a robot in the home? We’ll see, but it’s impressive nonetheless.

Glyde Smart Hair Clippers

A new set of clippers from Glyde will let you trim your hair and even give you a skin fade if you want it to.

It works through a bizarre-looking headband, and will definitely require some trust on the part of the user — would you want AI to wield a blade close to your head? It’s hard to see it taking off, but if you’re super against visiting the barber for some reason, we’d imagine this is the next best thing.

Fraimic Smart E Ink Canvas

This innovative piece of tech from Fraimic lets you instantly change up the art on your wall just by speaking to it. The on-board AI will listen to your description of what you want to see and render the image on its state-of-the-art E Ink Spectra display.

Because it's E Ink, you get accurate color and natural tones without any glare or backlighting — as if you were looking at an actual picture. It boasts a multi-year battery life and comes with a black wood frame. The large canvas (24x36”x1" frame) comes in at $999 while the standard (14x18x1” frame) canvas is priced at $399. Both are due to ship in the spring.

More from Tom's Guide

• Govee announces 3 new smart lights at CES, including a ceiling light for windowless spaces
• LG Wallpaper OLED TV is back, and now it’s completely wireless (and actually affordable)
• Samsung TV lineup 2026: new OLEDs, Micro RGB TVs and Neo QLEDs announced at CES

Have you ever held a piece of tech so thin and light you were almost giddy? That's the experience I just had with a tablet called (appropriately enough) Paper here at CES 2026

Made by the Chinese company Haining Toall Technology, this Android device measures just 3.1mm thick. For those scoring at home, the iPad Pro M5 is 5.1mm thin.

The Paper tablet features a 13-inch AMOLED display, and it's so thin that the ports are stored in a raised area that's slightly thicker. You get two USB-C ports and a mini HDMI port. This bump also makes the slate a bit easier to hold.

We don't know much about the specs, but the company told us it will be available in 256GB and 512GB versions, and the starting price is $1,500.

When I asked about the CPU, I was just told by a company rep that Paper will be powered by a Chinese processor. So maybe that's MediaTek?

The other major trade-off, other than price? Battery life. The Paper is rated for just 3 hours of runtime, but you'll be able to get several more hours with the case.

There's no firm release date for Paper in the U.S., but if it does come stateside, we will definitely test it out and see if it can truly compete against the best tablets. Let us know what you think in the comments.

For more coverage, see our CES 2026 live blog right now.

More from Tom's Guide

• LG's crazy thin Wallpaper OLED TV is back and now completely wireless (and affordable)
• The coolest gadget of 2025 doesn’t just give me night vision, it makes me feel like I’m looking through a telescope
• Apple's biggest 5 new products for 2026

Apple TV’s arrival on Android devices earlier this year was a long time coming, but the app still had some limitations. Thankfully, a new update to the Apple TV app has fixed one of the biggest issues preventing the best viewing experience.

Originally, it wasn’t possible to use the Google Cast feature on Android phones and tablets while watching programs in the Apple TV app. However, the newly released version 2.2 of Apple's app finally gives Android users the option to cast their shows, thanks to a new button in the top right corner of the screen.

When you’re casting to your Android TV or Google Chromecast, the Apple TV app will show a miniplayer that offers users playback information, the device the content is being streamed to and a timeline.

However, this version doesn’t offer many controls, as you can only play, pause, or rewind the program by 10-second increments.

If you’re looking for a bit more control, then you can tap the miniplayer to enter a full-screen mode. In this version, you'll see the specific movie or TV show's cover art, a timeline scrubber, and two buttons for Audio and subtitles. You’ll also be able to pause/play the video from this screen and fast-forward or rewind by 10 seconds.

What to watch on Apple TV

With this new addition, it is easier to catch up with all the great programs currently available on Apple TV. While it might not have the quantity of streaming sites like Netflix or Disney Plus, it certainly doesn’t struggle when it comes to quality.

If you’re not sure about where to start, then we have a breakdown of the 31 best shows to watch on Apple TV Plus. These include hit programs like Murderbot, Presumed Innocent and Disclaimer. We also have a breakdown for some of the best VPNs to help you get the most out of your streaming experience, while also keeping you safe from any malicious actors.

Let us know what you’ve been dying to watch on the big screen with Apple TV, or do you have another preferred streaming site that you've been watching?

Want the iPad experience, but don't want to give up on Android? That's where I point you towards the best Samsung tablets — packing sleek designs, impressive specs and a well-tuned version of Google's OS for a great UI.

And, just like with the best Samsung phones, there are a lot of models to choose from. It can get tricky to decide, so we've been testing Samsung tablets for well over half a decade to help you pick the right one for your needs.

Our top pick for most folks is the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus, a great value, high-performance tablet with a stylus included for drawing and note taking, and an impressive seven years of updates, which would take you to 2031.

But that's not your only choice, as we've tested and rated the best Samsung tablets you can buy right now, from the latest models through to all-out laptop replacements for home or work use, and with pretty mega battery life too.

What Samsung tablets can you expect in 2026?

Now we're in a new year, Samsung surely has new slabs in the making to launch. Here's what we're expecting and our predictions on when they'll launch (based on the company's past release dates).

• Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 FE / FE+ - April or May 2026: Fan Editions usually launch about 6-7 months after the main flagship, so expect a Spring launch of this mid-range refresh.
• Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Lite - Summer 2026: Ready to capitalize on the back-to-school hype, Samsung usually releases a Lite model of its tablet around August time. So we're anticipating an S11 Lite around this window.
• Samsung Galaxy Tab S12 - September-ish 2026: Samsung's maintained a steady rhythm of launching its next generation tablets around early Fall. There's already been a couple of leaks surrounding the S12 and S12 Ultra, so I think we're locked in for a September release.

The best Samsung tablets you can buy right now

Best Samsung tablet overall

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus really impressed us with what you get for your money. The large 13.1-inch display makes it ideal for streaming and watching videos, it's bright at 782 nits peak brightness, and super vivid, making the colors pop even more.

Most surprising is the stereo speakers on here too. Normally, the small space for audio means you get tinny speakers, but in our testing, there's a nice warm bassy punch alongside all the details being represented nicely across the sound space.

Then throw in that big battery for all day use (lasting 15 hours and 43 minutes in our test), and you've got something with real staying power across all your films, web browsing and casual gaming.

Notice how I said casual gaming? The chip inside is certainly not the most powerful for intense tasks. Under significant pressure, you can see slowdown, but if your use cases are casual (ie, not editing videos or playing AAA games), you won't see it break a sweat.

Throw in that included stylus for whenever you're feeling creative, a decent camera system for video calls and snapping quick pics, and One UI 8 (launched in October 2025) for a great tablet experience, and price less than $500, you're onto a winner.

• Read our full Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus review

Best iPad alternative Samsung tablet

This is the closest Android kin to the best iPads you can buy — providing a top shot at getting the Apple experience while avoiding iOS. And it does so by pairing zippy performance and a gorgeous display with a sleek, lightweight design and a top notch OS.

On the face of it, this feels very iPad Air with super slim dimensions and a weight that just breaks one pound. It feels great in the hand, and that aluminum frame gives a nice durable confidence too.

Then you turn it on and are greeted by that mesmerizing 11-inch AMOLED display with 1,600 nits of peak brightness. Whether you're getting stuff done or binge watching in bed, that sharpness, smoothness and vivid color makes everything pop off the screen.

The processor is more than capable of handling everyday tasks like web browsing, emails and steaming, but also means you can properly game and video edit without too much trouble. Plus, the built-in speakers are rather good too.

Then there's the redesigned S Pen — feeling much more comfortable to hold with a hexagonal barrel to get a solid grip on for all your doodling.

And in that vein of getting stuff done, Samsung's made some impressive upgrades to DeX mode too, which can extend this into an almost desktop-like experience. So if you need to lock in with a keyboard and mouse to work hard, the S11 nails it.

Throw in the ocean of Android tablet apps, Google Gemini integration and impressive speed even under multitasking pressure (plus that massive 8,400 mAh battery) and you've got a banger.

• Read our Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 review

Best Samsung tablet laptop replacement

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra takes the formula of what made the S10 Ultra so great and upgrades the experience where it matters to anyone looking to replace their laptop with a slab.

The visual upgrades may be minor, but trust me, in my time testing it, the new internals give it a fresh power boost to handle intensive multitasking for power users. At $1,199, it’s a steep price if you’re looking to just get on the tablet train, but that’s not who the S11 Ultra is targeted towards.

With a massive, beautiful 14.6-inch AMOLED display and Dimensity 9400+ CPU, paired with 12GB of RAM and a sleek, ergonomic keyboard cover you can grab as an accessory, you can do far more than your average tablet user with this.

It’s built for productivity across the board — to bridge the gap to a laptop and really take advantage of some of those work-oriented apps in the Android marketplace. And the software answer to that is DeX mode, which gives you a UI more akin to Windows 11 than a tablet.

It’s not a flawless laptop replacement; DeX (Samsung's desktop interface) has been gutted a little of some of the original features like a taskbar and no touchpad on the Book Cover Keyboard. But from that screen and user experience to the 12-hour battery life and zippy performance, I believe this is another step forward for the Ultra lineage.

• Read our full Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra review

Also tested

How we test the best Samsung tablets

We put every tablet through real-world and lab testing to see how it holds up — not just to the hype, but to the competition. That means using each device like an actual owner would, while also digging into the data that matters.

• Battery life: We run a web-surfing test over Wi-Fi with the screen set to a standard brightness to see how long it lasts on a full charge.
• Display quality: We measure screen brightness (in nits) and color accuracy (via sRGB) to gauge how good it’ll look for work and play.
• Performance: We run benchmarks like Geekbench to see how fast and powerful the tablet really is.
• Software experience: On Android tablets, we check app availability and whether you’re getting full access to the Google Play Store.
• Parental controls: If a tablet offers kid-safe features, we try to break them — so your kids don’t.
• Everyday use: We spend days weeks using each tablet like any buyer would; opening apps, watching videos, multitasking, and seeing how it all feels in the hand.

FAQs

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra ($1,199 to start) is just as imposing as its super-sized predecessors. If you’re looking for the biggest tablet possible, this enormous slate will certainly meet that demand. While it has the same slim design and gorgeous OLED we’ve come to love, this tablet isn’t quite the laptop replacement it’s billed as.

The 14.6-inch OLED panel is still the star of the show. While I find the iPad Pro M5’s 13-inch tandem OLED panel more impressive, Samsung’s slate has the edge in terms of sheer size. Watching videos and playing games on such a large canvas is incredible.

Despite the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra’s large footprint, it’s surprisingly thin and light. You might forget you’re carrying it in your backpack. However, the tablet’s size can also make it uncomfortable to hold for long periods.

The new MediaTek Dimensity 9400+ processor gives the Tab S11 Ultra plenty of power to run all your favorite apps. Whether it’s writing on Google Docs or playing an Android game, you’ll have an overall smooth experience. Android 16 is also the most responsive version of the OS I’ve tested on a tablet.

Though there’s a lot to like about the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra, it has some trade-offs. The biggest issue is that DeX Mode isn’t as functional as before. I also dislike how the Book Cover Keyboard doesn't have a touchpad, which forces you to use touch controls or a wireless mouse.

Even if it makes for a lackluster laptop replacement, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra still impresses thanks to its nearly 15-inch OLED panel and slim design. It's certainly one of the best Android tablets. But unless you’re a hardcore Android or Samsung fan, it’s difficult to recommend this slate over the iPad Pro M5 or one of the best laptops. Find out why in my full review.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra review: Cheat sheet

• What is it? The Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra is the latest iteration of Samsung’s super-sized Android tablet, featuring a new MediaTek Dimensity processor.
• Who is it for? For anyone looking for a nearly 15-inch OLED tablet that can (somewhat) double as a laptop replacement.
• How much does it cost? The Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra starts at $1,199 on Samsung’s website for a model with 256GB of storage. Expect to pay $1,619 for a 1TB model.
• What do we like? We like the vivid 14.6-inch OLED panel, lightweight design, strong performance and long battery life.
• What don’t we like? The tablet is uncomfortable to hold for long periods and DeX Mode isn’t as useful as before.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra review: Specs

Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra review: The ups

There’s a lot to like about the Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra besides its gorgeous OLED panel, such as the lightweight design, strong performance and long battery life.

Lightweight design

Samsung didn’t redesign the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra. As before, it’s a Moses-worthy tablet thanks to its enormous 12.8 x 8.2 x 0.2 size. Despite being huge, it weighs only 1.6 pounds. The fact that such a big tablet can be so thin and light is still impressive. There’s a drawback to this, but we’ll cover that soon.

You’ll find the power and volume buttons on the tablet’s top left-hand side (when held horizontally). There’s also a microSD card slot on the top right side. Over on the back, you’ll find two rear-facing cameras. The quad speakers inside pump out sound through the grilles flanking the tablet’s sides. There’s a lone USB-C port on the right-hand side and no headphone jack.

While the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra looks the same as ever, that’s not a bad thing since it’s still an elegant and sturdy piece of aluminum that’s easy to travel with.

Vivid OLED panel

The Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra’s 14.6-inch panel is a marvel to behold. Thanks to its size and sharp 2960 x 1848 resolution, it’s easy to see even the smallest details in videos and games. The OLED panel also does a superb job of delivering inky blacks and eye-scorching whites. Your eyes won’t be disappointed when viewing anything on this tablet.

Our lab tests confirm my experience. As you can see in the table below, the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra can get very bright, especially when displaying HDR content. It also has oversaturated color representation (sRGB and DCI-P3) and good color accuracy (Delta-E).

How does that compare to the competition? The displays on the iPad Pro M5 and OnePlus Pad 3 can get brighter SDR, but the latter lacks HDR. While Samsung’s tablet can deliver HDR, Apple’s slate can get brighter in this area. Colors can look richer on the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra, though the displays on its competitors have more naturalistic hues.

Fast performance

The Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra runs on the MediaTek Dimensity 9400+ processor and packs 12GB of RAM. Thanks to these components, you get a tablet offering great performance for multitasking and gaming.

I used the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra as a laptop replacement (more on that in a bit), and it handled my usual workflow without slowing down. Watching videos and multitasking between apps is a breeze thanks to updated components and the responsive Android 16 operating system. However, Samsung’s premium tablet isn’t as powerful as the new iPad Pro M5.

On the Geekbench 6 CPU test, the Tab S11 Ultra performed slightly better than the Snapdragon 8 Elite-powered OnePlus Pad 3. It also just slightly edged out OnePlus’ slate in the 3DMark graphics test. But as you can see below, the iPad Pro M5 demolished both Android tablets in these performance tests.

Apple’s M5 chip is an absolute beast of a processor, but you’ll still have a generally smooth time using the Tab S11 Ultra for everyday tasks and when playing Android games.

Long battery life

The Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra is a big tablet that delivers equally big battery life.

In our battery life test, which involves continuous web surfing over Wi-Fi with the display set to 150 nits of brightness, the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra lasted for 12 hours and 13 minutes. That’s almost three hours longer than its predecessor, which is extremely impressive.

How does the Tab S11 Ultra’s endurance compare to its rivals? The iPad Pro M5 lasted for over an hour longer in the same test, but the OnePlus Pad 3 outlasted them both. While there are longer-lasting tablets available, it’s hard to complain about the Tab S11 Ultra’s strong battery life.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra review: The downs

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra is an impressive tablet, but it has some notable downsides holding it back.

Too big

The Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra’s size is a double-edged sword. While it’s certainly thin and light, you’ll likely have a hard time holding it for extended periods, even with two hands. That’s inconvenient when you’re trying to immerse yourself in a book or graphic novel.

Since this slate is so cumbersome to hold, you’ll need to prop it up against something like a couch arm or a pillow. I used the new Book Cover Keyboard that Samsung sent with our Tab S11 Ultra review unit, and it’s great for viewing videos in landscape mode. But if you want to look at anything in portrait mode, prepare for some frustration. Sometimes, you can have too much of a good thing!

Downgraded DeX Mode

Samsung’s DeX Mode has been around for several years and is meant to turn a tablet or phone’s UI into something more like a Windows 11 desktop. The feature has never been the greatest, but it mostly functioned as advertised. Samsung has redesigned DeX Mode with a brand-new layout and features. Unfortunately, it’s not as functional as before.

As I wrote about when I ditched my laptop for the Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra, the new Dex Mode no longer has a Windows-like taskbar on the actual tablet. You only get this specific taskbar when connected to an external display. You get a semblance of the taskbar on the tablet itself, but it’s not the same.

To be truly productive on the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra, you’ll need to connect to an external monitor and also connect a wireless mouse since the Book Cover Keyboard lacks a touchpad. If you need so many peripherals and devices to replicate a laptop experience, you’re better off getting an actual laptop. Not only will it streamline things, but it’ll be more affordable overall.

New Book Cover Keyboard

Let me start with the good before I get to the bad. The Tab S11 Ultra’s Book Cover Case improves on its predecessors thanks to its sturdiness. You can actually walk around with the tablet propped up, which is something you couldn’t do with the flimsy old covers. Since the new cover is thicker, typing on it is more comfortable and enjoyable.

That’s where my praise ends. As I said above, the Book Cover Keyboard does not have a touchpad! Yes, you can use the tablet’s touch controls to open apps and move them around. However, if you want to resize windows or move apps from the tablet to an external monitor (or vice versa), you’re going to have a difficult time.

I’m also not a fan of the new S Pen. Instead of a rounded stylus like before, the S Pen is hexagonal like a pencil. While some might favor that design, I don’t. The new S Pen also feels lighter than previous versions, which makes it seem plasticky. That said, the stylus is as responsive as ever, so it’s not a complete wash.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra review: Verdict

If you’re looking for an Android tablet with a super-sized OLED panel and long-lasting battery life, you can’t go wrong with the Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra. It’s effectively the same tablet as previous models, only with a faster processor, but that’s not altogether bad since it’s still a lovely slate with a gorgeous screen.

Though the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra is brilliant on its own and wonderful for watching videos and movies, it can’t function as a laptop replacement due to the less effective DeX Mode and touchpad-less keyboard peripheral. You’re better off with the Samsung Galaxy Book Pro 5 that’s currently on sale for $1,149. The pricier iPad Pro M5 is also a stronger option if you want a tablet to double as a laptop.

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra is less of a laptop replacement than its predecessors, but as a tablet, it’s still worth checking out.

The new Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra just arrived on my desk, and I’ve been testing the enormous tablet in preparation for my full review. One thing I’ve spent a lot of time with is Samsung’s DeX Mode, which exists to turn the tablet into a laptop replacement.

DeX Mode itself isn’t new, but it has recently been updated with a brand-new UI and features. I usually reserve my thoughts on DeX Mode for my Galaxy Tab S reviews, but given how differently this feature now functions, I wanted to spotlight it.

I review the best laptops and the best tablets for a living, so do I think the new DeX Mode makes the Samsung Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra into an effective laptop replacement? Read on to find out!

A major change for DeX

The new DeX Mode borrows many features from Samsung’s One UI 8 and reimagines the UI to be more like Android Desktop Mode. Some new features include support for up to four virtual desktops, a dedicated full-screen button, a new settings menu, easier window management and more.

The most controversial change that some Redditors (and I) aren’t happy about is that DeX Mode no longer has a Windows-like taskbar on the tablet. You only see this specific taskbar when connected to an external display. You get a semblance of the taskbar on the tablet itself, but it’s not the same.

You can still access the aforementioned features, such as virtual desktops, if you’re only using the tablet. However, if you want DeX Mode to function more like it used to, you’ll need an external monitor.

The new experience

To get the most from DeX Mode, I connected the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra to a monitor in our office. Doing this gave me the old DeX Mode taskbar on the monitor, but not on the tablet. That’s not too bad once you get used to it, but a new problem quickly presented itself.

The new Book Cover Keyboard for the Tab S11 Ultra is much sturdier than previous versions, and you can actually walk around with the tablet propped up without fear of it falling. I also find its keys comfortable to type on.

Unfortunately, the Book Cover Keyboard doesn’t have a touchpad. While you can use the tablet’s touch controls to open and select apps easily enough, resizing windows or moving apps from the tablet to the monitor (and vice versa) is nearly impossible with your fingers. Because of that, I had to use a wireless mouse to get work done.

In short, to truly be productive on the Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra, you’ll need to connect to an external monitor and also connect a wireless mouse. I don’t know about you, but that doesn’t sound like a laptop experience at all.

If you’re going to go through all that trouble, you could instead get the Samsung Galaxy Book Pro 5, which Samsung is currently selling for $1,149, which is less than what you’d pay for the entry-level Tab S11 Ultra and the $200 Book Cover Keyboard (not to mention an external monitor).

The positives

Before you think I’m dragging the new DeX Mode too hard, I should point out some of its useful qualities.

I’ve used prior versions of DeX Mode, and I can safely say this is the snappiest and most responsive version yet. This is especially true when switching between DeX Mode and the standard Android UI, which used to take several seconds. Now, you’re in either mode the instant you tap the DeX Button on the drop-down menu or press the keyboard’s dedicated DeX Button.

Flipping between your virtual desktops is also seamless, as is setting up each desktop with specific apps. For instance, I can have one desktop with the Google apps I need for work, while another desktop can have a YouTube video and Google Gemini if I have to research something. You’re limited to four virtual desktops, even if you’re connected to an external monitor, but four desktops are plenty for my purposes.

Outlook

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• Apple is bringing this long-overdue upgrade to new iPads and MacBooks
• Here's our first look at the Samsung Galaxy Tri-Fold
• I love Google Maps, but it sucks for hiking

Screen recording can come in very handy for Android users, but the options tend to be limited. However, in celebration of Android coming to computers, Google is reportedly working on new features for screen recording on Android devices.

A recent report from Android Authority has detailed all the potential changes coming to Android devices. In the new version, tapping the Quick Settings tile will launch the new toolbar to appear over your screen.

While this new bar apparently can’t be moved or resized, the screenshots make it appear noticeably smaller than the current dialogue box. The reported new look also doesn't darken the content behind the dialogue box, making it much easier to see what's on the screen.

The new toolbar also shows some added options, including a toggle for the selfie camera. While we can't say for certain what this will do, it will likely allow users to capture simultaneous footage from the screen and selfie cam. If accurate, then this would be a real boon for content creators looking to record tutorials or Twitch streaming.

The toolbar keeps many of the current options, including showing user inputs on the recording. However, Google has apparently tweaked some of the audio settings, with the new version listing the options as separate toggles.

Google is also working to change its post-capture experience for a later update by adding a new UI after you're done recording. In the current version, your device will send a notification when you finish recording, which prompts you to open the file in a video player app.

The new notification will launch a new screen that includes a basic video player that has a seekbar, play pause buttons and a mute button. It’s also stated to feature an option to retake, edit, delete or share the footage.

When are all of these changes coming?

These additions could make using, editing and improving screen recording much easier. Considering Android devices didn’t have a native means to screen record for most of their lifetime, this is great to see. Originally, users had to rely on third-party apps, which were often limited due to various factors and access permissions.

Android eventually released a native screen recording feature for Android 11 in 2020, but it could only capture the entire screen. Then, with the release of Android 14, Google added the option to capture a single app, increasing the feature's usability.

More from Tom's Guide

• The big Apple Intelligence upgrade to Siri is still on the way, but Apple's own testers are raising the alarm
• Samsung Galaxy S26 just tipped for a 2-month delay — but it won't be getting that crazy name change
• The Google Pixel 10 Pro Fold is my new favorite foldable phone — and it’s all because of this one feature

Xiaomi is a company you probably don't come across that often, which is fair. It's got almost no market penetration in the U.S., and while adoption is higher in my native U.K., it's certainly not a household name.

However, the most recent stats suggest it has 10% of the worldwide smartphone market — because in China, the company is massive. Domestically, around 97 million people carry a Xiaomi phone. That's not far off the 130 million people in the U.S. reportedly using an iPhone. And it doesn't just make smartphones — Xiaomi makes tablets, smart home tech and even electric cars.

So, when I heard the company was releasing compact tablet to rival the iPad mini 7 — complete with a performant chipset, 165Hz adaptive screen and accessories like a stylus — I was interested to see the result. For background, I love the iPad mini and I recently finished reviewing the RedMagic Astra, which — spoiler alert — I love even more.

Small tablets are brilliant. They take up less space than bigger devices and they're way cheaper than the best foldable phones. For someone like me who loves nothing more than battered paperbacks and Moleskine notebooks, they're the perfect form factor. So the prospect of trying the Xiaomi Pad Mini for myself had me pretty excited.

But before we go any further, let me deliver the bad news first: Xiaomi isn't selling the Pad Mini in the United States, the United Kingdom or Europe. According to the company's representatives, it'll only be available in China, the Middle East and Southeast Asia. And that sucks, because it's a solid mini tablet.

(Why the company sent me one to test out, knowing I won't be able to buy it, is a mystery to me as much as it is to you. Kinda rubs salt in the wound, doesn't it?)

$429 for a tablet you can't buy

Xiaomi is selling the Pad Mini in those above regions for a starting price of $429 in U.S. dollars. Which is a good deal when you start listing the device's specs: 8.8-inch LCD (3,008 x 1,880) display with up to 165Hz refresh rate, 8GB RAM, 256GB storage and a MediaTek Dimensity 9400+ processor.

A look around at the competition shows this price isn't too bad, especially given the impact of global tariffs on consumer technology right now. The iPad mini 7 starts at $499/ £499 but that's only for 128GB of storage. Apple's pricing increases to $799 if you want 512GB of storage on the iPad mini 7

On the Android side, the RedMagic Astra has a higher starting price of $699/ £499 for 256GB of storage that gets even higher ($799 / £699) if you push it up to 16GB/512GB.

But my dreams aren't dead

Okay, so the Xiaomi Pad Mini won't be available at Best Buy or Currys anytime soon, but never say never. It could still see a global release and at the very least, the fact it exists in some form is a reason for folks like me to celebrate.

See, I grew up in the time when small gadgets were cool. I'll never choose an iPhone 17 Pro Max over the regular iPhone 17 Pro because I don't want to walk around with a phone the size of a dinner plate. Yes, the iPhone Fold is on the horizon and that's very exciting — but unless I get a hefty raise between now and next September, it's not on my shopping list.

But smaller tech that doesn't skimp on power has always faced battery issues. That's being dealt with in two ways: firstly, the likes of TSMC’s 3nm process means we get smaller chips that are more densely packed together and therefore offer better performance without using as much power. The MediaTek Dimensity 9400+ (along with its rival, the Snapdragon 8 Elite) is an example of this.

Secondly, consumer electronics will soon start benefiting from silicon-carbon batteries where silicon anodes replace the graphite ones in lithium-ion. They're reportedly up to 10x denser than lithium ions, which means you can fit more battery capacity in the same physical space. That's great if, like the Xiaomi Pad Mini, you have a footprint of 205.13 x 132.03 x 6.46 mm to work with.

So the future is looking bright for anyone who wants smaller tech that doesn't compromise on power or longevity. Better yet, as these components become cheaper, the price we'll pay as consumers will also hopefully go down. Barring any crazy geopolitics, of course.

Bottom line

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There are two new challengers for a spot on our best Android tablets list, as Samsung has launched the Galaxy Tab S11 and Galaxy Tab S11 Ultra. Unveiled as part of Samsung's IFA announcements, these two premium tablets are equipped with a number of upgrades that have got me excited to try them again, with all the apps I need for work, so I can see how close they come to replacing my laptop.

The Galaxy Tab S11 (from $799 / £799 / AU$1,399) measures 11 inches, while the Ultra remains a massive 14.6 inches. But while its display is expansive, the Tab S11 Ultra (starting at $1,199 / £1,199 / AU$2,099) is the slimmest Galaxy Tab that Samsung's yet produced, measuring 5.1mm (0.2 inches) thick. It's lighter than the last generation too, at 692 grams (24.4 ounces).

The 469g (16.5 ounces), 11-inch model may not be a record-breaker like the Ultra is, but it's still a welcome sight, as Samsung only produced the Galaxy Tab S10 series in Plus and Ultra variants. Given that the rival iPad Pro offers both 11-inch and 13-inch versions, and the OnePlus Pad 3, our current best Android tablet, doesn't have a small version, Samsung is smart to corner this niche.

Samsung promises up to 1,600 nits of brightness from these tablets' AMOLED 2X displays, which should keep Samsung's slates at the top of the tablet brightness charts. And there's a little more display space to appreciate that brightness on the Ultra, as it now has a new, smaller notch design (albeit with one fewer camera).

To accompany these tablets, Samsung has a redesigned S Pen, with a hexagonal barrel and a solid cone tip. It's a big change from previous, soft-tipped S Pens, and there's no longer a magnetic strip on the back to store it on either. But for users familiar with the Apple Pencil on the best iPads, this should feel quite comfortable.

For multitaskers, Samsung has made some upgrades to the Tab S11's DeX desktop mode. With a monitor attached, you can now expand your workspace, rather than just mirror it, with Extended mode. And if you want even more space, DeX now supports up to four workspaces to arrange your apps across.

Samsung's Galaxy AI features benefit from the tablet's large screen. Like the Galaxy Z Fold 7, Google Gemini can now be used in a movable overlay, allowing you to place the output from your ever-ready chatbot where you need it as you switch between apps. And features like Drawing Assist are definitely at their best when used with a stylus on a large canvas.

More traditional productivity apps, like Notion, Goodnotes, LumaFusion and Clip Studio Paint, come pre-installed on the Tab S11 series, and with bonuses like templates or free trials as a deal-sweetener. Samsung's clearly still keen on users trying to use their tablets more like laptops, in case the upgrades to DeX didn't make that clear.

Driving the Tab S11 is a MediaTek Dimensity 9400+ chipset, the first 3nm chip Samsung has used on a tablet. The result of this new chip is apparently performance increases of 24% for the CPU, 27% for the GPU and 33% for the NPU over the Tab S10.

Users can opt for 128GB, 256GB or 512GB of storage for the Galaxy Tab S11, and pick from 256GB, 512GB and 1TB in the case of the Tab S11 Ultra. By default, the tablets are Wi-Fi only, but 5G can be optionally added to any model for a little extra cash.

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OnePlus has a proven track record of making excellent devices, so it's no surprise that the OnePlus Pad 3 is easily the best Android tablet you can buy right now. But if you were hoping for a great tablet without such a large display, you don't have to go for the iPad mini 7.

Leaker Digital Chat Station claims that OnePlus is working on a smaller version of the tablet, tentatively called the OnePlus Pad Mini. But, unlike the OnePlus Pad Lite, this is designed to be a premium device.

In other words, we should expect this to simply be a smaller version of existing OnePlus tablets — rather than a cheaper model that has to compromise on features and specs.

The leaker claims that the tablet is currently being tested with the Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 2 chipset. The chip is expected to launch later this year as a follow-up to the Snapdragon 8 Elite, which is itself easily the best chipset you can get for an Android device.

That may give the OnePlus Pad Mini a slight advantage compared to Apple's smallest iPad — since it will (presumably) have the same processing hardware as the next wave of OnePlus flagships.

As much as we love the iPad mini 7, we can't ignore the fact it's missing performance prowess as other iPads. It's all because it runs on the A17 Pro chipset, an older mobile chipset that debuted on iPhone 15 Pro, while the likes of the iPad Air and iPad Pro utilize Apple's M3 and M4 chips respectively. That means the larger tablets end up with significantly better performance and efficiency.

OnePlus Pad Mini: What to expect

With that in mind, it's clear that the OnePlus Pad Mini is not going to be a slouch in the performance department. It's quite the step up from the MediaTek Helio G100 OnePlus put into the Pad Lite — and the first generation Snapdragon 8 Elite in the OnePlus Pad 3.

We don't know how big the screen is going to be, but DCS claims the tablet will launch alongside a 6.3-inch OnePlus phone — which one source claims will be the OnePlus 15T.

My guess is that the Pad Mini would be slightly larger, while still being noticeably smaller than its 13.2-inch predecessor. Probably something closer to 8 or 9 inches, based on the name, since a 10-inch tablet screen doesn't exactly scream "small." A bit like the iPad mini, in fact.

Now, I did pause at the mention of this tablet arriving alongside the OnePlus 15T. Considering we've only just seen the release of the OnePlus 13T back in May, it suggests we may be waiting almost 2 years for the OnePlus Tab Mini to arrive. That's hardly ideal.

But DCS claims that the OnePlus Tab Mini should be arriving sometime early next year. So I'm just guessing there has been some miscommunication along the way — or some kind of mistranslation.

I guess it depends on whether OnePlus will be skipping over the OnePlus 14, as it did with the OnePlus 4. In the meantime, check out our roundup of all the best tablets you can buy.

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There's been a hole in my life ever since I finally said goodbye to my aging iPad mini several years ago. In my mind, Apple's smallest iPad is one of the best tablets out there, but the arrival of the RedMagic Astra this month has given me pause. What's on offer is pretty simple: a compact Android tablet running the latest and greatest chipset designed for a supreme gaming experience.

While I'm not a massive mobile gamer, I've always appreciated that the iPad mini 7 didn't compromise on power even though it was smaller than its bigger brethren. The same is true here. RedMagic has thrown everything but the kitchen sink into this device thanks to a Snapdragon 8 Elite chip, a stunning OLED screen, active cooling, fast charging and a slick design.

Space is at a premium in my everyday carry, and I'm not quite willing to pony up for one of the best foldable phones, no matter how slim the new Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 7 is. That leaves me looking for that Goldilocks device; a tablet larger than a phone but not as big as a hybrid, that doesn't compromise on power and has a few unique tricks up its sleeve. And after having used it for a couple of weeks, I think the RedMagic Astra delivers on all fronts. Let me tell you how...

RedMagic Astra: Specs

Redmagic Astra: Price and availability

The Redmagic Astra comes in three different configurations with pricing to match. The entry-level price for both the Eclipse (black) and Starfrost (silver) versions gets you 12GB RAM and 256GB of storage for $699 / £499.

If you opt for 16GB RAM and 512GB storage, that pricing increases to $799 / £699.

And if you push up to 24GB RAM and 1TB storage, the cost goes up to $949 / £879. Just note: only the Eclipse colorway is available in this configuration.

Those prices are a little on the high side and put this above the level of a casual purchase. For example, the entry-level price is actually higher than the $499 starting price for the iPad mini 7. It's true that Apple's tablet has half the storage for that price, but still — if you want a small tablet on a budget, then Apple actually has the edge here.

However, Apple's pricing increases to $799 if you want 512GB of storage on the iPad mini 7, so once you start getting into the higher configurations, you're getting better value from Redmagic.

Perhaps a more realistic comparison is Lenovo's Legion Tab, another 8-inch tablet with a gaming focus that also starts at $549, albeit with an older chipset and an LCD screen rather than an OLED one.

Another recent Android tablet to launch with the Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset is the OnePlus Pad 3, which commands a £599 / $699 price for its 16GB RAM and 512GB configuration — but that's also got a larger 13.2-inch screen.

RedMagic Astra: Design

Gaming devices can be somewhat divisive when it comes to design, but I think most people would be hard-pressed to find fault with the RedMagic Astra. Bezels around the front of the device are kept to a minimum, thanks to the 90.1% screen-to-body ratio, while the back is pretty understated.

First up, I'm not sure I can remember the last time I used a tablet (or phone) without a camera bump. Seriously, it's been that long. The Astra is completely flush across the back, which means you can slide it in and out of a backpack, prop it up on a stand or even attach it to a telescopic controller without any resistance.

The aluminum frame has rounded corners and measures a pitch-perfect 7.3mm thick — enough to give you something to grip onto without being too chunky. The power button sits on the left edge naturally, where your index finger rests while holding it in landscape mode, and doubles up as a fingerprint scanner. The Astra's USB-C port is across from it on the right edge. Up top is the volume rocker and RedMagic's metallic red slider that toggles on its Game Space launcher — more on that later.

I'm not quite sure why RedMagic decided to put the USB-C on the right-hand side — it's too far up to use in a telescopic controller, and because it's not on the bottom, you can't easily attach it to a dock or charging station.

Whether you opt for the Starfrost or Eclipse color, you get a soft matte finish on the back that looks awesome. It dulls those pesky reflections you get with a glossy finish, although this slate still isn't immune to fingerprint smudges.

Aside from the single RedMagic logo in the middle of the chassis, there's a rectangular glass window running along the top that gives you a glimpse of a PCB-stylised graphic with gold stamps for the Snapdragon 8 Elite logo, as well as highlighting the vapor chamber and "composite liquid metal" build.

There's also the RedMagic logo written out in font, which you can set to pulse with light in the tablet's settings. You can also illuminate the ring around the camera lens.

These small bits of RGB lighting let you subtly know it's a gaming machine and they can be set for additional functionality, like working with an alarm or indicating a charging process.

The RedMagic Astra is rated IP54 waterproof, which means it'll survive the odd splash if you want to take your gaming session outside in the rain or into the shower — but it's not going to survive being fully submerged.

One small gripe I have about the design is that the speaker vents are placed on the left and right below the power button and USB-C port. This means that when you're gripping the tablet in landscape mode, your palms can muffle the output and spoil the audio quality. Given the relative size of the device, I'm not sure where else you would locate the speakers, but if the power button and USB-C port had been shifted to the top and bottom, respectively, RedMagic may have been able to shift the speaker grilles further up and alleviate the problem.

All told, though, I'm a real fan of the RedMagic Astra design. It leans just enough into a premium, gamer sci-fi vibe to be recognized as a premium tablet without being garish. Meanwhile, the heft (370g) and proportions — about the same as a Moleskine notebook at 134.2mm (H) x 207mm (W) x 6.9mm (D) — are just right to slip into my rucksack without making a nuisance.

RedMagic Astra: Display

If the design around back is cool, then the RedMagic Astra's display is ice cold — and probably one of the best reasons I have to recommend this device. Not just to anyone wanting a gaming machine, but anyone wanting a small, powerful tablet, period.

You get a full-on OLED display with a 165Hz refresh rate and 1,600 nits of peak brightness. It's absolutely popping with vibrancy and contrast in games like Call of Duty: Mobile or Genshin Impact, and it's really impressive.

The 2,400 x 1,504 pixel resolution is more than enough on the Astra's 9.06-inch screen (with a 16:10 aspect ratio), and if you want to switch off the games and enjoy one of the best streaming shows, it's just as good. It doesn't support HDR on services like Netflix, but to my eye, the contrast on those deep blacks still looked fantastic.

RedMagic Astra: Performance

The Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset has made itself at home in a number of the best Android phones, but is still relatively rare in tablets. The RedMagic Astra has the regular version of the chip without an overclocked CPU. I was able to comfortably run Genshin Impact, Call of Duty, FC Mobile, Command & Conquer: Rivals and Horizon Chase with the Astra set to 165Hz, and it was the best gaming experience I've ever had on a tablet.

From loading up and navigating through menus to actual gameplay, the experience was fluid and responsive without a hint of stutter or lag. I'm no fan of touchscreen gaming, but the response rate — to my untrained fingers — was sublime.

There's an active cooling system and the vapor chamber inside the RedMagic Astra, and the fan will start up under aggressive conditions to try and keep the thing cool. You can hear it whirring away if you put your ear to the back of the device, but otherwise it won't spoil your gaming session, and it succeeds in keeping the tablet cool throughout even the most demanding games.

Running the Astra through a series of benchmarks just confirms the inevitable; this device blows its competition away when it comes to sheer grunt. It scored higher than the OnePlus Pad 3 on single-core Geekbench score and narrowly lost out on multi-core. Meanwhile, it swatted away Apple's M3 iPad Air without breaking a sweat. You can see the full results in the table below.

The basic RedMagic Astra comes with 12GB RAM and 256GB storage, while the higher-spec model I've been using has 16GB RAM with 512GB onboard memory. If you really want to go overboard, you can pick this tablet up with 24GB of RAM and a massive 1TB of storage.

Most people won't need that, but if you've got deep pockets (read: $899) and want a device for the long haul, you may be interested.

RedMagic Astra: Battery and charging

Battery life is something you usually have to sacrifice with smaller devices, but the Astra does a commendable job when it comes to staying power. Tucked inside that stylized matte casing is an 8,200mAh battery that RedMagic quotes will give you around 5.5 hours of gameplay at full frame rate or 5.3 hours of gameplay whilst livestreaming.

If you want to use it for movies, RedMagic claims you'll get 33 hours of continuous playback before it dies.

In more day-to-day usage, you're going to get somewhere in between those two extremes. I fired the RedMagic Astra up at 9am and used it continuously until 6pm for streaming video, playing music, browsing the web and playing some games. All of which with the screen at full brightness and locked to 165Hz.

I took a break for a few hours at 6pm, but came back to it for another two hours later in the evening for a little more YouTube and gaming with a Bluetooth controller attached. Even after nearly 12 hours, I still had a quarter of its available charge left. That's pretty good considering my colleague Tony took a similar approach with the iPad mini 7 and landed on 10 hours and 34 minutes before that device died.

As you'd expect, the Astra supports 80W charging and will charge to full in 71 minutes when connected to a compatible charging brick. You just need to be aware that RedMagic doesn't ship the device with its own charger.

Part of the reason RedMagic says the Astra can last this long is due to its "Liquid Metal" technology. The company says it used an indium-based alloy formed mostly from potassium to create a solid piece of metal with strong thermal conductivity. Placing this directly over the CPU lowers the chip's temperature by up to 5°C and improves the overall thermal performance and, by extension, efficiency.

RedMagic Astra: Software

There's some good and some bad when it comes to the software side of things here. Bad stuff first; this tablet comes pre-loaded with the kind of bloat I assumed was a thing of the past, but is sadly all too common with Chinese manufacturers. Thankfully, much of it can be uninstalled swiftly, but it's still a laborious process that takes some of the sheen off firing up a brand-new tablet.

Similarly, I noticed a particular quirk when I was scrolling through my email inbox, and the messages were all layered on top of each other into a blurry mess. I fixed the issue by forcibly locking the screen to 65Hz and reloading the app. It hasn't happened before, but I wouldn't be surprised if I run into a few other glitches here and there.

Thankfully, the RedMagic Astra keeps things mostly to stock Android 15 with a few tweaks added by the company's RedMagic OS 10.5 skin. You get some extra options like the aforementioned RGB lighting on the back of the device, around the camera lens and the company's logo. Alongside the aforementioned bloatware, there's also some AI gimmicks like "RedMagic Translation" that offers you real-time voice translation on voice content. Finally, there's an app sidebar you can call up at any time by swiping in from the side of the screen and holding for a few seconds. This displays your recently or most-used apps and can be handy.

One thing I would have liked to see is a real multitasking solution akin to OnePlus' Canvas feature. The RedMagic Astra is more than powerful enough to run a bunch of apps simultaneously, so (even on a small screen) not having software take advantage of this seems like a missed opportunity.

But when the rubber meets the road, this is a gaming device, so the star of the show is RedMagic's Game Space — activated via a slide of the metallic red toggle on top.

This transports you (through a fancy, lightspeed-esque graphic) into a game launcher where you can find all your games as well as quick settings for CPU and GPU performance.

And you can tweak the settings for each individual game. It's a simple procedure to toggle superior performance for a demanding game like Genshin Impact while easing back on the throttle for something simple like your next round at Solitaire.

RedMagic Astra review: Verdict

The RedMagic Astra is a certified contender for the best gaming tablet you can buy, thanks to the combination of the Snapdragon 8 Elite chip and a jaw-dropping OLED 165Hz screen. It doesn't come cheap, but then considering the hardware and specs you're getting for the price, there's a whole lot of value on offer here.

Are there some drawbacks? Of course. There's no 5G cellular option for a start, and whilst the hardware and battery will last you a good few years, the same can't be said for the software. RedMagic has committed to three years of software updates (including one major Android update), which isn't good enough in an age where Samsung is supporting its phones for seven years.

Looking past those points, the RedMagic Astra is a fantastic device even if you're not a huge gamer. It'll handle any pro-grade app you throw at it, and you could just as easily use this for a bit of on-the-go video editing or hook it up to a monitor and a Bluetooth keyboard and use it as a work machine. You can get a range of dedicated accessories, like a stylus, case or gamepad, directly from RedMagic, too.

Smaller tablets generally don't have the allure of their larger siblings, but I'm a big fan because I rate portability highly. And while I feel like I've always had to compromise on power or battery life to achieve that, the RedMagic Astra shows I can have my small cake and eat it.

If you want a small, powerful tablet that's not the iPad Mini 7, then this is the device for you. It helps a bit if you like to play games, too.

I knew the day when I’d find an Android tablet I’d be happy to switch my iPad for would come eventually, but I was still a little surprised it’s come right now in the form of the OnePlus Pad 3.

OnePlus’ previous tablet attempts have been high quality, but a few changes made to this model have not only kept it among the best tablets available today, but have propelled it to the best on the market in areas like productivity and battery longevity.

The OnePlus Pad 3 is more expensive than the company’s previous tablets, and still lacks proper biometric security. But it still undercuts even rival 11-inch tablets on price, while offering more power, battery life, and display space than ever before.

I still have some quibbles with this slate that keep it out of five-star territory, and I can’t rule out swapping back to an iPad in the future. But the OnePlus Pad 3 has proven to be the best balance of price and features you can get in Android tablets, if not all tablets, right now. And I can't wait to tell you why.

OnePlus Pad 3: Specs

OnePlus Pad 3: Price and availability

The new OnePlus Pad 3 costs £529 in its basic form with 12GB RAM and 256GB storage, or £599 / $699 for 16GB RAM and 512GB storage.

That's £100 more than the OnePlus Pad 2 from last year, I must sadly report. Plus, for some weird reason, the U.S. only has access to the more expensive edition of the Pad 3, which means it's effectively a price hike of $150 in that market.

Fortunately for OnePlus, even with these increases, the Pad 3 is still on the cheap side. For instance, the 13-inch iPad Air M3 starts at $799, the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus at $649/£649, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus at $999, and the 13-inch iPad Pro M4 at $1,299. The OnePlus Pad 3 costs less than all of these, yet as we'll see, it's still on a level with these other tablets.

OnePlus Pad 3: Design

After two generations of the same unique design, OnePlus has fallen in line with its competitors to give the Pad 3 a new but more typical Android tablet look. The flat edges and corner camera in a pill-shaped bump are not as distinct as a round-sided tablet with a centered circular camera block, but this doesn't matter much for the tablet's usability.

What does impact the user experience is the change in size. The Pad 3 boasts a thinner profile than the Pad 2, which, while not quite as slim as the iPad Pro or the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus, is slimmer than the iPad Air or Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus. And the display's increased in size by over an inch compared to the OnePlus Pad 2, to give you more room to work with, or play with, as you need.

Disappointingly, OnePlus still hasn't added a fingerprint scanner to the OnePlus Pad 3. It offers facial recognition, but only the vanilla kind with limited security. It's a fast method to enter the tablet, and my attempts to break in with a photo of my face were unsuccessful. But visual-only facial recognition is not secure in the way that Face ID or a fingerprint scanner are, meaning you may be better off just leaving it as a slower PIN-unlocked device if you plan to save sensitive material on your tablet.

OnePlus is only offering the Pad 3 in a Storm Blue colorway for Europe and North America. A Frosted Silver version exists, but that's only being sold in India. That's an unfortunate limitation to put on the more neutral color option, but the blue looks pretty classy as is.

OnePlus Pad 3: Display

Having grown from 12.4 inches to 13.2 inches, the OnePlus Pad 3 is now among the largest tablets you can buy today. The display comes with a 3.4k resolution and in a practical 7:5 aspect ratio, making it a squarer, iPad-style tablet compared to the more rectangular Galaxy Tabs. This gels well with the Open Canvas multi-tasking interface, which we'll look at later.

Performance is smooth too, with a peak refresh rate of 144Hz, slightly higher than that of the 120Hz iPad Pro and Galaxy Tab S10 series. This can change between that and six other speeds with an adaptive system, although it's not fully adaptive like the LTPO technology used by Apple and Samsung, as OnePlus has stuck with a more typical LCD screen.

LCD puts the OnePlus Pad 3 in line with the iPad Air. As the results above show, the OnePlus wins on peak brightness while lagging behind a little on color accuracy and coverage. An OLED display would have been an enormous upgrade for OnePlus to introduce, but given the price has already increased this year, adding OLED could have driven the price up more, so sticking to LCD is probably the lesser of the two evils the Pad 3 could have ended up with.

OnePlus Pad 3: Performance

OnePlus is the first manufacturer to put the Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset, found in this year's best premium Android phones, into a tablet, and it performs just as well as I'd hoped. Check out the numbers below to see how the OnePlus Pad 3 decimates its competitors on graphics, and stays ahead of the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus on CPU performance too. I wasn't expecting the OnePlus to triumph over the iPad Air, as its M3 chip is the same found in full-fat Mac machines. But the fact that the iPad could have processed a video from 4K to 1080p almost three times over in the time the OnePlus takes to do it once may make you think twice if you want a tablet for work, depending on what your daily activities are.

This zippy performance is obvious while gaming, with a long session of Ex Astris at maximum settings looking stunning with only a couple of framerate hiccups during loading. The Pad 3's graphene-lined vapor chambers kept the temperature increase inevitable from extended gaming to the top left corner of the tablet by the camera, meaning I couldn't actually feel the tablet heat up when I was holding it horizontally.

The basic OnePlus Pad 3 spec comes with 12GB RAM and 256GB storage. The higher spec, which offers 16GB RAM/512GB storage, is the only variant offered in the U.S.. That's unfortunate from a cost perspective, but on the plus side, the 16GB spec not only offers more capacity but a higher spec LPDDR5T memory type, which is faster and more power efficient than the LPDDR5x kind used in the 12GB edition and most other tablets.

OnePlus Pad 3: Audio

The OnePlus Pad 3 blows your mind with its audio without even playing anything, simply because it features an octo-speaker set-up, doubling the usual quad-speaker arrangement that many premium tablets have. This gives anything you play through the Pad 3 an amazingly wide soundstage effect, and also enables a neat feature called Holo Audio.

Holo Audio lets the tablet pipe certain kinds of sound in specific directions to help you pick them out more clearly from other sounds. So while your music or video audio would come at you as if from the centre of the OnePlus Pad 3, you can have ongoing voice calls come in from the left, and notifications from the right to help you perceive these as three separate sources and deal with them accordingly. This works both through the Pad 3's speakers or through headphones, and can be left on automatic or customized in surprising depth if you want.

However, I have to dock points from the OnePlus Pad 3 for being the least bassy tablet I've ever tested. Compared to the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus, the OnePlus did help separate out the instruments and vocals in the thrilling track "Carpe Diem" from the Guilty Gear: Strive soundtrack more effectively, making Naoki's snarling vocals easier to hear. But anything from the bass guitar or the lower registers of the lead guitar or synth was almost completely lost.

OnePlus Pad 3: Battery and charging

I expected nothing less than excellent from the OnePlus Pad 3's battery, given this is an area of focus for every one of the company's devices. And sure enough, with a new 12,140 mAh battery (about 27% larger than the Pad 2's) and an upgraded chipset, the Pad 3 lasted an astonishing 16 hours and 21 minutes in adaptive refresh rate mode on the TG custom battery test.

First off, this is a good improvement on the 14 hours and 8 minutes that the OnePlus Pad 2 managed. It also beats the 15 hours and 43 minutes managed by the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus, and utterly thrashed the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus, which lasted almost half as long at 8 hours and 22 minutes. Even the otherwise fantastic 13-inch iPad Pro M4 is shown up, with its 13 hours and 13 minutes result still hours behind the OnePlus.

OnePlus gave the Pad 3 80W charging, up from 67W on the previous model, but you'll need to buy the charger separately in Europe in order to use it. Fortunately, our U.S. testing model came with the charger, so we were able to test how fast it fills the tablet.

We recorded the OnePlus Pad 3 charging to 20% in 15 minutes and 34% in 30 minutes in our lab, similar to the OnePlus Pad 2. This is slower in terms of percentage than the 40% the Tab S10 Plus manages, but that seems fair given the extra capacity of the OnePlus slate.

OnePlus Pad 3: Cameras

The OnePlus Pad 3's cameras have remained the same as the Pad 2's - a 13MP rear camera and an 8MP front camera.

Tablet cameras aren't meant to be a user's primary camera, but even still, I'd rather take my photos with the warmer-toned OnePlus Pad 3 than the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus — everything just looks more inviting through its lenses. Then again, Samsung's more natural coloring and greater contrast do help elements like the wood grain of these shelves, which is perhaps ideal if your video calls involve showing off more than just your pretty face.

OnePlus Pad 3: Accessories

There's a mix of old and new with the first-party accessories for the OnePlus Pad 3. The headliner this year is an updated $199 / £169 keyboard case, comes in two parts, with an adjustable kickstand section and a separate lower deck if you want to leave the keyboard behind.

The new keyboard case offers larger keys compared to OnePlus' previous keyboard cases, and the pogo pin connector is now much flatter, attaching to the back of the tablet for an easier time positioning and transporting the tablet and keyboard together. But there's one important detail to highlight here: OnePlus' new keyboard has both Bluetooth and physical pogo pin connection options in the U.S., but due to regulatory differences, there is no Bluetooth in Europe, including the U.K.

This is likely why there's a larger price difference between the prices for this accessory in USD and GBP. And it also unfortunately means one of the most unique parts of OnePlus' keyboard is locked off for a large number of users.

I didn't get to try the new $49 / £59 folio case, but it looks like a smart option for users who don't need to do large amounts of typing on their tablet, or value the option to stand the Pad 3 both vertically and horizontally at a variety of angles. This also comes with a magnetized fastener to keep the folio closed and your stylus in place, something lacking from the keyboard case.

Speaking of the stylus, the $99 / £99 OnePlus Stylo 2 is carried over from the OnePlus Pad 2 last year. It's a responsive input method, and the haptic feedback helps make writing on the smooth screen feel like a blend of the solid-tipped Apple Pencil and the rubber-tipped S Pen included with Samsung tablets. But I really wish that the magnetic connection between the Stylo and the Pad 3 could be stronger, as I'd regularly knock the stylus off the tablet when putting it in or taking it out of my bag. This still happens when I have a Galaxy Tab or iPad, but not quite so frequently.

OnePlus Pad 3: Software and AI features

OnePlus' OxygenOS 15 skin for Android 15 works excellently on phones, and makes just as much sense when blown up for a tablet screen. OnePlus adds a taskbar with a recent files and app drawer built-in to help navigation, and lets you use some apps in a two-pane view for easier navigation, two sensible additions for a large tablet screen.

Open Canvas is back again to provide the best multitasking experience on any tablet right now, letting users set up up to three apps in a flexible interface that lets you keep them at your preferred size, switching your view as needed. The Pad 3 also makes suggested pairings if you keep switching between apps frequently, reminding you to take advantage of the feature.

New to the Pad 3 are some improved connectivity options with other devices. You can now share files with OnePlus phones and mirror their screens too, if you want to keep your eyes on your tablet screen only. But, as we saw OnePlus' stablemate Oppo introduce on the Find N5 foldable a few months back, the OnePlus Pad 3 also allows an unexpected level of collaboration with Apple made gadgets, using its O+ Connect app to enable file sharing between the tablet and iPhones, iPads and Macs, along with the Mac Remote Control feature to use your laptop or desktop and its apps and files securely from anywhere with an internet connection. It takes a bit of setting up, but I have no doubt it could prove invaluable to Mac users in a pinch. Plus, it's something that iPads have no way of matching, outside of hoping you saved your files in iCloud.

On the AI front, the OnePlus Pad 3 has standard features like summaries, text generation, translation, all in a toolbar that you can quickly access with a swipe in from the side of the tablet at any time, as well as dedicated buttons for these abilities in relevant apps. Circle to Search and Gemini are here too for Google-powered image searches and AI requests.

This has all been pretty positive so far, but there is one unfortunate element of the OnePlus Pad 3's software — the support window. It's been guaranteed 3 Android upgrades and 6 years of security updates, two more years of security compared to the OnePlus Pad 2. However, this is not in line with the five or so years of OS updates that iPads normally get, or the seven and six years of full updates that Samsung guarantees for the Tab S10 and Tab S10 FE series, respectively.

OnePlus Pad 3 review: Verdict

I genuinely think the OnePlus Pad 3 would be a strong fit for basically any user with the budget for an upper-end tablet. Even Mac or iPhone owners who might default to an iPad could still be swayed by the Pad 3 thanks to its O+ Connect integrations with Apple devices. And anyone invested in Android or Windows-powered machines will have just as good a time passing files and controlling their apps via the Pad 3.

Granted, the OnePlus Pad 3's display is good, but Samsung's OLED tablets and the Tandem OLED iPad Pro are still superior. The iPad Air is more powerful, but it costs quite a bit more. And OnePlus' continued lack of biometric security baffles me. But for multitasking, battery life, and overall value, the OnePlus Pad 3 is an outstanding tablet, one of the best tablets you can buy today, and is going to stick by my side as my slate of choice long after this review is published.

Coming from a line of tablets that have let us down in the past, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus FE has turned things around to show that Samsung can do cheaper tablets just as well as premium ones, while making forgivable sacrifices to keep the cost down.

Offering a larger screen than the more premium Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus, but with better battery life and only one less year of update support, the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus is Samsung's answer to the iPad Air, which we rank as one of the best tablets. But unlike the OnePlus Pad 2, our current top player for the best Android tablets, the Tab S10 FE Plus is not focused on power, even if it is just as practical for light workloads.

It's a huge but portable slate that can be a brilliant addition to anyone who finds flagship chipsets or the latest AI features unnecessary distractions from their main goals of note-taking, drawing or streaming video.

I've enjoyed my time with the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus a whole lot, even though I know there are more potent tablets I could use instead. You'll see why I don't mind the power gap, enjoy the surprising ways it beats far more expensive tablets and how well it plays early ‘00s British rap if you read on.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus: Specs

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus: Price and availability

You can buy the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus right now for $649/£649/AU$ 1,299 for 128GB storage, or up that to $749/£749/AU$ 1,449 if you want 256GB storage.

These are the prices for the basic Wi-Fi-only model, but for just £100/AU$ 200 you can add 5G compatibility if you're in the U.K. or Australia. Sadly, U.S. users don't have access to the 5G edition of the Plus model —you'll have to downsize to the regular Tab S10 FE if you want mobile data on the tablet.

This is $50 more than the Galaxy Tab S9 FE Plus was last year, but that old model measures 12.4 inches, while the new one is noticeably larger at 13.1 inches. Meanwhile, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus starts at $999/£999, and comes with several more features in accordance with its flagship status and price. But the Tab S10 Plus also measures 12.4 inches across, keeping the Tab S10 FE as the better one for cost to size ratio.

Looking beyond Samsung, the closest Apple-made rival, a 13-inch iPad Air, costs at least $799, and doesn't come with a bundled stylus like the Galaxy Tab does. The OnePlus Pad 2, our favorite Android tablet, costs $549, but uses a 12.1-inch display, and also comes without a stylus by default.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus: Design

The Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus does not deviate from Samsung's basic tablet design principles, with rounded corners, a landscape-first layout with the front camera on the long side of the tablet and the antenna lines on the back the only decoration along with the Samsung logo. There is no stripe down the back of the tablet following the rear camera downwards, but there are still magnets in this area, despite this, making it an ideal S Pen stylus storage location.

At 13.1 inches, the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus is 0.7 inches larger than the Tab S9 FE Plus it replaces, giving you a whole lot of extra screen space for your money. But even with the extra room, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus FE remains noticeably more rectangular than most tablets, especially compared to the square-ish 13-inch iPad Air.

But the Galaxy Tab and the iPad are equally thin at 0.24 inches thick, even if Samsung’s slate is about an ounce heavier. But the Samsung scores extra points by making its tablet's body more durable, with an IP68 rating against dust and water.

Coming in Gray, Silver or Blue, there's no particularly loud color option for the Tab S10 Plus FE. But I doubt that will be a dealbreaker for anyone.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus: Display

A 13.1-inch LCD panel covers the front of the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus, offering a 90Hz refresh rate like the previous Tab FE models. And in line with its predecessors, Samsung runs rings around the competition when it comes to brightness, color and color accuracy.

It's a shame that Samsung kept the anti-reflective coating exclusive for its non-FE Tab S models, because with that, the Tab S10 FE Plus would inarguably have one of the best tablet displays around.

As things stand, it's still brilliant for watching video or browsing, with the 90Hz refresh rate still high enough to keep things feeling responsive and smooth, unlike the 60Hz tech that Apple still uses on all its iPads except for the Pro models.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus: Performance

As one of the most expensive parts of any device, the chipset is normally a prime candidate for downgrading when trying to make a cheaper version, and that applies to the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus.

Samsung isn't using the capable Dimensity 9300 Plus from the regular Tab S10 models, but instead its own Exynos 1580. You can see how far behind that leaves it compared to the competition in the table below, where it lags on our three key benchmarks.

This was noticeable outside the formal tests, too. When I played Ex Astris, an RPG with demanding graphics, the Tab S10 FE couldn't keep up. Only taking my party indoors and into tight corridors helped bring the refresh rate back up, and even then, only until I started doing anything more involved than just moving around the rooms. The Tab S10 Plus FE isn't built for gaming.

On the plus side, Samsung doesn't shortchange you with memory. The basic spec for the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus FE is 8GB RAM with 128GB storage, but you can also get a 12GB RAM/256GB storage version that puts the tablet on par with the best Android slates in terms of memory space for multitasking or storing files. There's microSD card support too, giving up to another 2TB of swappable storage if you need it.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus: Audio

The stereo speakers on the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus offer reasonable power and audio definition. But it's still way behind premium tablets like Samsung's own Galaxy Tab S10 Plus.

Even at 50% volume, Roots Manuva's "Witness" was plenty loud enough for me on the Tab S10 FE Plus. The track's signature squish bass was as punchy as you'd want it to be, Root's lyrics were clear and the higher-pitched effects and percussion, while a little muted compared to the lower-frequency sounds, were still well represented.

But at the same volume, the Tab S10 Plus was way louder and had a superior soundstage with its quad speaker set-up. And all at the same quality, too. It's not a big enough difference for me to feel poorly served by the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus. But it is still a mid-tier tablet, and premium slates have all kinds of advantages you may not expect.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus: Battery and charging

Although Samsung enlarged the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus compared to the Tab S9 FE Plus, it still uses the same 10,090 mAh battery capacity. On our custom battery test, the Tab S10 FE Plus lasted 15 hours and 43 minutes with its adaptive refresh rate. That's nearly two and a half hours shorter than the Tab S9 FE Plus, but close to two hours longer than the 14:08 result of the OnePlus Pad 2.

Samsung also kept the same 45W wired charging system for the latest generation of Tab S FE. It fills the tablet from empty to 8% in 15 minutes and 16% after half an hour. The OnePlus Pad managed to reach 36% after half an hour of charging, showing how Samsung still lags behind on refuelling, even if its tablets do well on efficiency.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus: Cameras

A simple duo of 13MP main and 12MP selfie cameras serves the Galaxy Tab S10 FE. Those are the same as you get on the Galaxy Tab S10, so we shouldn't see much difference between the photos I took on both tablets.

There's enough detail to show off your face or what's in front of you while you're on a video call. But these are not designed for proper photography, and given the size of the tablet, it's not practical to even try.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus: Accessories

Samsung’s main tablet accessory is the S Pen, which, in usual Samsung fashion, comes in the Tab S10 FE Plus’ box as part of the entry price. There are no Bluetooth features available for this stylus, but the built-in button and fine, rubbery tip make it an excellent precision writing or drawing tool.

There are also several case and cover options that Samsung will sell you. You can get a simple Smart Book Cover, which acts as a stand or screen protector as needed. There are also two keyboard covers — an all-in-one style without a trackpad, and one with a trackpad that has separate stand and keyboard elements for greater flexibility.

I didn't get to try any of these cases, but going by previous Samsung tablet keyboard cases I've used, they are useful, albeit somewhat expensive, additions that make the tablet more suitable for work or school.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus: Software and AI features

One UI 7 brings a fresh look to the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus' interface, in keeping with the regular Galaxy Tab S10 series and the Galaxy S25 line of phones. But this resemblance is somewhat skin-deep, as a lot of the Galaxy AI features found on these devices aren't available on the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus.

You still get Circle to Search, the visual Google Search tool to help find out more about what's on your screen. And inside the Notes app, you can use the Solve Math feature to help with equations, or adjust your handwriting with the app's Handwriting Help tools to tidy up your notes. But this isn't designed to be an AI-focused device, unlike the iPad Air, which can use all the same Apple Intelligence features as other recent Apple devices.

Samsung's DeX desktop mode is still present on the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus, as it has been on previous Galaxy Tab generations. Turning this mode on makes the tablet more laptop-like when required, and is ideal for use with a keyboard case or a separate keyboard and mouse.

While Samsung's flagship tablets get seven years of full update support, the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus gets six years of full support, along with six generations of Android. This is one of the best offers for software longevity in the tablet space, with most iPads getting around five years of support, and the OnePlus Pad 2 only getting three years of Android updates and four years of security updates guaranteed.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus review: Verdict

Samsung's been generous with how much the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus offers, except in two key areas. Performance is one — this isn't a machine for high-fidelity gaming, or for work beyond some typing or spreadsheet editing. The other is the lack of AI features, which you'd perhaps expect on a tablet of this price in 2025, but may not matter too much given the Tab S10 FE Plus isn't focused on productivity.

The Tab S10 FE Plus' display size and quality, its strong battery life and the value for money for its hardware (plus the bundled stylus) make it a better mid-range tablet than others. It's just the right combination of features for anyone who wants something better than a standard iPad or Galaxy Tab A series model, but finds the laptop-grade M3 chip in the iPad Air excessive, let alone the price.

The OnePlus Pad 2 remains our top Android tablet pick for its overall performance and value for money. But if you're happy trading away some power and features for a longer battery life and extra display quality, the Galaxy Tab S10 FE Plus might be the ideal middle ground for you.

The OnePlus Pad 3, the sequel to the top-ranked device on our best Android tablets guide available today, is debuting on June 5, TG has learned in an exclusive interview with Celina Shi, Chief Marketing Officer at OnePlus Europe.

As well as the reveal date, Shi had some fascinating insight on what OnePlus' new tablet will offer, such as upgraded internals, smarter software and a fresh look.

"In just two short years, we have built a strong reputation for bringing the most powerful and productive tablets to the market," said Shi. We continue this legacy with the OnePlus Pad 3," which she adds is "ready to redefine the Android tablet market in 2025."

The chipset you were hoping for

As we'd hope, OnePlus is using a mighty chipset in the Pad 3 — the Snapdragon 8 Elite. It is, in fact, the first tablet to use this chip, Shi says, though several smartphones like the OnePlus 13 have used this silicon for months already.

Samsung's current Galaxy Tab S10 Plus and Tab S10 Ultra models use a Dimensity 9300 Plus chip, while Apple sticks with it own A-series and M-series chips for the latest iPads like the iPad Air and iPad Pro, so it'll be an exciting three-horse race when we get the Pad 3 into our lab for testing.

New productivity features for Android and Apple users alike

To nobody's surprise, the OnePlus Pad 3 will run OxygenOS 15, based on Android 15, just like the OnePlus 13 series. As well as the general benefits of the new OS version, the Pad 3 will bring an update to Open Canvas, the dynamic multi-app interface seen on the Pad 2 and the OnePlus Open foldable.

"OnePlus' Open Canvas… is the absolute best way to multitask across big screen devices," says Shi. " It allows you to have multiple separate programs open at once and flick between them quickly and easily, making sure nothing gets in the way of your work." Shi also promised that Open Canvas is better, but elected not to elaborate further.

Apple users, not just existing OnePlus or Android users, will benefit from owning a Pad 3 thanks to some other software upgrades. Shi explains that the OnePlus Pad 3 introduces "new apps and functionality to help Apple Mac users, including remote Mac control and easy file sharing via drag-and-drop."

Remote Mac control, first seen on the Oppo Find N5, the latest foldable from OnePlus' stablemate, allows users to remotely and securely mirror their Mac desktop, with trackpad gestures and a full keyboard offered on-screen as needed. It's something you can't do with an iPad or iPhone, and could be useful for people who need access to a Mac's files at home or work while out and about.

A new and blue look

Design-wise, the OnePlus Pad 3 goes in a new direction with its rear camera block. The first and second OnePlus Pads had a rear camera in a circular block placed in the center of the long side of the device. Now however, the camera has moved to the top left corner in a pill-shaped bump, a more typical tablet camera placement that Shi describes as "a fresh, sleek look."

Shi also told us about the Pad 3's new color: Storm Blue, which is apparently "a dusty royal blue that whispers class and style anywhere you go." This was specified as the European colorway, which suggests other regions could get different colorways, although OnePlus hasn't offered this on any of its previous tablets sold in Europe or North America.

The OnePlus Pad 3's open sale date remains a secret, but Shi confirmed that pre-orders will open on launch day with "a selection of early-bird discounts and incentives," all on offer from OnePlus' website.

Taking in all these details as a whole, it's clear that OnePlus has high hopes for the Pad 3, and going by the quality of its previous tablets, it has good reason to be. While we don't have any official info on what display specs, battery tech or accessories the OnePlus Pad 3 will have, there are only a few weeks to wait until we find out on launch day. We'll let you know as soon as we have hands-on time with the OnePlus Pad 3, and give you a full review and verdict as soon as we can.

More from Tom's Guide

• Acer launches 2 new tablets at Computex 2025 to take on the iPad — meet the Iconia V11 and V12
• I just tested ChatGPT vs Gemini with 7 AI image prompts — and one crushed the other
• I replaced my desktop tower with the AceMagic F3a mini PC for 7 days — here are my pros and cons

Acer has launched two new Android-based Iconia tablets at Computex 2025 with an eye towards capturing budget-conscious customers on the lookout for a new Android tablet.

The Iconia V11 and V12 arrive running Android 15 powered by a MediaTek Helio G99 processor backed by up to 8GB of DDR4 RAM.

Judging from the European pricing (U.S. and U.K. prices haven't been revealed yet) of €289 for the V12 and €229 for the V11, we're looking at sub-$300 mid-tier devices vying for a spot on the best cheap tablets list.

So, what do you get for the money? Acer is packing these devices with 11- and 12-inch, 16:10 aspect ratio screens with up to a 2K resolution and a 90Hz refresh rate.

Both tablets feature an aluminum chassis and while the V12 weighs in at 595g (1.3 pounds), the V11 is quite a bit lighter at 500g (1.1 pounds).

Both devices come with an iPad-style magnetic folio case that doubles up as a kickstand with three different viewing angles. Acer also has an accompanying stylus it's selling separately. You only get one color option, and it's an eye-pleasing "mist green".

There's 256GB of built-in storage in each tablet with the option to expand that up to 1TB via microSD.

Acer quotes a 10-hour battery life from the integrated 8,000mAh batteries — but that's obviously something we'll have to test independently once we get our hands on these tablets.

Camera-wise, you're looking at an 8-megapixel rear shooter and a 5-megapixel front one for video calls. Again, we'll have to test these out in the hand to determine if the quality is any good.

USB fast charging is on offer and Wi-Fi 6 and Bluetooth 5.2 round out the connectivity options. Acer has a 4G LTE version of the Iconia V11 for anyone who wants to include a cellular connection.

How do they stack up?

We won't know exactly how good these devices are until we've got them into the Tom's Guide testing labs for a full review. But it's safe to say competition to offer the best cheap tablets is fierce right now.

The Samsung Galaxy Tab A7 can be had for under $200 at Amazon right now thanks to a 13% discount. For Android users, this is a solid entry-level option with a 10.4-inch 2,000 x 1,200 display and a Snapdragon 662 processor inside along with 3GB of RAM.

Of course, for those with a little bit more to spend, there's the 11-inch iPad (10th generation) which is hovering at $321 at Amazon at time of writing due to an 8% discount. That's the best overall cheap tablet you can buy right now and a tough opponent for Acer to match.

The Iconia tablets are far from the only products Acer is unleashing at Computex this year. Tom's Guide will be reporting from the show floor all week so make sure you check back for the latest news as it happens.

More from Tom's Guide

• I tested a curved OLED gaming monitor with a secret side quest — it's also a killer smart TV
• I found the perfect monitor for my RTX 5060 Ti — and it’s a QHD OLED dream that won’t break the bank
• I just saw the future of computing — and it makes me a believer in AR smart glasses

Today is the final day of the Amazon Big Spring Sale! That means you only have a few hours to find some of the best tablets at a discount. This includes slates from Apple, Samsung, and, of course, Amazon.

Some of the best iPad deals right now include the new 11-inch iPad Air M3 for $549 and the 13-inch iPad Air M3 for $738. I also like the 11-inch iPad Pro M4 for $919, which is a $100 deal. Another awesome deal is the iPad mini 7 for $399.

Into the best Android tablets? If so, you can get a Google Pixel Tablet for $279 (a 30% discount) and a Samsung Galaxy Tab S10+ for $150 off. Naturally, Amazon has slashed the price of its tablets, such as the Amazon Fire 7 for $44.

Below are the best last-minute tablet deals for the Amazon Big Spring Sale.

Quick Links

• Amazon Fire 7: was $59 now $44 @ Amazon
• Apple 11" iPad (WiFi/128GB): was $349 now $327 @ Amazon
• Apple iPad mini 7: was $499 now $399 @ Amazon
• Google Pixel Tablet: was $499 now $399 @ Amazon
• Apple 11" iPad Air (WiFi/128GB): was $599 now $549 at Amazon
• Apple 13" iPad Air (WiFi/128GB): was $799 now $738 @ Amazon
• Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus: was $999 now $849 @ Amazon
• Apple 11" iPad Pro (WiFi/256GB): was $999 now $919 @ Amazon
• Apple 13" iPad Pro (Wi-Fi/256GB): was $1,299 now $1,185 @ Amazon

iPad deals

Android tablet deals

The Google Pixel Tablet is quite an underrated device. Not only does it come with Google's Pixel launcher and super fast Android updates, it’s also incredibly useful if you want a slate that seamlessly links with your smart home.

So when I tell you that you can pick up the Pixel Tablet for just $279 at Amazon, you might want to pay attention. That’s $120 off the usual price of $399, and one of the lowest prices we’ve ever seen this device go.

If you need more storage space, the 256GB model is $359, down from $499 — a $140 savings.

The Pixel Tablet is an excellent device. For starters, it shares many of the same attributes as Google Pixel phone series. The Tensor G2 chipset is a little old, but it still supports a bunch of great AI features, including photo editing and speech recognition.

We also found that the 11-inch display with 2560 x 1600 resolution was pleasantly crisp in our Google Pixel Tablet review. Not only does content look great on the tablet, it also has some pretty wide viewing angles.

Camera quality is generally excellent too, for those of you that actually want to take photos with a tablet. You’re also looking at around 12 hours of battery life on a single charge, according to our custom battery test, which beats out the similarly-price iPad 10th generation.

Smart home users can get a lot from the Pixel Tablet as well, since the optional speaker dock can turn the display into a bonafide smart home hub — complete with Chromecast capabilities and smart home controls.

Sadly, the discounted models don’t come with the dock, and you’ll have to pay $399 if you want to buy both devices as a bundle.

Or, if you decide you want to buy the dock later, you can pick one up by itself at the Google Store for $129.

OnePlus may be working on a powerful new tablet that could launch this year. The new tablet is reportedly the OnePlus Pad 2 Pro.

Specs for the beastly new tablet were shared by regular leaker Digital Chat Station over on Weibo. DCS claimed that that Pro version of the Pad 2 is one of only two tablets expected to launch in the first half of 2025 featuring Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Elite chipset.

However, it's unclear what the other tablet supposedly is and we couldn't find it mentioned in his Weibo feed.

OnePlus Pad 2 Pro reported specs

As for the OnePlus Pad 2 Pro, DCS says (via machine translation) that the tablet is "more oriented towards gaming and e-sports."

It's supposed to feature the Snapdragon chip and 16GB of LPDDR5X RAM alongside 1TB of storage.

It'll also be larger the than the OnePlus Pad 2 with a 13.2-inch LCD display about an inch larger than the 12.1-inch panel on last year's tablet. It should match the Pad 2 with a 3.4K resolution.

For cameras, the Pro version is supposed to have a 13MP rear camera and an 8MP front cam.

For charging it'll either have 67W or 80W charging with a "super 10,000-level large battery." If OnePlus is known for one thing it has to be battery life and last year's tablet ran out a 9,000 mAh battery that had provided epic battery life in Tom's Guide testing at nearly 15 hours.

It's looking like the Pad 2 Pro will likely have even longer battery life with its larger battery and optimization and efficiency with the Qualcomm chip.

OnePlus Pad 3 possible release date

If this tablet turns out to be real, the question is whether or not the global audience will get this version. Last year, OnePlus released the OnePlus Pad Pro as a China-only tablet.

However, the OnePlus Pad 2 that came out in the United States was the same tablet specs-wise.

If we do see this Pad 2 Pro outside of China it will likely launch as the OnePlus Pad 3. The Pad 2 came out in June of 2024 so we expect a similar launch window for the Pad 3, if it comes to the States.

More from Tom's Guide

• OnePlus 13 review: The best Android flagship for the money
• OnePlus Open 2 could have been the best foldable of the year — so why is it not happening?
• OnePlus is ditching this iconic feature — and there's serious backlash

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus has arrived with little fanfare, which seems unfair given that it is the Android tablet world's best answer to the iPad Pro, for better or for worse.

While it's smaller than its sibling, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra, this is still a big tablet with big specs, which is especially noticeable with its display. And although it's got a higher up-front cost than many tablets, the included S Pen stylus and guaranteed seven years of updates mean it's got more immediate and long-term benefits than its rivals.

All it asks for in return are regular visits to the charger and that you forgive it for not scoring as highly on benchmarks as its Apple-made competition.

Even setting the best iPads aside, we have other Android tablets we'd recommend ahead of the Tab S10 Plus for both typical and pro-level users. But maybe users who want to split the difference between power, size and price, and especially users who own a Galaxy phone, will find this as one of the best Android tablets by the end of this Galaxy Tab S10 Plus review.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus review: Specs

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus: Price and availability

Samsung put the Galaxy Tab S10 series up for sale at a $999/£999 start price for the standard 256GB Wi-Fi model. There's a 512GB option costing $1,199/£1,099 too, plus 5G versions for those who want built-in connectivity, which are another £150/$150 on top of the price of either storage option.

This is $200 less than the Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra while offering most of the same functionality in a smaller package. Next to Apple's tablet range, the closest comparison is the iPad Pro M4, which begins at $999 for the 11-inch version and $1,299 for the larger 13-inch one.

Going for the Samsung gets you more tablet and more accessories for the money, but you don't have a size choice unless you want to pay the extra to get the cheapest 14.6-inch Tab S10 Ultra.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus: Design and display

At 1.26 pounds, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus is lighter than the smaller OnePlus Pad 2 and Apple's 13-inch Apple tablets. It's only a fraction of a millimeter thicker than the iPad Pro M4, too, showing that Samsung remains competitive even with the toughest of rivals.

That's just as well since the Tab S10 has the same design as the Galaxy Tab S9 series, featuring flat sides with power and volume buttons and a front-facing camera on the long side of the display. Ideal for horizontal use, which is how many tablet apps now expect you to use it.

The S Pen, an included accessory, has a home in a magnetic strip on the back of the tablet, in line with the dual rear cameras. Other than the antenna lines decorating the edges of the panel, the back of the Tab S10 Plus is as plain as the front.

The optical fingerprint scanner sits under the display on the right side of the tablet (when holding it horizontally), offering a speedy way to log into the tablet. But I'm not sure why the scanner doesn't prompt you to set it up by default. Seems like an obvious thing to do during the setup flow rather than having the user decide later on if they want it or not.

Colors are the typical limited bland options that premium tablets like to stick to. The Moonstone Gray of my test device looks fine, as does the brighter Platinum option. I'd love for there to be one more fun option, even if there isn't the rainbow of color options you see for cheaper tablets.

What the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus lacks in dramatic looks, it makes up for with durability. It features IP68 dust/water resistance to protect the tablet's insides from damage and Armor Aluminum for peace of mind in case you drop or scrape the edge of the Tab.

You can rely on a Samsung tablet to offer some exceptional screen technology. The 12.4-inch AMOLED screen, with its 120Hz maximum refresh rate, is delightfully smooth to navigate and eye-searingly bright at its highest levels.

When using the Galaxy Tab horizontally, as Samsung intends you to use it, it feels quite normal, even if I'd prefer a little more vertical space when trying to work from it laptop-style.

But when held vertically, the Tab feels quite narrow, though that could be because I'm used to using a much squarer iPad Pro. It makes a difference if I'm using the Galaxy Tab as a notepad, as I tend to run out of space quickly when writing, but it feels fine when using apps with regular taps and swipes.

In testing, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus proved the best in terms of color gamut coverage, especially in its default Vivid color mode. It lags behind the competition in terms of brightness, though, especially compared to the Tandem OLED-powered screen of the iPad Pro.

Fortunately, the Tab S10 Plus' lower brightness is made up for by my favorite part of its display — its anti-reflective layer. It is easy to see it in action compared to any other screen you'll have to hand (unless you have a Galaxy S24 Ultra, which uses the same style of screen) as soon as you're outside your carefully-lit work environment.

Using the Galaxy Tab in outdoor or awkward indoor lighting, as is likely to happen when you're trying to use the device on the move, is far easier than other tablets when you combine the anti-glare with the bright OLED display.

And unlike the nanotexture display option offered on the iPad Pro M4, this coating comes as part of the basic price, is available on all storage options, and doesn't affect the smoothness of the screen either. That's good news for frequent stylus users.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus: Performance

Unlike previous Samsung Galaxy Tab S models, the Tab S10 series uses a Dimensity 9300+ chipset, rather than one built by Samsung or Qualcomm. But this is still a premium tablet despite the different silicon.

As the results below show, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus outperforms the OnePlus Pad 2, currently our favorite Android tablet, on our three main tests. However, Apple's mighty M-series chips still leave the Tab S10 Plus in the dust, especially the latest M4 silicon powering the iPad Pro.

The Tab S10 series retains the vapor chamber cooling of the Tab S9 to keep its performance consistent over long periods of time. While playing Ex Astris, I didn't feel the Tab S10 Plus get warm at all, although with all settings set to Ultra and the frame rate at 60fps, the tablet's performance did stutter, even in sparsely populated areas.

Inside the Tab S10 is 12GB RAM and 256GB storage, or 512GB in its top-specced form. While that's likely enough room for most users, you can still expand the storage with up to a 1.5TB microSD card should you need to. That's not something you can do with the iPad Pro, even if you can get 1TB and 2TB onboard storage versions of that tablet.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus: Audio

The quad speakers within the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus certainly give any audio you play a lot of oomph, especially for low-end notes, making this an ideal tablet for bassheads.

Listening to the complex and chaotic "Transcendental Cha Cha Cha" by Tom Cardy, the synthy bass notes and drum beats anchoring the song came across best on the Samsung tablet, while my old iPad Pro helped emphasize the castanets, drum machine cymbals, guitar and Cardy's vocals.

Personally, the high-end frequency focus of the iPad Pro's speakers, which brings out more of a track's regular instruments and the percussion parts, is more to my taste. But I still enjoyed listening to music, watching videos and playing games on the Samsung tablet.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus: Battery and charging

The 10,090 mAh battery within the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus is pretty large, but the tablet only lasted 8 hours and 22 minutes on our custom TG battery test (constantly browsing the internet from 100% to 0% charge).

Compared to the incredible 14 hours and 8 minutes that the OnePlus Pad 2 lasted, or the similarly strong 13 hours and 13 minutes or 9 hours and 41 minutes that the iPad Pro M4 and iPad Air M3 (respectively) achieved, that's not particularly impressive.

Anecdotally, I got about 10 hours of screen-on time per charge, perhaps because most of my use wasn't as power-hungry as opening web pages non-stop. I imagine I'd still get more use between charges out of the other tablets we've mentioned, but you can still be confident in the Tab S10 Plus lasting a full day of work if you're nervous about the benchmark result above.

The Tab S10 Plus supports 45W wired charging, but you won't find a charger in the box. Fortunately, we have a compatible charger in our test lab, and we found that the Tab S10 Plus powers from 0% to 40% in 30 minutes. That's pretty good if you need a mid-day refuel, but it's a pity you'll be paying extra for the privilege of this speed.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus: Cameras

Samsung has stuck to including two cameras on the back Galaxy Tab S10 series, even while Apple's dropped the ultrawide from the back of the iPad Pro. The 13MP main and 12MP ultrawide sensors are identical between the Tab S10 Plus and Tab S10 Ultra, as is the 12MP front camera.

But the Ultra gets an additional 12MP ultrawide sensor in its camera notch, as befitting its higher status and price.

Tablet cameras are not meant for hardcore photography, which is why it's not surprising to see these shots of a coffee plant and a selfie look a little grainy and dark, even for an indoor environment.

The cameras are more than passable for making video calls, though, which is by far the most common thing you'll be using them for on the Tab S10 Plus.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus: Accessories

The S Pen still comes with the Galaxy Tab by default, and is a smooth and low-latency stylus that I loved using.

It's very different from using an Apple Pencil Pro, with its mechanical button for accessing alternative tools and softer tip. But as someone who mostly uses styluses for taking notes and the odd doodle, I don't miss advanced features like Hover or Barrel Roll.

The other main accessory Samsung offers is the AI Book Cover Keyboard, which costs $229/£229 extra. As well as adding an adjustable stand to the tablet, the keyboard itself feels pretty nice to type on and can be used separately from the stand, depending on your needs. However, the trackpad can feel a bit wonky depending on the app you try to use it in.

This revised keyboard also features an AI key, which acts as a shortcut to either Bixby or Google Gemini, as you prefer. It doesn't activate any contextual Galaxy AI features sadly, which I feel would have been a better use of a dedicated key.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus: Software and AI

Samsung has brought its seven-year software support promise from its recent phones to the Galaxy Tab S10 series. That means the Tab S10 series will see full OS and security updates until the end of October 2031, which is the best guaranteed software support of any tablet.

Returning from previous Galaxy Tabs is DeX mode, which switches the standard Android interface to a more laptop-style one. You can open multiple windows and move them around freely or into up to four tiled spots, which offers a reasonable amount of freedom for work if your workflow can be translated into Android apps.

In my case, this was normally very easy since I'm usually writing in or referring to one Google Workspace app or another. However, when I would normally use a company-made Chrome extension to make adjustments to a document or go into Tom's Guide's back-end, it was normally wiser to lock the Tab S10 Plus and open up my laptop instead.

If you prefer to keep things traditional, split view for apps is back, letting you divide the screen between three apps. But this is the traditional style of cramming everything into the screen, rather than the smarter OnePlus Open Canvas system that lets you shift parts of the interface off-screen as required. But the 12.4-inch screen is still plenty large enough to work off an app running at a quarter of its regular size.

I wrote a large part of this review with Google Docs squished into the corner of the screen while my notes and Chrome were open at the same time. It's still not the same level of multitasking that a proper laptop can manage, but it's probably more than enough for most people.

Galaxy AI isn't new to the Galaxy Tab line, but the Tab S10 series is the first set of models to launch with Samsung's AI features included. Once you're settled into the tablet, you can try out features like transforming doodles into more polished versions with Sketch to Image, translating PDFs via an overlay, recording and transcription tools and equation-solving built into the Notes app. You also get the ability to reformat, translate or summarize text across the tablet's One UI interface.

And if that wasn't enough, Google Circle to Search is also available to help you learn about anything curious that appears on your travels.

Having a larger, split-screen canvas makes sense for many of these tools, even if they're no different in function from the version you'll get on a Galaxy S24 or Galaxy Z Fold 6.

Some abilities, like live translation or photo editing, still suit those smaller, more camera-focused devices. But in tablet terms, Samsung has a far more mature AI suite than the OnePlus Pad's OxygenOS or Apple's iPadOS, and makes up for any features it lacks compared to the Pixel Tablet by offering far superior hardware.

For me, the translation tools (which work without an internet connection if you've downloaded the languages needed already) plus the text formatting tools are well worth using.

Since I'm not much of an artist or photo editor, Sketch to Image doesn't have much to offer me beyond showing it to curious friends. And while I wish the audio transcription tools sounded amazing, these are still flummoxed by anyone reading at above-average pace with less-than-perfect enunciation.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus review: Verdict

While not Samsung's ultimate tablet, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus seems a more well-rounded choice in terms of price and portability compared to the Tab S10 Ultra. And that applies to the competition too, since it roughly splits the difference between the 11-inch and 13-inch size of Apple's comparable iPads, while being no more expensive, especially when you consider the stylus is bundled in for free.

Tablet users, be it for work or play, will appreciate the Tab S10 Plus' brilliant screen and its generous software updates. The bevy of productivity and creativity features between regular software and Galaxy AI also makes this tablet handy for all kinds of users.

However, the weak battery life and middling performance perhaps mean this isn't as capable a laptop replacement as an iPad would be, although that changes depending on what other devices you're using.

Samsung has once again staked a claim on a spot on our best Android tablets list with the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus. The OnePlus Pad remains a far better value device, and could win you over with its battery life alone, but Samsung is the way to go if you seek the best and most complete experience for your Android tablet.

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 FE appears to have taken another step closer to release after benchmarks appeared on the Geekbench website. The scores show a big step forward from the company’s previous mid-range tablet — the Galaxy Tab S9 FE — but performance still falls well short of the premium Galaxy Tab S10 range.

The listing for a device labelled SM-X520 appeared on the site yesterday and shows the tablet’s chip — rumored to be the Exynos 1580 — producing scores of 1,349 in single-core tests and 3,882 for the multi-core equivalents.

Turbo boost

That’s a significant boost on the Exynos 1380-powered Samsung Galaxy Tab S9 FE Plus. Our review measurement came on a different version of the benchmarking software and is therefore incomparable, but a listing for the Tab S9 FE on the Geekbench site using the same test gave it scores of 1,005 and 2,923. So we’re looking at a possible boost of 32-34%.

But it’s important to note that “Fan Edition” remains something of a misnomer, given it relates to lower-cost versions of popular Samsung brands, and thus performance isn’t really comparable to the non-FE versions. The same appears true here: the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus achieves scores of between 1,600 and 2,200 for single-core and 6,000 to 7,200 for multi-core performance.

But then the Tab S9 FE cost $450 when it arrived in October 2023, and with Samsung choosing to skip the regular 10.9-inch Tab S10 in favour of just Plus and Ultra models last year, prices start at an intimidating $999.

That could make the Galaxy Tab S10 FE an appealing alternative — especially as it’s rumored to reintroduce the regular-sized 10.9-inch model alongside an even bigger 13.1-inch Plus version. The smaller model is tipped to pack a 2,304 x 1,440 LCD screen, while the latter opts for 2,880 x 1,800. The extra screen space creates more space for a larger battery too: 10,090 mAh for the larger model against 8,000mAh for the smaller version.

Outlook

Renders based on leaks show a device that will look familiar to fans of Samsung’s tablets, with the S Pen tipped for inclusion once again. The screens are expected to get 200 nits brighter than the previous FE tablets, and buyers should be able to configure their purchases with either 8GB or 12GB RAM, and 128GB or 256GB of onboard storage.

The tablets have previously been tipped for a release “in the coming weeks” and this appearance on Geekbench seems to back that up. Given the Samsung Galaxy S25 Edge has been tipped for an April launch, it’s possible these cheap and cheerful tablets will be the support act.

The Honor Pad 9 was an Android tablet disguised as an iPad. MagicOS offers the same levels of “it just works” smoothness to the UI, but drawbacks in performance and the speakers stopped just short of pipping the lower-end iPad 10th Gen to the post — not to mention the huge app store.

Well, one year later, and the Honor Pad V9 takes its performance to a new level, the battery is way bigger, the speakers are better, and MagicOS just got a dose of AI. Packed into a new slim, sleek chassis with an improved display, I believe the Cupertino crew has just met its match. Put simply, it’s one of the best Android tablets you can buy.

That’s not to say it’s overcome all the obstacles to get to Apple. Android is still behind iPadOS in terms of app market, and the cameras remain unchanged from the potatoes you got on the Pad 9.

But in where it matters — getting stuff done, playing games and binge watching to your heart’s content — this is a stellar option. Alongside this, Kids Space managed to keep my nephew entertained for so long. Provided you get a durable case (he’s rather clumsy), this is also a shout for one of the best kids tablets you can snag.

Honor Pad 9: Cheat Sheet

• What is it? This is a mid-range Android tablet.
• Who’s it for? This tablet is ideal for binge watchers and families looking to entertain their kids on-the-go.
• What is the price? The price is yet to be confirmed, but based on leaks, we’re predicting a £299 price tag.
• How does this compare to an iPad? The closest competition is the 10th Gen iPad, and on pure hardware, Honor Pad V9 beats it comfortably with a gorgeous display, strong internals and impressive speakers — alongside a smooth UI that matches iPadOS.
• Anything I didn’t like? Android is still a bit of a desert when it comes to the full suite of iPad apps you can download, and the cameras are a bit naff.

Honor Pad V9: Specs

Honor Pad V9: The ups

With important gains made in key areas, there’s a lot to love about the Honor Pad V9 — all of which became obvious over my month with it.

Sleek and stylish

Yes, the display is technically smaller than the 12.1-inch panel you got in the Pad 9. But what you get for that mesmerizing-yet-smaller 11.5-inch screen (more on that later) is a smaller, slimmer and lighter design that feels unmistakably premium in the hand.

The aluminum shell feels great with a nice even weight distribution to not cause any obvious fatigue when holding in one hand, and the NIL Nano-topography process ensures a (mostly) fingerprint-free screen. It works by adding a textured surface that’s so fine it can only be seen through a microscope.

You won’t be able to feel it — the display glass feels nice and smooth to navigate around. But this industry-first process for tablet glass does make it surprisingly resistant to your typical finger smudges.

Now, one key thing that comes with making your devices even thinner is something that I’m sure will summon JerryRigEverything like Beetlejuice if I say it three times — does it bend?

The answer, fortunately, is no. With enough strength, you can see the tiniest milli-degree curve but it doesn’t stick around. The bend resistance here is strong enough to give you a resounding confidence in its durability.

Nice on the eyes

By default, if ever I have shows to binge watch on my train journeys down to London, I grab my MacBook Pro. But now, the Honor Pad V9 has officially taken over — thanks to its drop dead gorgeous 11.5-inch display.

Moving from the 16:10 of Pad 9 to a 3:2 aspect ratio makes this feel like a great slab to use in both portrait and landscape. And that 2800 x 1840-pixel resolution is super crispy for text and graphics — all running at a silky smooth 144Hz refresh rate.

I get it. You saw “IPS LCD” in the specs and probably had a moment of doubt. IPS panels aren’t exactly known for their eye-popping vibrancy, and given this tablet’s lower price, it’s fair to question its display quality. But those concerns vanish the moment you lay eyes on the screen.

Case in point: watching my partner’s latest obsession, Entergalactic, Kid Cudi’s stunningly animated love story. The resolution handles every intricate detail with precision, while the color and contrast deliver a dazzling rush of vibrancy that keeps every frame alive.

MagicOS gets a lot more AI fun

MagicOS 9.0 — built on Android 15 — grows on what we’ve seen so far from what I believe to be the smoothest tablet OS in the Android ecosystem with some extra AI smarts.

First off, the Magic Lock screen brings a ton of customized wallpapers and color tweaking to get just the right aesthetic for you. Second, the 3D Avatar may be a bit of a gimmick, but it’s definitely fun to see your AI-generated figurine and customize it to your liking.

And finally, on the more useful side of things, Honor Notes has been enriched with AI. Beyond searching, pinning and categorizing your notes, there’s math formula recognition, handwriting beautification (great for my chicken scratch writing), and even voice-to-text capabilities — even being able to translate and transcribe video meetings in real time.

These are great little additions, which underpin the fundamental smoothness and logical nature of navigation.

All the multi-finger gestures make multitasking effortless, swiping in from edges of the screen do exactly what you expect it to do in zipping around the OS, and the interconnection of different devices via Honor Connect screams “it just works” in a way that would make Apple sweat.

Better performance and battery life

The Honor Pad 9’s main thorn in the paw was the Snapdragon 6 Gen 1 chipset not offering much in the way of performance. Switching to MediaTek Dimensity 8350 Elite has helped with that somewhat.

Don’t get me wrong, you’re not getting pro tablet levels of performance, but you’re getting more than enough for all the casual uses of a cheaper tablet. Zipping between apps came with no slowdown and games run at respectable 60 FPS with decently sharp graphical fidelity.

Pair that with a chunky 10,100 mAh battery with a high energy density ensures a good, long runtime. I ran a test of online video streaming last year, and the Pad 9 hit 11 hours and 26 minutes. With Pad V9, you’re looking more at a massive 16:07. That’s an impressive gain that puts it safely into worry-free battery life territory.

Oh, and if the battery does drain, you can charge it back to full in just under 30 minutes.

Honor Pad 9: The downs

Honestly, the only real downside to the Honor Pad V9 now (outside of the whole Android tablet app selection issue) is a simple one.

Cameras are not good

I’ll start by saying the obvious — don’t use your tablet to take pictures. Your smartphone will almost always take far superior photos. But for those impromptu video calls or the rare moment when the Honor Pad 9 is your only option, the camera setup is serviceable, though far from impressive.

The 8MP front camera works well enough for the occasional WhatsApp chat, but expect noticeable noise in dimly lit areas. Around the back, the 13MP main sensor produces images with less grain, but at the cost of fine details and rich color accuracy, leaving shots looking somewhat flat and lacking sharpness.

Honor Pad V9: Verdict

The Honor Pad V9 takes mostly everything the company learnt from the previous Pad 9, and fixes it. It’s easily one of the best Android tablets I’ve used in recent memory, and a serious contender for the iPad’s crown.

Important improvements to performance and the display make this a top notch binge watching device with the battery life to boot, and the sharpened AI features provide a helping hand that doesn’t feel overbearing or gimmicky.

Put simply, if you’re in the market for an Android tablet, this should be on your list.

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S series has consistently been among the best Android tablets you can buy, but they don’t come cheap. With the standard 11-inch Galaxy Tab discontinued for this generation, the cheapest current entry is the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus, which starts at $999, rising to $1,199 if you fancy the massive 14.6-inch Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra.

Good news for those with tighter tablet budgets may be coming soon. According to the leaker Roland Quandt, Samsung is planning a follow-up to 2023’s Galaxy Tab S9 FE, when prices started at a far more reasonable $450.

According to Quandt, the Galaxy Tab S10 FE will once again be available in two form factors: regular and Plus sizes.

But while the former will keep the same 10.9-inch screen as its predecessor, the latter is set to grow to 13.1 inches — a 0.7-inch size increase on its Fan Edition predecessor and the regular Tab S10 Plus, both of which measured 12.4 inches.

While that’s still smaller than the 14.6 inches of the Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra, the extra screen real estate will certainly be welcome both for content creators and consumers.

Our Australian Managing Editor, Stephen Lambrechts will certainly be happy — last year, he discovered how much more pleasurable it is to sketch, read comics and watch movies on the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus over the smaller internal screens of the best foldable phones.

Apart from screen tech, Quandt reveals two more details about the upcoming tablets. They will apparently pack up to 12GB RAM and 256GB of storage, which suggests an upgrade for the non-Plus model at least. While the Tab S9 FE Plus could be bought in a 12GB/256GB configuration, the regular tablet started with just 6GB and RAM and maxed out at 8GB.

Of course, to make it a ‘FE’ device, savings have got to be found somewhere — especially with previous models coming with a bundled S Pen — and the most obvious place to do that is with the processor.

We’ve heard that the Tab S10 FE series will use the Exynos 1580 chipset, which should certainly offer weaker performance than the MediaTek Dimensity 9300 powering the regular Tab S10 series.

While Samsung hasn’t given any indication of when the Tab S10 FE range might arrive, one big hint is hidden on the company’s official website.

In the small print of an offer for a year’s worth of free Good Notes to tablet buyers, the text clearly says that the offer is “open to participants in the United States who purchase and activate a Tab S10 series, or Tab S10 FE series device by 7/31/2025.” Either that’s a cruel typo, or we can expect the cheaper tablets to arrive before summer is out.

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra ($1,199 to start) is the latest and greatest slate Samsung has released in 2024, not to mention the biggest.

But at this point that's no surprise, since Samsung has been releasing super-sized Ultra tablets since it debuted the Galaxy Tab S8 Ultra in 2022. This is the third iteration of Samsung's massive Ultra slate, and while the 14.6-inch AMOLED display remains the star of the show there's a new MediaTek Dimensity 9300+ chip under the hood providing a much-needed speed boost.

Unfortunately, that's basically the only notable upgrade in this 2024 Ultra, and while the speed is nice it can't compare to the power of Apple's latest iPad Pro M4. So while this isn't the best tablet released this year, it is one of the best Android tablets you can buy if you want a laptop replacement or just the most ginormous screen possible. 

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra review: Cheat sheet

• What is it? As the name suggest, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra is the biggest, most expensive tablet in Samsung's Galaxy Tab S10 family of slates.
• What does it cost? $1,199 to start via Samsung's website, though the price rises if you upgrade the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra and falls if you take advantage of Samsung's trade-in deals.
• Who is it for? Anyone who wants a top-of-the-line $1,200+ Android tablet with a nearly 15-inch AMOLED screen. It's well-suited for watching movies and using as a laptop replacement.
• What do we like? The big, lovely AMOLED display, the speedy performance that can run any app in the Google Play Store and the packed-in stylus.
• What don’t we like? The size of this tablet makes it a bit unwieldy to use, even with both hands.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra review: Specs

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra review: The ups

I like the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra because it feels like a big, premium Android tablet with an eye-catching AMOLED display. Here are a few specific things I love about this slate.

Big AMOLED display makes everything look great

I love a good OLED screen, so the 14.6-inch AMOLED display on the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra is one of the things I adore most about it. I'm happy Samsung has put such a good screen on this slate because it's huge and 99% display, so you'll spend all your time looking at what you spent your money on.

I know because I spent hours playing games and streaming movies on this slate, and the colors really pop with lots of nice contrasts between lights and darks. 

While I sometimes grew frustrated with the way fingerprints show up on the screen quite easily, it's easy to wipe them off with a cleaning cloth whenever they begin to irritate you.

When we brought our Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra review unit into our testing lab and pointed our instruments at it, we discovered this slate is capable getting decently bright, peaking at roughly 775 nits when viewing HDR content.

It's also capable of good color reproduction, and proved better at covering the more demanding DCI-P3 color gamut than either Apple's new iPad Pro M4 or the OnePlus Pad 2.

However, Apple's iPad Pro M4 with its Tandem OLED display is capable of getting far brighter than the Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra. So if a bright screen is the most important thing to look for in a tablet, the Ultra is fine but Apple's Pro slate can get far brighter for nearly the same price.

Under-the-hood upgrade helps this slate feel speedy

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra runs on a MediaTek Dimensity 9300+ SoC, which is a bit of an upgrade from the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 which powered its predecessor. 

It's plenty fast enough to run most any app you can pull from the Google Play Store at good to great framerates, and I had a good time playing games, watching movies and multitasking between apps on the S10 Ultra without noticing any major lag or slowdown.

I really like how snappy and fast the Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra feels, and I do think it's one of the high points of splurging on this expensive slate. However, when we got the S10 Ultra into our testing lab and ran in through some benchmarking utilities we saw that while it performs well, it can't keep pace with Apple's top-tier iPad Pro M4.

We run all tablets we test through a gauntlet of tests, and the chart of results above shows you a rundown of how the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra scored versus the iPad Pro M4 and OnePlus Pad 2. These benchmarks assign scores to a tablet based on how well it performs: we use Geekbench 6 to test a tablet's CPU capabilities, and 3DMark to test its graphical output.

As you can see, the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra is neck-and-neck with the One Plus Pad 2 when it comes to single-core and multi-core CPU performance, though the OnePlus Pad 2 falls into last place when it comes to graphical performance.

But in every test, Apple's iPad Pro M4 blows both Android tablets out of the water. The M4 chip is simply faster and better, so if pure performance is all you care about the S10 Ultra is clearly not the best tablet for you.

Packed-in stylus is a welcome touch

Maybe it seems like a minor detail when you're looking at spending over $1,000 on a new tablet, but I love that Samsung includes a stylus for free with every Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra.

Apple doesn't give you the same courtesy, and I think that's a real failing because getting a tablet with a stylus included gives you permission to immediately start using it as a content creation device. Sure, you can use your fingers to draw or paint on a tablet, but I find it feels inaccurate and no fun at all. 

But with the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra, you can immediately start taking notes, annotating papers and doodling notes in the margins. The stylus also snaps magnetically to the tablet, either on the edge or on the rear, making it pretty easy to keep track of when you're moving around. 

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra review: The downs

While I love the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra for its sheer size and audacity, there are some downsides you should know about before you buy.

This is an awkward tablet for all but the biggest hands

I'm 6'4" tall with big hands, and even I find the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra a little frustrating to use as a tablet because of its sheer size.

Don't get me wrong, it's amazing that you can hold this 14.6-inch AMOLED tablet in your hands and carry it around like a portable screen that opens up onto the Internet. The screen size takes some getting used to, but once you do you'll find yourself squinting at all your other mobile devices. 

But even I basically have to use this thing propped up on a pillow, a couch arm or something else to help me manage the weight. Sure, 1.58 pounds doesn't sound like much, but it's really the awkward size of the tablet that makes it feel so burdensome. you can hold it with both hands for a few minutes, but trying to hang onto it while watching an episode of your favorite show or playing your favorite games can be a real pain. 

Unfortunately, the only good permanent solution to this problem is to buy a nice case that comes with a built-in kickstand or something else you can use to prop the tablet up when you're tired of holding it. 

Costs the same/more as iPad Pro M4, performs worse

As much as I like the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra, I have to say that it's really hard to recommend over the iPad Pro M4 if you're open to using Apple's tablets.

That was less true in years past, when Samsung's Ultra tablets sported AMOLED displays while Apple's iPads all had LCD screens. When that was true you could buy a Samsung tablet and feel like even if you weren't getting iPad speeds or apps, you were getting a nicer display that made everything look better than it would on an iPad.

But now the iPad Pro M4 comes with a Tandem OLED display that gets brighter and more colorful than the Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra, so Samsung's slates have lost their OLED advantage. On top of that, the M4 chip drives the latest iPad Pro to greater heights of performance and better battery life than the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra (the Pro M4 lasted 13:13 in our testing, while the S10 Ultra lasted just 9:22), and there's no reason not to choose an iPad Pro M4 if you're not tied to Google's app ecosystem.

Factor in the fact that the entry-level 11-inch iPad Pro M4 starts at $999, while the 13-inch model starts just over the S10 Ultra at $1,299, and you can see why I think it sucks that the S10 Ultra can't match the performance or power efficiency of the M4 chip.

Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra review: Verdict

If you've made it this far you know the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra is the latest edition of the biggest Android tablet you can buy from Samsung right now, and it looks great and feels snappy.

It's marketed as a laptop replacement, and I've used it that way myself while working in both standard mode and DeX mode. Both are doable, and in the wake of Android 14 landing I think there's never been a better time to own an Android tablet. If you need one with a massive screen, either for enjoying movies like a king or getting work done on the road, this is a great choice.

But like I said, Apple's M4 chip is just plain better than what the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra is packing under the hood. So while the S10 Ultra is easily among the best Samsung tablets you can buy right now, those open to Apple's ways might be happier spending that money on an iPad Pro M4.

A recent APK has given us our first look at how the Android Motion Cue feature will look before its possible release.

Using a phone in the car always comes with the threat of motion sickness, it's just a part of traveling. However, phone manufacturers have been working on ways to minimize, if not completely resolve, this problem. Apple introduced Vehicle Motion Cues in iOS 18, and Google was spotted working on a similar feature. Now it seems we have our first look at exactly what this will look like when it finally releases.

The feature was found in the APK performed by Android Authority, who were able to get a demo to function on one of their devices and released the above video showing off how the feature looks. According to the video, when the feature is activated, dots appear on the screen that mimic the direction of your vehicle's movement. This movement aims to help lessen the sensory conflict between your eyes and the motion felt by your inner ear, thus reducing motion sickness.

Unfortunately, the feature is not currently available within Play Services, and there's no mention of when it might be released. However, considering the state of completion that we can see in the video, which was taken in the current Google Play Services v24.29.32 beta, it likely isn't far off. It's also worth noting that Google will want the feature available as soon as possible to help compete with Apple's release.

This isn't the only big change coming for Android phones, as Android 16 is currently in the works and could be released shockingly soon. Meanwhile, Samsung users are preparing for the next Galaxy Unpacked in January, which will see the release of the Galaxy S25 and, according to leaks, the official unveiling of One UI 7. Finally, it seems that Google is working to improve the user experience on Google Maps with one major upgrade to make traveling much easier.

As with any APK, there's no guarantee that these features will arrive, and there are other ways to avoid getting motion sickness. The main thing is to take breaks from looking at the screen while traveling. However, this feature would make life just a little easier when using some of the best Android phones while on the move.

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Traveling could soon be a little less stressful as the Google Wallet app can now store a digital version of US passports.

Google has slowly been improving the Google Wallet app by allowing it to store several different forms of ID for ease of use. The idea is to store everything you usually carry in your wallet on your phone. However, many were waiting to see when the confirmed rumor about the wallet being able to store passports would happen. According to a report from The Verge, it seems that Google is starting to roll out the feature.

According to the article, Google Wallet users can now add a digital version of their US passports to the app. This is accomplished by selecting the prompt to create an ID pass in the app, following the instructions to scan the security chip in the back of the passport, and taking a selfie to confirm your identity. However, Google stated in their September blog post that Google Wallet is not a replacement for a physical ID, so you should still carry a physical passport for now.

The digital ID feature will reportedly be available to all eligible users in the coming weeks, according to Jenny Chang, the VP and GM of Google Wallet. The TSA's website shows a map of all the airports that accept a digital ID. Cheng also revealed that Google Wallet can now save New Mexico driver's licenses and IDs, making it the sixth state to support the feature, according to 9to5 Google.

Google has slowly been improving the wallet feature over the last few months. For instance, the "Everything Else" feature showed off at Google's I/O event in May has started to roll out to users. This feature allows users to scan any pass, such as a concert ticket, insurance card, or library card, to create a digital version. Not only that, Google Wallet now allows kids to make contactless payments from their phones while using a Family Link-managed account.

Google is constantly looking to make its app more central to users' lives, and this is a great step in that direction. While there's no word on whether this will go global just yet, we can only hope it does.

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Tablets are weird, aren't they? I'm not talking about products like the Microsoft Surface Pro 10, which has a tablet form but is actually a 2-in-1 laptop that runs Windows 11 — I'm talking about traditional slate tablets, which felt futuristic and cool with the arrival of the original iPad in 2010, but now sit in an awkward place between your ultra-powerful smartphone and a proper laptop.

Many tablets today still function like an oversized smartphone, giving users a larger screen to run creativity and productivity-focused apps, along with stylus support on selected devices. And while some of the best tablets can offer laptop-like functionality with the right peripherals and a few workarounds, the experience is not quite enough to replace Windows or macOS entirely.

That said, there's no denying that tablets geared towards professionals do serve a purpose, particularly for digital art creators. It's the tablets intended for casual use which are starting to feel like a harder sell these days.

Of course, it's really the arrival of foldable smartphones like the Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold and Samsung Galaxy Z Fold 6 which is the biggest threat to standalone tablets. When a phone that fits in your pocket can unfold into a mini tablet, carrying around an additional big screen device no longer seems necessary.

Despite this opinion, I will admit to being sucked into the excitement surrounding Samsung's new Galaxy Tab S10 range. Compared to my most recent tablet, the Galaxy Tab S6 (2019), Samsung's newest slates are like the monoliths from Stanley Kubrick's "2001: A Space Odyssey", signalling an evolutionary shift in terms of design and display quality. Now excuse me while I launch my old tablet towards the sky.

As someone who uses the aforementioned Pixel 9 Pro Fold as my daily driver, I will readily admit that it isn't quite the tablet replacement I'd initially hoped for. There's no denying how great its square unfolded display is for photo editing, internet browsing and social media, but its aspect ratio is far from ideal for watching movies or reading comics, which are my two most important reasons to own a tablet.

With that in mind, the first thing I did after getting my hands on Samsung's new Tab S10 Plus is load up some comics and grab some movies and TV shows from Netflix for offline viewing.

The first part wasn't as straightforward as I'd expected — it's been a hot minute since I used a tablet to read comics, and I was surprised to find that all of my usual comic reader apps had seemingly vanished from the Google Play store.

After attempting to read my ComiXology library in the Kindle app and finding it a rather frustrating experience, I eventually settled on GlobalComix for new comic finds and CDisplayEx for my backed up collection of CBR/CBZ files.

To say that reading comics on a full-size tablet is better than doing so on my Pixel 9 Pro Fold would be the understatement of the millennium. At 12.4 inches, the screen on Samsung's Galaxy Tab S10 Plus is large enough to display standard-size comic book pages without having to scale them down at all.

On top of this, the tablet's 1752 x 2800 resolution Dynamic AMOLED display is so sharp and vibrant, with perfect black levels and stunning brightness, that the experience of reading comics on it is arguably better than flipping through a physical copy.

And, while you may think that the 120Hz high refresh rate on the Tab S10 Plus isn't terribly important for reading static comic pages, it does make page transitions incredibly smooth.

As for watching TV shows and movies, you probably won't be surprised to hear that the Tab S10 Plus offers an immensely superior viewing experience over any foldable handset on the market. For starters, its display has a 16:10 aspect ratio, allowing widescreen content to be viewed in all its glory with minimal letterboxing above and below the content.

By comparison, my Pixel 9 Pro Fold's 6:5 inner display offers an image that's barely larger than a standard smartphone for most modern shows and movies, resulting in huge black bars of wasted space.

Now, those who like to watch something in the background while checking emails or browsing the web will undoubtedly appreciate the more square aspect ratio on devices like the Galaxy Z Fold 6 and Pixel 9 Pro Fold, but that doesn't describe me — I like to give my undivided attention to whatever I'm watching.

To that end, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus I've been testing feels like a mini cinema that I can carry around in my work bag, and I'm here for it. While I personally haven't travelled since the before times (2019), this tablet makes me wish I had a long flight ahead so I can lose myself in the majesty of its display while watching back-to-back "Lord of the Rings" films.

Sure, there are other things you can do on the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus which makes it worthwhile — especially if you're a creative type. I've found that sketching in the Notes app and using the AI-powered Sketch to Image feature to transform quick doodles into instant works of art simply never gets old.

In particular, the many ways Galaxy AI tries to interpret my Homer Simpson sketches is always hilarious, and I do enjoy Samsung's Notepaper Screen cover, which has a matte finish and is supposed to make it feel like you're drawing on paper. The effect isn't quite as convincing as a Kindle Scribe (2024) or ReMarkable Paper Pro ereader, but as a magnetic snap-on option that doubles as screen protection, it's quite impressive.

And while using the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus as a laptop replacement would never be one of my primary reasons for owning a tablet, I do believe that its built-in Samsung DeX functionality, which gives users an instant desktop-like interface when Samsung's Book Cover Keyboard is connected, is incredibly handy.

However, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus comes equipped with the new DeX interface by default, and I must admit I'm not a fan. It's closer in appearance to the normal tablet UI, with apps spread out in a grid and a taskbar at the bottom for recently used apps, making it feel less like a Windows-style desktop than the old version. Thankfully, you can switch back to the Classic DeX layout in the device's settings.

Taking all of these things into account, Samsung's Galaxy Tab S10 Plus has convinced me that there's still a place for tablets in our post-foldable world, and is destined to be one of the best tablets of 2024.

Its large display is better-suited to watching movies, reading comics, sketching and browsing than any foldable handset I've tested, and while carrying around an additional device does come at the cost of convenience, I think that trade-off is still worth it.

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OnePlus might be working on a shiny new tablet, but the rumored device may turn out to be not nearly as expensive as the OnePlus Pad 2, its current high-end model. But that would likely mean lower specs on this potential new tablet compared to the OnePlus Pad 2, which we rate as the best tablet for Android users currently.

The report on OnePlus' tablet plans comes from a well-regarded leaker named Digital Chat Station on Weibo. The leaker described the new device as a "OnePlus Tablet Standard Edition," which probably won't be its final name, as we'd assume OnePlus would want to stick with the Pad branding it uses globally.

Regarding what the tablet will have for specs, GSMArena reports that it'll have an 11.6-inch display with a 2.8K resolution and 144Hz refresh rate. Compared with the OnePlus Pad 2's 12.1-inch screen, that would make the new tablet a bit smaller overall, even if there is still plenty of screen space to get stuff done.

The reports also say the affordable tablet will come with a MediaTek Dimensity 8350 SoC, a budget-friendly chip made on a 4nm process node. The chip offers 3.35GHz Cortex-A715 prime cores and four Cortex-A510 cores. This is where the alleged affordable tablet will see a significant downgrade, as the OnePlus Pad 2 features the beastly Snapdragon 8 Gen 3.

OnePlus isn't known for skimping on batteries, and its rumored midrange tablet would follow that trend. The reports say it'll get a large 9,520mAh battery with 67W fast charging, the same found on the more expensive slate.

Looking at the rumored specs and the fact that Oppo and OnePlus are owned by BBK group leads us to conclude that the new OnePlus model will be a rebranded Oppo Pad 3.

More likely than not, this tablet will replace the original OnePlus Pad, which is still available. However, it's also possible that OnePlus will target a price that's even lower than $300 and keep the original OnePlus Pad as an option. Either way, if an affordable tablet from OnePlus is anywhere near as good as its flagship, I'm here for it and can't wait to see what the company pulls off.

Perhaps we'll learn more during the global launch of the OnePlus 13 next month, but seeing as that's right around the corner, it could be a little longer.

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The current battle of the Android titans is between the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra and the Google Pixel 9 Pro XL. Both are fantastic flagship phones, but if you're shopping for phones, you can only pick one.

Samsung's Galaxy S25 Ultra is the newer, and more expensive. But the extra money nets you some of the best hardware you can buy on a phone today, backed up with Samsung's newly-refreshed software and Galaxy AI features. The Pixel 9 Pro XL is older, but it could still be the perfect phone for you with its bright display, strong cameras and a cheaper price.

This comparison of the Galaxy S25 Ultra and Pixel 9 Pro XL will take you through all of these features bit by bit. After thorough testing of both phones, we'll give you a fair rundown of both devices' capabilities, so you can make the right choice.

Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra vs. Pixel 9 Pro XL: Specs

Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra vs Google Pixel 9 Pro XL: Price and availability

Samsung started selling the Galaxy S25 Ultra in February 2025, with the basic 256GB version costing $1,299. The Google Pixel 9 Pro XL is older, having launched in August 2024. It starts at $1,099, $200 less than the S25 Ultra, but you also get half the default storage: 128GB.

The Pixel 9 Pro is obviously the more affordable of these two phones. Even if you pay extra for 256GB storage, it's still $100 less than the Galaxy S25 Ultra. But Samsung's phone comes with a lot of hardware that the Pixel can't match up to, so hold on before making a final judgment of value.

Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra vs Google Pixel 9 Pro XL: Design and display

The Galaxy S25 Ultra and Pixel 9 Pro XL both share some similar looks, with their flat sides and rounded corners, and large displays with centred punch-hole selfie cameras on the front.

But around the back Samsung goes for separate rings for its camera blocks, while Google has all its sensors packed into a single horizontal camera bar. Google also differs by giving the Pixel 9 Pro XL an aluminum frame with a glossy finish, rather than the matte-textured titanium you'll find around the sides of the Galaxy S25 Ultra.

Display-wise, the Galaxy S25 Ultra features a slightly larger 6.9-inch OLED display, with the Pixel 9 Pro XL offering a still large 6.8-inch panel. Both have 1 - 120Hz refresh rates, but the Galaxy S25 Ultra benefits from a slightly higher pixel count.

In our testing, the Galaxy S25 Ultra's display wasn't as bright as the Pixel 9 Pro XL's, but it offers better color gamut coverage, and identical color accuracy according to our figures.

Also, while not part of these tests, the Galaxy S25 Ultra does have a unique advantage in outdoor use with its anti-glare display layer, which makes it much easier to read in bright light despite its lower brightness. The Google phone doesn't have an equivalent.

Samsung offers a surprisingly wide number of color options for the Galaxy S25 Ultra. Most retailers or carriers will sell you the S25 Ultra in Titanium Black, Titanium Gray, Titanium Silverblue or Titanium Whitesilver, but buying the phone from Samsung itself also unlocks Titanium Jadegreen, Titanium Jetblack, and Titanium Pinkgold as options.

Google has four colors for the Pixel 9 Pro XL: Obsidian, Porcelain, Hazel and Rose Quartz. That's half of Samsung's offering but still likely enough variety for most people.

A quick word on durability. Both of these phones are rated IP68 for dust/water resistance, but Samsung uses a newer Gorilla Armor 2 glass material for its display and back panel. On the Pixel, Google uses Gorilla Glass Victus 2, which is still tough but a couple of years older than the Armor 2 glass.

Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra vs Google Pixel 9 Pro XL: Cameras

Samsung and Google are alike in focusing these flagship phones on their photography capabilities. But out of the gate, the Galaxy S25 Ultra is superior. Its loadout of 200MP main, 50MP ultrawide, 10MP 3x, 50MP 5x and 12MP selfie cameras beats the Pixel's 50MP main, 48MP ultrawide, 48MP 5x telephoto and 42MP selfie array on camera quantity, resolution and zoom range. But let's look at some real-life comparisons to see how these specs impact actual performance.

We'll see in a lot of these photos that the Galaxy S25 Ultra generally takes brighter photos, and that's on full display with this shot of a snack kiosk. But then we see greater balance between light and shadow in the Pixel's shot, which makes it hard to pick a favorite. Brighter shots are often livelier sots, but it can draw your eye around the photo in odd ways, rather than just letting you enjoy the whole scene

Another downside of brightness is that it can drain a scene of color, which is something visible in this ultrawide photo of a Citibike docking station. The Google Pixel 9 Pro XL, as well as showing a little more in shot thanks to its wider lens, has richer colors compared to the Galaxy S25 Ultra's photo.

Stepping away from the kiosk from earlier with these 5x telephoto photos, we have the tightest competition between the two phones of any of these cameras. The Galaxy S25 Ultra's image isn't as noticeably bright as other shots we've seen from it, but it is still cooler than what we get from the Pixel 9 Pro XL. The increased sharpness of the S25 Ultra does give it a slight edge though.

In this last comparison, the Galaxy photo is the brighter one again, but the Pixel's color reproduction is closer to reality, which is normally a priority when you've got yourself or another person (in this case, my colleague John) as your subject.

If you want a more in-depth comparison, you can see more images in our Galaxy S25 Ultra vs. Pixel 9 Pro XL 200 photo shootout.

Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra vs Google Pixel 9 Pro XL: Performance

Samsung managed to snag a customized Snapdragon 8 Elite "for Galaxy" to use in the Galaxy S25 series, meaning that the Galaxy S25 Ultra is way more powerful than the Pixel's Tensor G4, as we can see in our benchmark results.

It's important to note that the Pixel 9 Pro XL isn't incapable of doing intensive tasks or running premium mobile games, it's just a little slower or less sharp. The big difference in benchmark scores doesn't translate 1:1.

You get 12GB RAM inside the Galaxy S25 Ultra, but the Pixel 9 Pro XL has 16GB for better multitasking and AI processing. But things are reversed when we look at storage capacities.

The Galaxy S25 Ultra starts at 256GB storage, with 512GB and 1TB editions also offered for $1,419 and $1,659 respectively. The Pixel 9 Pro XL offers 128GB by default, with it costing $1,199 to get 256GB and $1,319 for 512GB, with the storage options topping out at 1TB again, for $1,549.

Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra vs Google Pixel 9 Pro XL: Battery and charging

Our two competitors' battery capacities are very similar, with the Galaxy S25 Ultra carrying a 5,000 mAh battery against the Pixel 9 Pro XL's 5,060 mAh. But the battery life those cells offer vary drastically.

The Galaxy S25 Ultra managed to last 17 hours and 14 minutes on our battery test, putting in eight place overall on our best phone battery life guide. The 12:54 result that the Pixel managed is sub-par for a phone of its size, falling over three hours short of the 16-hour battery life hurdle that phones have to clear to get on the guide.

Samsung wins on charging as well. Its 45W wired standard fills the phone to 71% after half an hour, while the Pixel 9 Pro XL's 37W wired option gets it to 63% in the same time.

We should also note that the Galaxy S25 Ultra has 15W wireless Qi2 charging support, but no magnets in the phone to use compatible magnetic pads. The Pixel 9 Pro XL also supports 15W charging, but only with Google's own charging stand. Otherwise, you get 12W from a generic wireless charger.

Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra vs Google Pixel 9 Pro XL: Software and special features

Our two candidates both have a heavy focus on AI features. For the Galaxy S25 Ultra, that includes cross-app actions with Gemini for both Google and Samsung apps, plus a few lucky third-party ones like Spotify, plus the Now Brief and Now Bar for convenient notifications and summarisation of your day's activities.

In the Pixel's case, you get the Add Me feature to include yourself in photos that you already took, the Reimagine tool and Pixel Studio to generate edits or full new images with AI, and the Pixel Screenshots app that collects and indexes all your screencaps to help you search through everything when you need it later.

The Galaxy S25 Ultra also comes with the S Pen included. There's no Bluetooth this time, so you don't get the same remote control-style gestures as previous Galaxy Ultras, but it is still an effective way of drawing or handwriting, and something the Pixel has no answer to.

You get seven years of full updates with both phones, although due to the gap between these two phones' release dates that likely means the Galaxy S25 Ultra will stop getting updates a year after the Pixel 9 Pro XL. Either way, there's currently no better offer for extended support in the smartphone market.

Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra vs Google Pixel 9 Pro XL: Verdict

The Google Pixel 9 Pro XL offers a lot, but the Samsung Galaxy S25 Ultra offers even more. The S25 Ultra's extra camera and enhanced quality, better battery life and performance help it come out ahead in this comparison, but the Pixel 9 Pro XL comes close to all of that, and costs less while doing so, which could make it a better purchase for a lot of users.

If you want to look at other Android flagship options, or want to see how these phones fare against other rivals, our best Android phones guide has even more top picks for various budgets that you can check out.

Google's Pixel tablets are either mostly dead or maybe continuing. Toward the end of November, two different reports came out claiming that Google had cancelled the Pixel Tablet 2 or axed the Pixel Tablet 3.

As of this writing, there is no Pixel Tablet 2.

Either way, it seems that Google may abandon its tablet plans with either the Pixel Tablet 2 or Tablet 3 being the last Google tablet.

Now Android Authority reportedly has the specs for what would have been the Pixel Tablet 2. At a glance, it seems like a modest but welcome series of improvements including expanded connectivity.

The sequel tablet was supposedly going to feature a tablet-version of the Tensor G4 processor, that last one built in partnership with Samsung. Next year's Pixel 10 is supposed to feature an in-house designed Tensor G5 manufactured with TSMC.

It would have been a big upgrade over the Tensor G2 with faster processing and battery efficiency.

Google apparently was going to create a cellular variant featuring a 5G Exynos Modem 5400, the same as in the Pixel 9 phone lineup. A non-cellular Wi-Fi only version would have also been available.

On the connectivity front, the Pixel Tablet 2 was going to come with Thread, a network protocol for Internet of Things devices. This indicates stronger support for a smart display and smart home controller.

Outside of that, the LCD panel looks to be the same size but would have an upgraded 120Hz refresh rate and be slightly brighter. Similarly, the front and rear cameras would get slight upgrades to 10MP lenses with autofocus on the rear camera.

The original Pixel Tablet was fine as a tablet but not as a laptop replacement. The sequel was allegedly going to have DisplayPort support up to 4K.

According to Android Authority, Google was also planning accessories like a detachable keyboard and stylus, something very much lacking from the original.

Overall, most of the updates are nice-to-haves and would have made for a pretty decent tablet. Though, reportedly, Google is worried that the tablet wouldn't sell.

For now, either the Pixel Tablet 2 and the Pixel Tablet 3 are both cancelled, or one of of them is and the other will come out at some point.

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A recent report has indicated that Google could be canceling the Pixel Tablet 3 and any future tablets.

Google's Pixel tablet range has had a bit of a turbulent history, with Google announcing it was stopping production of tablets back in 2019. However, it then teased the Pixel Tablet in 2022, which was then released in 2023. Sadly, it seems history is repeating itself, as a new report has indicated that Google is stepping out of the tablet market.

This news comes from a recent exclusive by Android Headlines regarding the future of Google's tablet. The report cites multiple industry sources close to the project who confirm Google is not going forward with the Pixel Tablet 3.

Supposedly, Google made this decision last week, with the personnel previously assigned to the Pixel Tablet 3 being redirected to other initiatives in the company.

This change would mean a major shift in Google's hardware roadmap, although it's reported that Android will still work on tablet software. In truth, the decision makes a certain amount of sense. There is currently a push in the foldable market, and the Google Pixel 9 Pro Fold was one of the best foldable phones recently released. I would expect this would be an area Google will focus on, especially as Apple has yet to join the foldable market.

This news would also mean that the Google Pixel Tablet 2 will be the last of the brand. While the rumors regarding the next tablet have been pretty minimal, there were indications that it will be visually similar to the past tablet, but with the addition of a possible keyboard cover. While it won't be as impressive as the proposed changes for the Pixel Tablet 3, which aimed to be a laptop replacement, we expect it will still be as serviceable as the original Pixel Tablet.

Google canceling a hardware project is surprising, but the circulation of the information seems to point out that this is set in stone. However, we will have to wait for the next Google I/O to see what this means for the company. In the meantime, check out our list of the best tablets to see which might be worth grabbing this Black Friday.

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With the Pixel Tablet 3 tipped to emerge in 2027 with designs on being a possible laptop replacement, Google only has a smallish window to get the second generation slate out the door. Rumors of what to expect from a Pixel Tablet 2 have been pretty light, but a Google insider talking to Android Authority has given us a few pointers of what to expect when the device hits store shelves.

When it first came out back in 2023, one of the few criticisms we had in our four-star Pixel Tablet review was the lack of official productivity accessories, and that could reportedly be one of the things addressed with its successor. 

The source claims that the company is currently prototyping a keyboard cover which attaches to the tablet via pogo pins on the rear of the device while folding to prop the tablet up on a table like a laptop. This sounds a lot like other keyboard case accessories, such as the OnePlus Pad 2’s implementation pictured below.

You may remember that around the original tablet’s release that there was a suggestion Google was working on both official stylus and keyboard accessories for the device, but these never emerged. When quizzed on their absence by Android Authority, the source claimed that they were ultimately scrapped over quality concerns — hopefully the same thing won’t happen for this prototype keyboard case. 

From a software perspective, Android is certainly in a better place to support serious productivity now. The site notes that in the 16 months since the Pixel Tablet was released, a long list of upgrades have been implemented — from desktop windowing support to a revamped keyboard shortcut menu. Given the sequel’s release date is still up in the air, it’s possible plenty more quality-of-life improvements could yet arrive before it goes on sale, too.

Google Pixel Tablet 2 biggest rumors 

While the source says that the basic design of the Pixel Tablet 2 won’t be all that different from the first one, barring the possible relocation of the camera and some buttons, there are a couple of likely upgrades on the inside pencilled in.

The first is an improvement to the tablet’s camera. No details were provided, but we can expect an advance on the quality of photos and/or video taken by the 8MP, f/2.0 1/4-inch sensors found on the original — not a priority with a tablet, but nice to have. 

More importantly, from a general performance perspective, we’ll also see the age=ing Tensor G2 processor replaced by something newer. Though it’s not clear how much newer just yet..

The recently released Google Pixel 9 included the Tensor G4 chip, but it’s possible that the tablet will get the upcoming G5 depending on when it goes into production. Early reports suggest 2027’s Pixel Tablet 3 will have a cheaper version of the Tensor G6, though, so perhaps Google will opt for the G4 to ensure the difference between generations will be as pronounced as possible. 

Having been a no-show at the recent Made by Google Fall event, there’s no firm release date for the Pixel Tablet 2. In the past, a May release to coincide with Google I/O would seem likely, but with the Pixel 9a reportedly due as soon as March, it may be in early adopters’ hands sooner than you think.

You ever dream about ditching your laptop and working entirely from a phone or tablet?

I've been fantasizing about realizing that dream for my entire career. As a working journalist I've been lugging a laptop, phone, audio recorder and notebook around in my bag for well over a decade, and as soon as smartphones and tablets became commonplace I started wondering how I was going to downsize my daily carry.

I've tried relying on one of the best phones or tablets in the past, but I've always felt handicapped by the limited screen real estate, clunky interface and limited ability to do things like move files around.

But right now I'm in the middle of reviewing the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra, which is the biggest Android tablet we've ever tested. We named the Tab S9 Ultra one of the best Android tablets to buy when you want to replace your laptop, so I figured this was the perfect opportunity to see how true that is of its successor and road-test this 14.6-inch tablet as a daily driver to boot.

After ditching my laptop for the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra and relying entirely on the tablet for work and play over a few days, I've learned that Android tablets have come a long way in the last decade.

While I still don't think you can ditch your laptop completely without losing out on some key capabilities, for a lot of us it's now completely feasible to work from a tablet. Over the last few days I've had little trouble researching and writing stories, keeping in touch with coworkers and staying on top of my email during the workday. And when my work is done I can slide the tablet into my bag faster and easier than I can close up my laptop, and it's a lot easier to carry since it barley weighs more than a pound.

That said, there are some things you should know before joining me on this this journey. Here's what I've learned from ditching my laptop in favor of a Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra.

A big screen makes a big difference

One of the first things I learned is that screen size is a game-changer for productivity.

Maybe that seems obvious, but honestly I didn't think the ginormous 14.6-inch WQXGA+ AMOLED display on the Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra would make that big of a difference. In fact, when I started out I was afraid it would make the slate too hefty and unwieldy to easily carry throughout the day.

And to some extent, that's true: this tablet is massive, and since I don't have a carrying case or bag designed for it I had to make do with cramming it into a laptop sleeve. But it's light enough that the unwieldy size didn't really bog me down when walking around.

And when I sat down to work, having this big canvas to work on helped me be more productive than I've ever been when getting work done on my phone, or smaller tablets.

It's especially useful when you get the hang of using Android and can quickly flip between tasks using the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra's Recent Apps view, or bring two apps side-by-side in split-screen to, say, work on something while keeping tabs on your work Slack.

So while the massive display on the Tab S10 Ultra is a bit unwieldy (especially if you have small hands) I think it's ultimately a great value, as it not only helps you enjoy watching movies and playing games on the tablet but makes it easier to get work done as well.

Accessorizing is key

Turns out, the question of how much you can get done on a tablet and how comfortable you feel doing it has a lot to do with what accessories you use.

Specifically, you definitely want a good Bluetooth keyboard if you're going to be doing a lot of typing on your tablet. On-screen keyboards are a lot better than they used to be, but you don't want to be writing out a paper, a script or even a particularly detailed email on one.

I don't happen to have the Book Cover Keyboard Samsung sells for the Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra, so I had to scrounge around my apartment to find a decent keyboard. What I came up with was an old, cheap foldable Bluetooth keyboard I'd bought off Amazon ages ago, thinking I might one day carry it in my pocket and work entirely from my phone.

That dream didn't work out, but the keyboard ended up working just fine with the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra. And while the ergonomics of using this cheap, flimsy keyboard aren't great, I think it still beats typing or writing on the tablet.

Speaking of ergonomics, if you want to work on a tablet often you'll want some sort of stand to prop it up on a desk. Most keyboard covers for tablets have a built-in stand, but if you're not buying a keyboard cover you'll want something better than a book to prop up your slate.

I ended up using a cheap $40 laptop stand and it worked just fine, though it held the tablet a little low for comfort.

What I learned from this is that accessories matter, and you may not want to just grab whatever the manufacturer sells for your tablet of choice. Samsung sells the $350 Book Cover Keyboard for the Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra, but I think that's a bit much to pay for such a thin, flimsy keyboard.

While it's great that such keyboards are built into the tablet cover, I think if you really want to be productive and comfortable when working on a tablet you should invest in the best wireless keyboard you can afford that works with your device, then find a stand that holds it so you can look at it comfortably without craning your neck down—that way lies serious back pain.

Just about every slate on the market supports Bluetooth, so if you can get a Bluetooth keyboard that feels comfortable to type on (and that you don't mind throwing in your bag if you have to) I think you'll have a much better time working on your tablet.

DeX mode is a game-changer

After using the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra as my daily driver, I've gained a new appreciation for Samsung's DeX mode.

If you're not familiar, DeX mode has been available on Samsung devices for years and effectively aims to replicate a Windows desktop environment by, among other things, creating a "taskbar" of icons and moving the app drawer to the lower-left corner in a facsimile of the Start button.

The real game-changer for productivity is being able to have multiple apps open in windows on the tablet screen at once in DeX mode, which basically means you can use it like a laptop. It might seem like a minor feature, but on a big-screen tablet like the Ultra it's a killer value because you can make the most efficient use of all that space. It's even more useful when you can hook your tablet up to an external monitor, because then you can use it just like a PC.

Outlook

After some time using an Android tablet as my daily driver, I think we're finally at the point where it's not just a feasible alternative, but a good idea for some folks.

Analysts, journalists, salespeople, students or basically anyone who moves around a lot and needs a decent computer for research, meetings, writing and note-taking could probably get by with one of the best tablets on the market instead of a laptop. The hardware, speed and battery life have all reached a point where slates are more than just entertainment devices or second screens: they're useful computers.

I think the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra is probably the prime example of a tablet that makes a great laptop replacement because of its big, beautiful AMOLED screen, speedy MediaTek CPU and 9+ hours of tested battery life.

Samsung's DeX mode is the cherry on top, making this $1,200 tablet the best laptop replacement I've yet tested. After what I've learned using it for work, I think I could do pretty well for myself just doing all my work on a nice tablet from here on out.

Alternative Android tablets

Not everyone loves Samsung's approach to Android, and some may find the amount of additional apps and features overkill for what they need. If you're in that group, here's a few of the best Android tablets that make great alternatives.

1. OnePlus Pad 3

The OnePlus Pad 3 is about half the price of an iPad, but just as capable. The brand's Open Canvas multi-tasking feature means that the tablet is more like an extremely portable laptop, allowing you to switch between apps and tasks with ease.

It's a fantastic tablet in its own right, but the reason it's so compelling as an iPad alternative (aside from the price) is that you can use an app to remotely connect to your MacBook, iMac or iPhone from the tablet directly.

You can't even do this with an iPad, so OnePlus has delivered something genuinely quite impressive, and it works reliably too. The tablet is fast, lasts a long time between charges and a brilliant display, making this an easy one to recommend.

• Read our full OnePlus Pad 3 review

2. Amazon Fire HD 10

Amazon's long history with hardware is complex, but one area the company has always succeeded is tablets. The Amazon Fire tablets are cheap, last a long time between charges and are very well set up for all your entertainment needs.

The Fire HD 10 (2023) is exactly what you need from a cheap tablet; reliable performance for streaming and everyday tasks. It can't handle games (Amazon keeps the price down by reducing its power) but is an excellent option, especially if you're a big user of Amazon's various digital services.

• Read our full Amazon Fire HD 10 review

3. Google Pixel Tablet

Like Amazon, Google has a complicated history with hardware products. But when it does release a tablet, it's nearly always one of the greatest ways to use Android on a larger display. And that's the case with the Pixel Tablet.

This is really more like a tablet that doubles as a smart home hub. To really hammer home that point, the tablet comes with a combined charging and speaker dock for when you want to put it in a hub-like mode.

It's not as fast or nimble as the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra, but then it's almost half the price. So the main reason to pick this up is not as a productivity workhorse, but as a hub for all your home's smarts, with music streaming as a nice bonus.

• Read our full Google Pixel Tablet review

A sequel to the Google Pixel Tablet hasn't even been released yet, but a series of rumors from Android Authority purports to reveal a Pixel Tablet 3. It was highly rumored that a Pixel Tablet 2 would launch this August alongside the Pixel 9 lineup. Obviously, that did not come to pass, which means we might see a sequel tablet in 2025.

This future third-generation tablet will drop in 2027 with the upgraded Tensor G6 chip that has previously been rumored to be built on a 3nm node.

Apparently, Google will add a second USB-C port to the Tensor G6. Technically, the Pixel Tablet has two USB ports, a standard USB-C port and a USB 2.0 connection under the pogo pins that connect to the tablet dock. Android Authority says this new 3.2 USB-C port will be used for "tablet only use cases" and support a DisplayPort output. 

The suggestion is that a new port will make the Pixel Tablet 3 more of a laptop replacement. The report claims the tablet will support up to four external displays (two via the ports and two more via daisy-chaining).

Additionally, this alleged treasure trove of Google documents from the gChips team, supposedly the Tensor G6 will power several future Pixel devices with the codenames "Premium 26," Base 26," "Fold 26," and "Entry Phone 27." Presumably, these forthcoming devices will be the Pixel 11 Pro, Pixel 11, Pixel 11 Pro Fold and the mid-range Pixel 11a. 

There is also a listed "Tablet Pixel 27" which would probably be the Pixel Tablet 3. Assuming Google releases a Pixel Tablet 2 next year, it would put the company's tablets on a two-year release schedule. This also suggests that the Pixel Tablet 3 will be released before the Pixel 12 in 2027, probably during the annual Google I/O conference in the spring.

The documents point to the Pixel 11a and the Pixel Tablet 3 getting a downgraded version of the Tensor G6 chipset. With Google supposedly switching over to TSMC from Samsung to build their future chips, the question becomes, how will Google make a less powerful chip? 

According to the AA source, Google is looking into removing defective parts from chips that should be trashed, meaning that the chips will automatically be reduced in effectiveness. Specifically, it looks like it will affect AI capabilities, meaning that various AI features won't be available for the tablet and mid-range Pixel phone.

Allegedly, there will also be different amounts of RAM between the flagship Pixel series, the A-series and the tablets.

It's clear that Google is working on the future of the company's Pixel devices, but many of these rumors are two or three years away from becoming reality. Surprisingly, it's not clear what the tech giant is actually doing next year with the Pixel 10 other than the Tensor G5. It's starting to look like next year's Pixel devices will be gap phones until Google settles in with TSMC.

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New anti-theft measures for Android are rolling out to users so make sure your device is updated if you want Google's latest security features.

These features were announced back at May's Google I/O event, but are now on their way to phones via a Google Mobile Services update. They'll work on any Android device running Android 10 or later, not just Google's incoming Android 15 update. Good news for anyone still running old, but perfectly functional, hardware.

There are three parts to Google's new anti-theft plan, and the first is the plainly-named Theft Detection. If the phone believes it's been swiped from your hand by someone and they're speeding off on foot or a bike or in a vehicle (based on motion data fed through an algorithm), it'll lock the screen and ask for your password or fingerprint again.

If a thief already has access to your phone, you can still rely on Offline Device Lock to try and stop things from getting worse. This feature locks the phone if someone disables its internet connections, a common way for thieves to avoid you tracking your phone in the hope of reclaiming it.

Remote Lock is another tool to stop thieves from accessing your data if they have your phone. By going to the Android website and inputting your phone number and an answer to a security question, you can lock your phone (assuming it's still online) until you can use your PIN or biometrics to unlock it again. Google will let you use this up to twice a day.

9to5Google reports that Google Pixel and Samsung Galaxy phones (but not tablets) have had the update so far. I haven't seen the update yet on my Google Pixel 9 Pro XL in the U.K. though.

If Google's new anti-theft tools are available on your phone, you'll find them by opening the Settings app, then going to the Google menu, tapping the All services header on the next screen, and then under Personal & device safety. Hopefully my Pixel and everyone else's will receive the update quickly so we can all gain some extra assurance that we may get our phone back if it's stolen, and without the thief accessing critical data.

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The OnePlus Pad 2 ($549), as its name suggests, is the follow-up to the original OnePlus Pad that won us over in 2023. You can consider the “2” as more than a title since this new Android tablet packs almost twice the memory and storage. It’s also more powerful thanks to its Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip that replaces the MediaTek Dimensity 9000 of the previous model.

Like before, this tablet’s most distinguishing features are its super-sized 13MP rear camera and unusual 7:5 aspect ratio display. The former makes it easier to take photos with the tablet, while the latter is ideal for reading books in both portrait and landscape orientations. These attributes help the OnePlus Pad 2 stand out in a sea of similar-looking tablets.

Android tablets don’t always have the best track record for performance. And while the OnePlus Pad 2 can’t contend with any of the best iPads packing an M-series chip, it performs very well for an Android 14 device — especially for basic tasks like surfing the web, reading comics and watching streaming videos. Though not as responsive as an iPad Air M2, the OnePlus Pad 2 isn’t sluggish.

If you’re a fan of the OnePlus Open phone, you’ll be happy to know that its OnePlus Canvas feature is also available on the company’s new tablet. This system lets you have up to three apps open on-screen at once, which is meant to boost your productivity if you’re using the OnePlus Pad 2 for work. Though I’d rather get work done on one of the best laptops, OnePlus Canvas works well enough if you need to write something in a pinch.

While the OnePlus Pad 2 costs $70 more than its predecessor, it’s well worth the investment — especially if you’re looking for one of the best Android tablets. OnePlus’ updated slate is so good, that it also earns a spot on our best tablets page. Find out why in my full review. 

OnePlus Pad 2 review: Cheat sheet

• What is it? The OnePlus Pad 2 is a unique Android tablet with a large rear camera and a 7:5 aspect ratio.
• Who is it for? For those who want an Android tablet that’s great for reading, streaming videos or getting some work done.
• How much does it cost? The only configuration of the OnePlus Pad 2 costs $549 from OnePlus’ website.
• What do we like? The unusual design, bright display and fast performance.
• What don’t we like? The middling camera quality.

OnePlus Pad 2 review: Specs

OnePlus Pad 2 review: The ups

The OnePlus Pad 2 is an excellent upgrade to the original thanks to its vivid display, fast performance, stellar battery life and awesome speaker quality.

Distinctive design

The OnePlus Pad 2 looks virtually identical to the previous model. It has a metal-bodied design with curved edges and a big round camera block in the top center of the back when you hold it in landscape orientation. One major difference is that the new tablet comes in Nimbus Gray instead of Halo Green like before. I prefer the new color, so I’m not complaining.

The screen size is now 12.1 inches instead of 11.6 — a nice change that gives you more real estate to play with. Of course, the new tablet retains the original’s 7:5 aspect ratio, making it taller and wider than most tablets. In fact, the display’s shape is more akin to a laptop’s. The OnePlus Pad 2 retains the same thickness as the old Pad but it’s a heavier slate at 1.9 pounds over 1.2. Despite that, the tablet is still comfortable to hold for long stretches.

I’m glad that OnePlus kept the same basic design of the first Pad since it helps it stand out from other slates. Not only does it look unique, but it feels nice to hold thanks to its curved edges and relatively lightweight.

Bright display

The 12.1-inch (3,000 x 2,120) 144Hz display isn’t the best I’ve seen (the iPad Pro M4 with its OLED panel has spoiled me). But it’s perfect for reading comics and watching YouTube videos. The 7:5 aspect ratio also lets you see more lines in an e-book and more rows on a spreadsheet. Videos like the last Deadpool & Wolverine trailer also look bright and colorful on this slate. 

While the OnePlus Pad 2 doesn’t hit the advertised 900 nits of brightness, it gets plenty bright to my eyes. Our lab display test corroborates this, as the display averages 580 nits of brightness according to our instruments. Color reproduction (sRGB and DCI-P3) is good but not great since images can appear desaturated compared to other displays. However, color accuracy (Delta-E) is fairly good.

As you can see above, the OnePlus Pad 2’s display is on par with those of the iPad Air M2 and Samsung Galaxy Tab S9. So even if this might not be a premium Android tablet like the Samsung Galaxy Tab series, you’re not getting a lesser viewing experience.

Great performance 

The OnePlus Pad 2 receives a nice spec bump thanks to its Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip replacing the mid-powered Dimensity chip of old. It also gets 12GB of RAM and 256GB of storage, which doubles the first tablet’s memory and storage. Toss in the latest version of Android 14, and you get a noticeable performance boost.

Performance-wise, OnePlus’ tablet never buckled when I used it to browse the web, watch videos and read comics. It also does a fine job of running games like Genshin Impact. The original OnePlus Pad didn’t disappoint when performing those tasks, but the new tablet is notably faster and more responsive no matter what you’re doing on it.

How did the OnePlus Pad 2 fare in our lab test? On Geekbench 6, which tests overall CPU performance, this Android slate turned in solid single-core and multi-core scores. The iPad Air with its M2 processor has better multi-core performance but OnePlus’ slate outshines the Galaxy Tab S9 with its older Snapdragon 8 Gen 2 chip.

In our video transcoding test in Adobe Premiere Rush, the OnePlus Pad 2 took 58 seconds to complete the task. That’s much slower than the iPad Air M2 (21 seconds) and Galaxy Tab S9 (40 seconds). Though good for everyday tasks, the OnePlus Pad 2 isn’t great for video editors.

Incredible battery life 

The original OnePlus Pad had incredible battery life and I’m happy to report that its successor has even stronger endurance.

In our battery test involving continuous web surfing over Wi-Fi with the display set to 150 nits of brightness, the OnePlus Pad 2 lasted for an epic 14 hours and 58 minutes. As you can see above, that’s nearly an hour and a half longer than its predecessor. OnePlus’ tablet also lasts for three and a half hours more than the M2-powered iPad Air.

Great speakers 

The OnePlus Pad 2 has six stereo speakers instead of four like the last model. Not only can the tablet get much louder, but the overall sound quality is richer — enhancing the experience when watching videos (especially movies). Even when I crank the volume to the max, everything comes through clearly without any audio distortion.

I fired up Dream Theater’s “Alien” and was impressed by how well the speakers separated the various instruments. If you like progressive metal like me, this is a fine tablet to listen to your favorite bands. Podcasts and movies also sound phenomenal on the OnePlus Pad 2.

Useful accessories

To get the most from the OnePlus Pad 2, you’ll need the optional Stylo 2 stylus and Smart Keyboard. Though not as exorbitantly priced as the Apple Magic Keyboard and Apple Pencil Pro, these accessories aren’t exactly cheap either at $99 for the Stylo 2 and $149 for the keyboard attachment.

The magnetically attachable and chargeable Stylo 2 comes with a haptic motor that provides pen-and-paper-style feedback by vibrating as you make strokes. I won’t say this is comparable to writing on actual paper, but the haptics deliver a nice sensation. The stylus' accurate pressure detection and tracking make it a precise tool for writing and drawing.

Then there’s the Smart Keyboard, which is a two-part package made up of an independently usable keyboard deck and a fully adjustable kickstand. This keyboard comes with a larger trackpad than the OnePlus Pad's version, and also comes with a dedicated AI button just like a Copilot+ PC. Doing so gives you the option to use Google Assistant or Google Gemini. In that sense, you can consider the OnePlus Pad 2 an “AI tablet” like the iPad Pro.

The keyboard can be used while attached to pogo pins on the side of the OnePlus Pad 2, but can also be used via Bluetooth if you want to detach them for greater flexibility. This peripheral gets a job done if you need to write something in a pinch but make sure it’s on a sturdy desk since it feels unstable on your lap thanks to the flimsy kickstand.

I should note that if you have a OnePlus phone, you can tap it on the NFC point to the right of the trackpad to easily set up a hotspot connection and share files, notifications and copy/paste clipboards, as well as hand off app activity back and forth as you need. I didn’t have a OnePlus phone to test this, but it’s a neat feature worth mentioning.

Multitasking features

The OnePlus Pad 2 is a multi-tasking beast thanks to the Open Canvas system it borrows from the OnePlus Open phone and lets you run up to three apps simultaneously.

Typically, tablets and foldable phones shrink apps into small windows. Instead of that, Open Canvas moves inactive windows almost off-screen. This lets you use the full display to focus on one task at a time, and you can switch to another app by tapping its exposed section. You can also open up a full view of the workspace with a simple four-finger pinch gesture, similar to macOS' Mission Control feature.

Thanks to the snappy interface, I had no problems switching between apps. I prefer Apple’s Stage Manager for iPads since it does a better job centering the app you’re working on. This may be the OnePlus Pad 2's killer feature that'll let it pinch sales from productivity-minded users who'd otherwise go to Apple or Samsung for a new slate.

OnePlus Pad 2 review: The downs

The OnePlus Pad 2 doesn’t disappoint as an Android tablet. However, one of its defining features is also one of its drawbacks.

Poor camera quality

Like the original OnePlus Pad, the updated model sports a huge 13MP camera centered along the top rear of the tablet. While it doesn’t take horrible photos, don’t expect anything on par with the best camera phones. 

As you can see above, the photo I snapped in our office is somewhat washed out. Yes, you can see everything in the photo, but the overall quality isn’t as sharp as I would have liked. Considering how the big rear camera is a major selling point, this aspect is disappointing.

OnePlus Pad 2 review: Verdict

The OnePlus Pad 2 improves everything about the first generation, but doing so has increased the price. Because of that, it’s more comparable to an iPad Air M2 or Galaxy Tab S9 than the 10th Gen iPad. However, given the faster performance, larger storage, refined accessories and larger display, you’re more than getting your money’s worth.

Like its predecessor, the OnePlus Pad 2 is an exemplary Android slate. It won’t unseat the iPad Air as the best overall tablet, but if you’re looking for a distinctive device that’s ideal for reading and watching videos, you can’t go wrong with this one.

The Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra and Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Plus arrive next week. The company just unveiled the successors to the Galaxy Tab S9 Ultra and Galaxy Tab S9 Plus, adopting updated components in a familiar design for its latest tablets. And in case you were wondering, yes, these tablets pack some of the AI features available on the best Samsung phones.

The Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra and Tab S10 Plus have 14.6- and 12.4-inch OLED displays, respectively, and both screens work with an included S Pen. Regarding the Tab S10 Ultra, Samsung says its large tablet benefits from an 18% increase in CPU, 28% increase in GPU and 14% increase in NPU over the Tab S9 Ultra. The company says the MediaTek Dimensity 9300 Plus powering the tablet “enables faster and more responsive AI features.”

Interestingly enough, the Book Cover Keyboard will have a new Galaxy AI Key similar to the Copilot key found on several Copilot+ PCs.

In terms of software, features like Note Assist and Drawing Assist will let you take notes and draw on these tablets, as their names would suggest. Samsung also said the Galaxy Tab S10 series can act as a home AI device. A 3D Map View shows an overview of your home and connected devices to let you easily manage devices across Samsung’s SmartThings ecosystem. The company’s Samsung Knox security exists to keep your data safe.

The Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra starts at $1,199 with 256GB, with upgrades available for 512GB and 1TB. Likewise, the Galaxy Tab S10 Plus starts at $999 with 256GB of storage but you can upgrade up to 512GB. Both tablets will be available in Moonstone Gray and Platinum Silver colors.

Preorders for the Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra and Galaxy Tab S10 Plus are available now from Samsung, with the tablets arriving on October 3. The S10 Plus will be available in a 5G model from carriers like AT&T, T-Mobile and Verizon. If you order either slate from Samsung or Best Buy, Samsung is offering a trade-in value of up to $800.

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We weren't expecting to see a new tablet from Samsung until October, but a new report claims that the Galaxy Tab S10 series is actually going to launch before the end of September. 

The leaked release report from 9to5Google isn't totally out of left field, as a plethora of rumors and leaks have started to pop up in recent weeks. A potential release date of September 26 comes to us from Roland Quandt of the German site Winfuture.

According to the leak, Samsung will release two new S10 tablets instead of the usual three. We expect a larger Ultra model, with Samsung dropping the standard model in favor of the larger 12.4-inch "Plus" variant. 

With the loss of the 11-inch version, it appears that Samsung is explicitly looking to compete with the iPad Pro. It could be argued that Samsung was introducing rival tablets for both the Pro model iPads and the smaller iPad Air.

The new tablets could either be powered by Qualcomm's Snapdragon X Elite processor that runs Microsoft's first wave of Copilot+ PCs. However a Samsung leaker, Ice Universe, claimed the S10 will be powered by a MediaTek 9300+ chip.

From the renders we've seen, the upcoming S10 should look familiar as the design appears much like the current S9 series. The design seems like a copy of the S9 Ultra variant. 

Either way, we will know more about the new Galaxy tablets before the end of the year. Samsung reps told Android Authority in July that Tab S10 would launch before the end of the year. 

Samsung moving the tablet release from October makes some sense. It was expected that Apple might announce the iPad Mini 7 during the Glowtime event, which revealed the iPhone 16 lineup, Apple Watch Series 10 and two versions of the AirPods 4.

However, the iPad didn't appear, and new rumors suggest that we might see the tablet in October. Launching in September lets Samsung avoid direct conflict with Apple's next tiny tablet while getting a device out in time for the holiday season.

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The Honor MagicPad 2 is something special – one of the best Android tablets you can buy right now. But it’s those words “Android tablet” that cause concern for a lot of potential punters.

You probably already know the score by now. In terms of tablet app ecosystem, iPad lineage has a clear edge. When it comes to being productive in many different ways, Apple has this war won in both hardware and software. However, the MagicPad 2 comes close enough to matching it that you could get away with using this and be just as happy.

Software-wise, this comes in the form of MagicOS offering a super slick UI that is a cinch to browse around and get most work done – supercharged with AI innovations that rival Apple Intelligence, and a smooth multitasking experience that matches the various picture-in-picture and split screen options you see on an iPad. In fact, as I wrote about a little earlier, you’ll be surprised at how much you can actually do on Android tablet if you ditch your laptop for this.

And hardware wise, you’ve got a drop dead gorgeous OLED display, which matches and even beats the cream of the crop in the M4 iPad Pro in terms of brightness and refresh rate. Color so vivid you’ll believe you’re tasting the rainbow at every glance. 

On top of that, the battery capacity gives you over 10 hours on one charge, Snapdragon 8S Gen 3 may not be the same as Apple silicon, but it’s enough for the Android tablet app levels of casual productivity, and all of this is packed into a gorgeously luxurious chassis and surrounded by ergonomically strong accessories in the keyboard cover and MagicPen 3.

So what you need to do is make a choice – think about what apps you’ll actually use and what you actually want to do with your tablet. If you don’t want to be hampered by the limitations of a reduced tablet app library and reduced power, then something like the similarly-priced M2 iPad Air may be the one for you. On the android side of things, the OnePlus Pad offers more performance.

But if your workload is more in the office space and you want the best of the best in terms of displays for binge watching, then the Honor MagicPad 2 could very well be the one to buy.

Let’s get into it some more.

Honor MagicPad 2: Cheat Sheet

• What is it? This is a premium Android tablet.
• Who is it for? For those who want the best viewing experience on a tablet (thanks to that OLED screen).
• What does it cost? Pricing is set at £499 in the UK (roughly $600).
• What do we like? The OLED display is a true feast for the eyes that beats the iPad Pro, MagicOS 8 is a phenomenal effort by Honor to workaround Android tablet limitations and give us a slick UI, and all of this is packed into a drop dead gorgeous chassis.
• What don’t we like? The downside is a simple one here – it’s an Android tablet. This isn’t really Honor’s fault here, but I can’t ignore the fact that a sea of stretched out phone apps is a huge detractor from a tablet like this, and should make you seriously consider an iPad for the better app support.

Honor MagicPad 2: Specs

Honor MagicPad 2: What we like

Let’s get to the good part. After the admirable effort of the Honor Pad 9, the MagicPad 2 is a leap frog — so much better than expected in three key areas.

A half-price iPad Pro

There’s one shining strength here, literally when you take into account its 1,600-nit peak brightness. The 12.3-inch OLED panel on here is nothing short of a mouthwatering marvel — a flash flood of color that greets your eyes in a way that only the M4 iPad Pro has done so in the past.

On top of that, you may notice that the screen on offer here is slightly better too with a higher resolution and a faster refresh rate. Realistically though, those improvements won’t really be noticeable, and if you really believe you can spot the difference between 120 and 144Hz, I have a bridge you sell you.

But the real superpower here is that you’re getting this glorious glow of OLED at half the price of the Pro. Don’t get me wrong, the performance of this tablet doesn’t even come close to Apple’s uber premium slab (more on that later). But if your main motivation is the best display for binge watching and casual productivity, this is the best option at a fraction of the cost.

Special shout-out to the confidence felt in the color-accuracy when using Photoshop Express to edit, and dipping into some super HDR-rich content like Blade Runner 2049 that showcases those inky blacks, the deep contrast ratio and the raw vividity on offer here.

An Android tablet you can actually get stuff done on!?

I’ve already gone into some detail about this when talking about switching my MacBook Pro with the MagicPad 2. But to turn this section into a quick TL;DR — the marriage of this sleek, productive hardware and the super slick UI of MagicOS 8 makes this an Android tablet you can actually use for productivity as well as entertainment.

Working around the awkward lack of Android tablet-optimized apps is definitely easier here, as Honor has built its own office suite and notes app to complement what is already present in Google’s selection of apps like Gmail and Chrome. Add the fact that multitasking is a cinch on here, from picture-in-picture to side-by-side, and you’ve got an all-in-one for all your document creation needs.

Of course there are limitations in its power and app selection (more on that later), but if you’re workload is more of a typist and doodler than a prosumer, then the MagicPad 2, the Smart Bluetooth Keyboard (honestly one of the best typing experiences I’ve had with a tablet, that uber response Magic Pencil 3, and the OS skin come together and help you get into your focus rather well.

Actual intelligence

For a while now, phone and tablet makers have been figuring out how to make AI a worthwhile selling point. In some cases, the answer is to go a little crazy on the generative side of things, but for Honor, I really enjoyed the small but thoughtful and logical additions here and there.

You’ll see it pop up here and there, or just aid in the background without you even realizing. So far, two key ones come to mind, but honorable mentions are the handwriting recognition for writing in formulas, voice transcription and the usefulness of Gemini Advanced that you already know about.

First is the Magic Portal, which sees the screen peel off in a 3D effect to reveal some quick actions — chosen by learning the way you use the tablet. Think of it as an AI-driven right-click functionality, which grabs context of what you’re looking at and points you towards what you’re most likely to do. 

For example, if I’m looking at a review of a game, opening up Magic Portal gives me the options to find the game to buy on Amazon, share on my very geeky Whatsapp group chat, bookmark the page or take a note of it. All these things I do often, and the MagicPad 2 picked up on it.

Second is something you’ll never notice, but is a good one if you ever see any normal screen blur slightly in front of you. Myopia is a very common in those who spend a lot of time looking at screens (so basically all of us), and Honor’s got a nifty workaround alternative to buying a pair of computer glasses — the AI Defocus Display.

Simply put, the front facing camera judges your distance from the screen, and through some trickery, Honor is able to fudge the pixels a little to subtly blur your peripheral vision while keeping the center of your gaze in sharp definition. It’s proven to help reduce the Myopia effect by some margin, which will keep those peepers strong for longer.

Honor MagicPad 2: What we don't like

For all the love I have for this tablet, it doesn’t make me blind to the two key obstacles here for the MagicPad 2, which may make you want to consider its competition — even though the OLED display here is clearly superior.

Keep it casual

That sub-flagship Snapdragon 8s Gen 3 is decent, don’t get me wrong. It is enough for casual productivity and some lighter multitasking, but you can see it strain around the edges when you start to put it under a little more pressure. For example, a Premiere Rush video export, Chrome with 5 tabs, a PiP video playing and a sketching app being used gave me a bit of stuttering.

And the same can be said for the graphics. Most Android games will be more than playable on here, but you may see some frame rate reductions when you throw anything more graphically intense at it.

If you make sure you play by its rules, you won’t see these problems. But there’s no getting away from the fact that the M2 iPad Air just eats this thing for lunch in the performance department, and you can get more zippiness from the OnePlus Pad 2 for the same cost.

The decision of whether that OLED display is worth it at the sacrifice of raw performance comes down to your use cases, so allow me to break it down.

• If your workload is a lighter one (office work and web browsing), and you casually dabble in creative work, then the MagicPad 2 is enough and you can get that gorgeous OLED panel.
• If you’re starting casual but want to get into more advanced creative workloads, the iPad Air is absolutely the right decision – even though you’ll lose out on that OLED panel, you’ll get more longevity.

Trying to swim upstream

For all the work Honor has done to paint over the cracks of an Android tablet, there’s no escaping the OS and its lack of tablet apps. And no, I’m not talking about a raw number of apps (like some of you mentioned in the comments of my Pad 9 review), I’m talking about the actual tablet app experience – an area that the iPad dominates.

There’s no avoiding this fact, and I still find myself running into the same familiar issues of stretched out phone apps across social and creative software. It constrains what you can actually do, and feels a little defeating against the hard work Honor’s put in.

Hopefully developers notice just how prominent the Android tablet market is and start to adapt for it, but at the moment, you’ll have to go through the rigmarole of entering the big screen option of settings and forcing every individual app into full screen.

Put simply, if you want all the apps, it’s no competition. Get the iPad. But Honor does an admirable job in providing an alternative.

Honor MagicPad 2: Verdict

And that’s the story of the Honor MagicPad 2 – a phenomenal tablet that is only held back by that one issue that faces every Android tablet.

The hardware is supreme, the UI skin is easily the best you can get on any slab sporting this OS, and the AI implementations on offer here are thoughtful and even caring for health thanks to that defocus display functionality. 

Pair that with the stellar accessories, and you can make this a great device for both your entertainment and productivity needs, while being the coolest person in the office with the most premium looking device in the group.

But with any tablet purchase, you’ve got to think carefully about how important that tablet app ecosystem is to you. If it’s critical, then the iPad Air’s mid display in comparison to the MagicPad 2 may be a worthwhile compromise. But the best credit I can give to Honor here is that this is the first tablet that makes the decision between Android and Apple a difficult one.

The Honor MagicPad 2 has just been announced at IFA 2024, and I’ve been testing it for a couple weeks. While we wait for the chance to tell you all about it in a review, I wanted to do something a little different – replace my M3 Pro MacBook Pro with this tablet for a week.

You see, Steve Jobs got a lot of things right, but one that he didn’t quite hit the mark on was this notion that tablets will replace laptops. All his talk of comparing this transition to the way people switched from trucks to cars just hasn’t come to fruition. 

No matter how many articles you read that test and ponder whether a tablet can be a laptop, that won’t change the inevitable fact that for peak productivity, laptops have won this war. So that argument would be pointless for me to make.

What I want to do instead is dip back into the world of Android tablets, and see whether they’ve come any further along. There’s a reason why iPads are a solid lock for the top spot of our best tablets list – they have access to a smorgasbord of apps as well as the performance and the capability to not just be binge-watching slabs, but actual productivity devices to help you get things done. 

Android slabs have never had the same expansive support in my experience, with a vastly smaller app library and a far less sleek UI. Well, that’s at least what I thought until I used the MagicPad 2 as my daily driver for 7 days.

Smooth operator

And so, I set it up with everything I needed and got to it. I have to say I’m surprised by how much I can get done here. MagicOS 8.0 (built on Android 14) is a sleek UI and you can tell Honor has put time and thought into making this make sense on a tablet.

Multi-tasking options are just a drag and a swipe away, and you have the chance to pre-save your most used side-by-side. Shout-out in particular to Magic Portal becoming something of an AI-infused version of a right-click for me – learning preferred system functions based on where I am on the MagicPad 2 and presenting them in a list for me to activate.

Plus, Honor’s done a bang-up job here with its own apps for getting things done, which have been supercharged with AI.

For example, it can do all the same things you’re seeing with Apple Intelligence, such as fixing your handwriting and solving formulas you doodle down, voice transcription in Honor notes, and more. Put a sleek file manager in the middle of it, and all the apps come together in a fine synergy of productivity.

Combine this with my workflow fortunately benefitting from having tablet-optimized apps for it, such as Slack and Gmail, and I was working hard in no time. Whether it’s sketching out an idea with the Magic-Pencil 3 with super low latency and a huge range of pressure sensitivity, or typing to my heart’s content with the Smart Bluetooth Keyboard case (keys feel amazing with 1.6mm of travel), it’s been a joy to write out this and many other stories.

A feast for the eyes

I’m of course talking about the main event here – that 12.3-inch 3K OLED panel with a 1,600-nit peak brightness and a 144Hz refresh rate. That beats the M4-equipped iPad Pro 2024 in both resolution and refresh rate, while being just as bright. 

In use, the UI zooms around oh so slickly, color temperature changes make this a nice display to work on, and that flash flood of color paired with peak brightness make even the most HDR-est of content look incredible

But the magic (pardon the pun) doesn’t stop there as the 4,320Hz Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) dimming sounds super technical, but means that any brightness fluctuations or flickering stripes are basically eliminated. And on top of that, Honor’s bringing something big to the table in the form of an AI Defocus Display.

This will be hard for me to show on camera, so let me explain. A common problem of spending so much time in front of screens is nearsightedness, but myopia glasses (or you may see them called defocus glasses) can help with that by intentionally defocusing everything in your peripheral vision and keeping the screen clear.

Well, the MagicPad 2 is just going to go ahead and use AI to recreate that. Using the camera to judge your distance and angle to the screen, this panel is able to replicate that same defocus glass effect, which can be important in reducing the myopia impacts of this display.

To say it’s better than an iPad would be a “stretch”

But imma stop you right there. Before I start gushing too much, there are some of what I’d like to call the Android Tablet Tribulations. First, we’re not entirely sure how many years of major Android updates this will get. In previous devices, Honor has committed to five years, which isn’t quite iPad-levels of longevity, but it’s good enough. We’ll see if that’s the case here.

Second, for all the work that Honor has done to make an office suite and apps that can give you a whiff of laptop-esque productivity, there’s no getting away from the fact that most of the biggest Android apps aren’t built for tablets. There’s a cumbersome process for these (Facebook is a classic example) where you’ll have to go into the Large-Screen Features settings menu and force these apps to go full-screen. And after all that, you’re left with a blown up phone app. Comparing that to seeing how developers make the most of that extra screen real estate on an iPad, this will always be a bit of a bummer.

And on top of that, while the Snapdragon 8 Gen 3S is a great sub-flagship chipset for most of your productivity, if anything more strenuous appeared in the app store (akin to Final Cut Pro or Logic Pro as you see on iPad), this tablet would slow to a crawl. You can configure this to 16GB of RAM, which is a blessing for multi-tasking, but it's a phone chipset slapped into a tablet, and you’ve got to be mindful of that.

Outlook

Now, there’s only so much I can say about the Honor MagicPad 2 before the review (don’t worry, it’s coming sooner than you think). But what you have here is a damn fine tablet – made even sweeter by that iPad Pro beater of an OLED display that is a joy for the eyes.

You can tell that Honor’s been in the tablet game for a while, as the company works around the common obstacles of using this OS to give you something that’s damn slick to use for productivity and entertainment. It’s reign as being the most iPad-est Android tablet you can buy continues strong.

As for this little experiment I was doing, there are for sure still some limitations in use when it comes to the whole “replacing a laptop for a tablet” thing. Those same common problems like the constricted tablet app selection and the lack of a suite for creative work rear their head again. Oh and you’re still contending with stretched out phone apps for everything else.

But Android has come a long way on the big screen, and so has Magic OS – to the point that I know I can get pretty much all of my more standard day-to-day tasks done on here, while having a stunning screen for chilling out after work. 

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There’s been a lot of talk about lockscreen widgets potentially making a comeback on certain devices running Android 15. The latest version of the beta, Android 15 QPR Beta 1, has more or less confirmed that it will be happening very soon. All thanks to introductory text and tips appearing in the software.

This was uncovered by Mishaal Rahman at Android Authority, who speculates that the new introductory text could be a sign Google is “polishing” the lock screen widgets feature for general release. If that’s the case we could see it arrive in beta within the next few months, and then release to the public at some point in the near future.

A screenshot of the text states that this feature lets you “get quick access to your favorite app widgets without unlocking your tablet”. The tablet part is pretty important, because Rahman has previously claimed that this feature won’t be coming to Android phones. At least, not as part of Android 15. Instead it’ll be exclusive to Android tablets like Google’s Pixel Tablet.

The screen features an “Add widget icon”, and once pressed, the lock screen widget interface opens up with more welcome dialog. Including some that warns you that opening apps using the widgets will require you to verify that you’re the one using the device — and that anything in the widget itself will be viewable by everything who has access to the tablet. Even when it’s locked.

Rahman also notes that a disclaimer warns against adding certain widgets that aren’t meant for the lock screen and might be “unsafe to add here”. While there is a toggle that lets you add whatever widgets you like to the lock screen, anything particularly sensitive is added at your own risk. Sadly it seems shortcuts won’t be allowed on the lockscreen, at least not as the feature looks right now.

Rahman had to activate this feature manually, so any Android tablet users running the Android 15 beta won’t be able to find it unless they do some diving into the OS itself. Still it’s nice to see that lockscreen widgets are finally making a comeback, almost 10 years after Google pulled the plug with the release of Android 5.

Admittedly, the tablet-exclusive aspect isn’t ideal. Apple added lockscreen widget support to iPhones in iOS 16, and many people were hoping Google would catch up — especially since lockscreen widgets used to exist in the early days of Android. Let’s just hope that this is just the first step towards a wider lockscreen widget rollout, even if it means waiting for Android 16.

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Earlier this year we saw reports claiming Google was working on enhancing Android’s desktop mode. An actual desktop mode, akin to Samsung’s DeX, rather than simply relying on screen mirroring. That early version didn’t run so great and missed a bunch of key features — but an improved version just reappeared in Android 15 Beta 4.1 and shows a little more promise.

Android Authority’s Mishaal Rahman has discovered that Android 15’s new desktop mode may be usable on Android tablets. Meaning you wouldn’t need to connect to an external display to activate a desktop-like experience on your tablet.

According to Rahman you will need an Android tablet with a large enough display, but doesn’t specify how big that display has to be other than the fact this did work on the 11-inch Pixel Tablet. Users will then need to enter the Recents menu, open an app’s dropdown menu and tap the brand new “Desktop” button.

Tapping that button will apparently turn that app into a free-floating window, with behavior similar to browser windows on Samsung DeX. This means you can minimize, maximize, pin the window to the side or connect it to a totally different app window. Naturally there’s a taskbar at the bottom of the screen to help keep tabs on everything. You can actually see it all in action in Rahman’s demo video.

A built-in desktop mode is an intriguing addition to the Android tablet experience. Combined with the fact the Google Pixel Tablet is able to act as a docked Nest home hub and a standalone tablet, adding desktop mode almost makes it look like Google wants Android tablets to be as versatile and multi-purpose as possible.

So no matter what you need a larger screen for, you’re able to do what you need to do as easily as possible. And without having to plug into an external screen, ensuring you can still work on your tablet on the go. That’s not something Samsung DeX can offer, though there is a big difference between carrying around a phone and tablet all the time.

That versatility may even be a useful selling point in the Pixel Tablet’s future, especially if that desktop mode is also compatible with external displays. But we’ll just have to wait and see how this plays out, and when the feature will be more widely available — because it doesn’t seem quite ready to debut when Android 15 launches.

Who knows, maybe this will be how Google tries to convince people to pick up a Pixel Tablet 2 — whenever that might arrive.

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A new leak has emerged regarding the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 series. It sounds like we won't have to wait too long to get our hands on the latest Samsung tablet, as it's now rumored to launch in October.

MaxJmb on X posted the information regarding the upcoming tablet. They claimed it'll launch in the fall of 2024 with a Samsung Galaxy S24 FE smartphone. That's much later than the Galaxy Tab S9, which came out in August 2023. The Galaxy Tab S9 FE and Galaxy Tab S9 FE+ came out in October, though, so it's not uncommon for Samsung to release a tablet in the fall instead of the late summer.

Renders from OnLeaks gave us an idea of what the tablet will look like when it eventually launches, whether in October or at another time. 

Rumors have suggested that the Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra will come with a Qualcomm Snapdragon Gen 3 SoC, and the Galaxy Tab S10+ will have a Dimensity 9300+ powering things. Benchmarks from GeekBench showed up for the Galaxy Tab S10+ recently, further backing the rumor that devices will have different chips. 

With the OnePlus Pad 2 making waves, being called "The Android tablet standard" in our hands-on, Samsung would do well to put its best foot forward for the Galaxy Tab S10 series. Of course, there are all the members of the best tablet list to contend with.  

If you're in the market for a new tablet now, look at our rundown of the best Prime Day tablet deals. Sure, the shopping event might be over, but tremendous deals are still available. 

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With the OnePlus summer launch event on July 16 almost upon us, the rumor mill shows no sign of stopping. A new leak has revealed specs and pricing for the OnePlus Pad 2, the company's follow-up to what we consider the best Android tablet on the market, and it looks to be more expensive than the OnePlus Pad.

As first spotted by Android Police, noted leaker Yogesh Brar shared images on X (formerly Twitter) of what appears to be the OnePlus Pad 2's retail packaging in India. And it looks like a price hike is imminent. Based on the images, the OnePlus Pad 2 will retail for ₹47,999, or roughly $575. For reference, its predecessor launched for $479 earlier this year. 

Though we don't have the official U.S. pricing yet, it's looking like you can expect a roughly $100 price bump compared to the original OnePlus Pad. The report said that the OnePlus Pad 2 may sell for just ₹45,999, or $550, as part of a limited-time promotion. 

That being said, the OnePlus Pad 2 is tipped to pack enough upgrades to justify the higher price. We know what to expect regarding specs, as it's already launched in China under a different name (OnePlus Pad Pro). The second-gen tablet is expected to have a 12.1-inch LCD and be powered by Qualcomm's ubiquitous Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset, though it'll pack the same 9,510 mAh battery with 67W fast wired charging as the original. 

If true, the OnePlus Pad 2 will feature the same top-tier chipset found in the best Android phones like the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra and a bigger, high-resolution display that'll make this one iPad competitor to watch out for. 

The 13MP rear camera and 8MP selfie camera are two more expected holdovers from the previous generation. However, that's less of a deal breaker than for phones, as no one's buying a tablet specifically for its camera. 

Rumor has it that OnePlus plans to launch two versions of the Pad 2 in different storage capacities and RAM configurations: one with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage, the other with 12GB of memory and 256GB of capacity. A third version with 16GB of RAM and 512GB of storage is currently sold in China, but it doesn't appear to be headed for international markets. 

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OnePlus is gearing up for its OnePlus Summer Launch event on July 16. Scheduled to take place in Milan, Italy, the company has already revealed the devices that it plans to show off. Earlier today (July 9), we had a chance to look at the OnePlus Nord 4 in all its glory, and now the company has followed up with new details about each of the other devices.

With the number of leaks on the next batch of OnePlus devices, it only makes sense that OnePlus wants to get ahead with some official information. 

Starting with the OnePlus Pad 2, the company didn't spill all the beans, but it provided enough details to pique our interest. First, the company said it would have a 12.1-inch 7:5 ratio display and "an industry-leading chipset," though it didn't specify exactly what chip it would have. Based on the rumors, though, it could have a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3, which is quite a powerful chip.

On the OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro front, the company revealed the earbuds will be available in Starry Black and Soft Jade colors. As for specs, the Nord Buds Pro 3 will have 49dB of noise cancellation, an ultra-wide frequency range of up to 4,000Hz and 12.4mm drivers. 

OnePlus says the Watch 2R will feature "a revolutionary Dual-Engine Architecture." The company promises a 100-hour battery life and ultra-precise dual-frequency GPS. You'll be able to get the watch in two colorways, as shown in the image above.

Many questions still exist regarding the new OnePlus devices, so there's plenty of reason to check out the company's YouTube channel on July 16, when the event begins. We're still looking forward to the show between the full specs of the OnePlus Pad 2, more details on the Nord Buds Pro 3, and what kind of power to expect from the Watch 2R.

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A week from now, OnePlus is planning a global launch for some products it's already unveiled in China with a July 16 event planned for Milan, Italy. But some of those products are getting an early look, thanks to some timely leaks.

One of the more noteworthy arrivals next week will be the OnePlus Pad 2, a new version of OnePlus' tablet that's appearing in China as the OnePlus Pad Pro. Specs for the OnePlus Pad sequel were posted on X by leaker Ishan Agarwal, and spotted by Android Police. Agarwal is from India, but says in his leak that these specs will be for the global version of the OnePlus Pad 2.

There will be two versions of the Pad 2 in different storage capacity and RAM configurations. One will feature 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage; the other will have 12GB of memory with and 256GB of capacity. In China, there's also a 16GB/512GB variant, but that version doesn't appear to be coming to the rest of the world.

Otherwise, the rest of the OnePlus Pad 2 specs appear to be the same as the original OnePlus Pad. The new version will feature a 12.1-inch LCD display with a 144Hz refresh rate and 900-nits of peak brightness. This will be powered by Qualcomm's ubiquitous Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chipset. OnePlus is leaning into giant batteries this year, and the Pad 2 will feature a 9,510 mAh battery with 67W Supervooc charging.

The tablet will also have a 13MP main camera, and an 8MP front camera.

Before the China event, some leaked images showed a new Stylo 2 smart pencil and an upgraded keyboard. The latest images leaked by OnLeaks on X and shared with Android Headlines, only show the tablet itself, which looks much like the previous iteration. That said, the Agarwal leak does claim that the keyboard and stylus will be released as well, along with a folio case.

OnePlus Watch 2R

A new smartwatch is also coming from OnePlus, dubbed the OnePlus Watch 2R. In general, OnePlus uses the R label on products to designate lower-priced models. Since the OnePlus Watch 2 costs $299, rumors indicate the Watch 2R will come in between $199 and $249.

One difference between the Watch 2 and the Watch 2R is that the 2R will come in green, as seen below in newly leaked renders posted by Android Headlines.

OnePlus Nord Buds 3 Pro

Surprisingly, we had not heard much about the Nord Buds 3 Pro, but these earbuds are also going to be announced at the July 16 event. OnePlus has described the buds as "the pinnacle of mid-range ANC earbuds". 

It looks like the buds will come in two colors, mint or black. Like the Galaxy Buds 3 Pro that Samsung's expected to announce at Galaxy Unpacked this Wednesday (July 10), the Nord Buds look to be aping Apple's stem design. 

The current OnePlus Buds Pro 2 sell for $129. We expect the new earbuds to be around that price. In our review, we thought the Pro 2 buds from OnePlus were good but lacking in the sound performance. Hopefully these new earbuds — shown above in more Android Headlines posts — improve on the sound.

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We only recently got our hands on the OnePlus Pad, which is a solid, wallet-friendly tablet and it's already getting a a Pro-level sibling.  For years OnePlus was in the habit of only releasing one or two devices a year, recently, the company has expanded its lineup significantly and part of that included adding "Pro" upgrades to its various phones. 

OnePlus surprised with a teaser of a new OnePlus Pad Pro last week on the Chinese social media site Weibo. However, at the time, the company did not release any other information beyond a June 27 release date.

This week, 9to5 Google spotted a series of images from regular Weibo leak-maven Digital Chat Station that showed off the OnePlus Pad Pro.

The images from the leak showcase a tablet that looks a lot like the OnePlus Pad. DCS says that the new tablet has a thin and light design with an "all metal body." The current OnePlus Pad only has an aluminum back. 

Alongside that, they teased a "very attractive" price. Currently, the OnePlus Pad sells for $479. With current 11-inch iPad Air 2024 and Samsung Tab S9+ tablets selling for $999, OnePlus could price their "Pro" model anywhere from we $600 to $1000. If we had to guess, we'll take bets on the Pro tablet being closer to $600.

The teaser image from OnePlus shows the new tablet with a magnetic keyboard and what looks like a black version of the OnePlus Stylo, one of the best Apple Pencil Alternatives. I've only seen the Stylo in white, so that would be new if OnePlus has different colorways planned.

Digital Chat's images also show off the magnetic keyboard and the black Stylo. Other than color, both accessories look to be getting slight design updates.

We'd already seen rumors of a OnePlus Pad 2, which may move on from a Dimensity 9000 chipset to the processor du jour in Qualcomm's Snapdragon 8 Gen 3. In replies to their post, Digital Chat Station seemed to indicate that the OnePlus Pad Pro will feature a Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip.

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