Apple iPad Pro review: Slate of the art
Slate of the art
Synthetic benchmarks
The iPad Pro is powered by Apple's A9X chip, which Apple says has a 64-bit desktop-class architecture. A few charts, shown at the launch event, detailed the advancements in Apple's tablet performance, and the Pro is said to pack a CPU 1.8 times more powerful than the one in the iPad Air 2 and a GPU twice as powerful.
We ran the usual tests on the iPad Pro to see just how this almighty chip compares against the rest, and we struggled a little with finding what to compare it against. For one, there aren't many tablets with such giant displays, certainly not outside of the proper desktop Windows OS realm.
The Android-running Samsung Galaxy Note Pro 12.2 / Galaxy Tab Pro 12.2 come to mind but they are 2 years old now, and instead of updating them Samsung seems to be focused on making kitchen tablets. So we rounded up the latest tablets we've tested, regardless of display size, and threw in some of the flagship phones of late.
In Geekbench the iPad Pro scored nearly 5,500 points, which is on par with our current Android champ, the Meizu Pro 5. Samsung flagships with the same chip have been tweaked differently and score lower. However, the more intriguing bit here is single-core performance, and a single 2.26GHz Twister core scores upwards of 3,400 - as much as the dual-core 2.3GHz Denver CPU inside the Nexus 9.
So, Apple's claim for a 1.8x performance improvement over the iPad Air 2, doesn't seem to hold true, at least not in Geekbench - it's more like 20-something percent. The Sony Xperia Z4 Tablet scores almost identical to the iPad Air 2, hence it trails the iPad Pro. The aging Galaxy Note Pro 12.2 is no match for any of the current powerhouses.
GeekBench 3
Higher is better
-
Meizu Pro 5
5578 -
Apple iPad Pro
5476 -
Samsung Galaxy S6 edge+
5158 -
Samsung Galaxy Note5
5124 -
Apple iPad Air 2
4464 -
Sony Xperia Z4 Tablet v2
4459 -
Apple iPhone 6s
4427 -
Apple iPhone 6s Plus
4413 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 9.7
4275 -
Sony Xperia Z5 Premium
4194 -
HTC One M9
3761 -
HTC Nexus 9
3470 -
Nokia N1
2835 -
Galaxy Note Pro 12.2 (Exynos)
2703 -
Apple iPad mini 3
2486
In Antutu, the iPad Pro still can't beat the Meizu Pro 5, but does leave the other Exynos 7420 devices behind. It also comfortably outpaces the newest Galaxy Tab S2 9.7. The current-gen iPhones score noticeably lower too.
AnTuTu 5
Higher is better
-
Meizu Pro 5
74655 -
Apple iPad Pro
72871 -
Samsung Galaxy Note5
69465 -
Samsung Galaxy S6 edge+
68324 -
Sony Xperia Z5 Premium
62652 -
HTC Nexus 9
60297 -
Apple iPhone 6s
59074 -
Apple iPhone 6s Plus
58582 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 9.7
52170 -
HTC One M9
51427 -
Nokia N1
46547
In Basemark II 2.0, however, the iPad Pro is without competition. The iPhone 6s/6s duo come closest, but still post substantially lower scores.
Basemark OS 2.0
Higher is better
-
Apple iPad Pro
2813 -
Apple iPhone 6s Plus
2261 -
Apple iPhone 6s
2195 -
Meizu Pro 5
1837 -
Samsung Galaxy S6 edge+
1789 -
Sony Xperia Z5 Premium
1687 -
Sony Xperia Z4 Tablet v2
1602 -
HTC Nexus 9
1540 -
HTC One M9
1365 -
Nokia N1
1166
Graphics tests paint the picture of an extremely powerful GPU. Acing the offscreen part in GFXBench 3.0 Manhattan, the iPad Pro's score drops significantly for the onscreen test. It still scores an excellent 29.4fps, and don't forget that the GPU needs to push some 5.6 million of pixels worth of resolution. The aging Galaxy Note 12.2 scores a meagre 2.2fps in comparison.
GFX 3.0 Manhattan (1080p offscreen)
Higher is better
-
Apple iPad Pro
62.5 -
Apple iPhone 6s Plus
39.5 -
Apple iPhone 6s
39.5 -
Apple iPad Air 2
32.6 -
HTC Nexus 9
31.5 -
Sony Xperia Z4 Tablet v2
27 -
Sony Xperia Z5 Premium
26 -
Meizu Pro 5
25 -
Samsung Galaxy S6 edge+
25 -
HTC One M9
23 -
Samsung Galaxy Note5
21 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 9.7
14 -
Apple iPad mini 3
13.1 -
Nokia N1
13 -
Galaxy Note Pro 12.2 (Exynos)
5.5
GFX 3.0 Manhattan (onscreen)
Higher is better
-
Apple iPhone 6s
53.6 -
Apple iPhone 6s Plus
38.6 -
Apple iPad Pro
29.4 -
Sony Xperia Z5 Premium
27 -
Meizu Pro 5
25 -
Apple iPad Air 2
24.7 -
HTC One M9
24 -
HTC Nexus 9
22.6 -
Sony Xperia Z4 Tablet v2
16 -
Samsung Galaxy Note5
15 -
Samsung Galaxy S6 edge+
15 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 9.7
12 -
Nokia N1
9.6 -
Apple iPad mini 3
8.9 -
Galaxy Note Pro 12.2 (Exynos)
2.8
Basemark Metal should yield cross-platform-comparable results with its Basemark ES 3.1 Android counterpart. Here the iPad Pro is in a league of its own, scoring twice as high as the iPhones, which are in turn miles ahead of anything Android has to offer right now.
Basemark ES 3.1 / Metal
Higher is better
-
Apple iPad Pro
1818 -
Apple iPhone 6s Plus
916 -
Apple iPhone 6s
879 -
Sony Xperia Z5 Premium
482 -
Meizu Pro 5
409 -
HTC One M9
409 -
Samsung Galaxy S6 edge+
348
In web browsing, the iPad Pro delivers as well. It only managed to run the JavaScript Kraken benchmark, but it passed with flying colors, scoring higher than the iPhone 6s and miles ahead of Android flagships. Our other usual test - Browsermark - was unfortunately a no-go on Apple's tablet, just like it was on the iPhone 6s.
Kraken 1.1
Lower is better
-
Apple iPad Pro
1484 -
Apple iPhone 6s Plus
1731 -
Apple iPhone 6s
1737 -
Samsung Galaxy Note5
3702 -
Samsung Galaxy S6 edge+
3767 -
Meizu Pro 5
3907 -
HTC Nexus 9
3953 -
Apple iPad Air 2
4054 -
Samsung Galaxy Tab S2 9.7
4135 -
Sony Xperia Z5 Premium
4226 -
Nokia N1
5154 -
Apple iPad mini 3
5382 -
HTC One M9
5500 -
Sony Xperia Z4 Tablet v2
5577
Overall, the iPad Pro aced all tests and proved that Apple has indeed built some serious hardware into it. There's hardly a tablet on the market now with more punch - at least one running a mobile OS, that is.
Reader comments
- Bro
- 30 Jan 2023
- sXy
To all of the weirdos out there who think this ipad is still good - its rubbish for multitasking and therefore bad for working and gaming. Good for people who just surf the web tho. Ps info on the specs page is wrong - my one is running iPadOS 1...
- AnonD-453339
- 28 Aug 2016
- tZk
It pen was incredible good just like the real pen , nice job apple i hope there are ipad pro 2 come out
- Faisal shafi
- 22 Apr 2016
- uWG
Listen pls all non Apple users do not compare Apple wth shamesung or other devices apple never compare wth u all okkkkkk u all r best now get lostttt and be remember simple if u have iPhone u have an iPhone if u don't have iPhone u don't have an iPho...