Apple announces a refreshed iPad mini with huge new upgrades

All New Ipad Mini (Image credit: Apple)

What you need to know

Apple has today announced the smallest iPad is getting its biggest upgrade ever.
The new iPad mini is now a miniature iPad Air.

Apple has just announced an all-new iPad mini with a massive redesign that you'll need to see to believe.

Just as rumors had suggested, the new iPad mini is a miniature iPad Air in all kinds of ways. It now supports USB-C, ditching Lightning for the first time. This is also the first iPad mini to support 5G cellular connectivity, too.

Alongside the all-new look, Apple has included Touch ID built right into the power button to make room for the new 8.3-inch display that supports Wide Color and True Tone support.

Further making the iPad mini a great solution for students, Apple has upgraded the front camera to a 12-megapixel part with Center Stage support, making it perfect for use both in the home and in the classroom. Throw in the new support for the second-generation Apple Pencil, and this is probably the best iPad for those wanting to take notes on the move. Colors? Apple's new iPad mini will come in space gray, pink, purple, and starlight colors.

2021 Ipad Mini Colors (Image credit: Apple)

The new iPad mini delivers an amazing experience in a gorgeous new array of finishes — pink, starlight, purple, and space gray. iPad mini features a larger 8.3-inch Liquid Retina display with narrow borders, all while keeping the same compact footprint. With advanced technologies such as 500 nits of brightness, a P3 wide color gamut, anti-reflective screen coating, True Tone, and full lamination, images and video will be vibrant and come right up to the surface of the glass. And new landscape stereo speakers, combined with the new display, deliver a great movie-viewing experience.

Apple has also announced that the iPad mini will be 40% faster in terms of raw CPU performance, while GPU performance will jump 80%. The included neural engine will also be 2x faster, all thanks to the use of Apple's speedy A15 chip.

With all of these changes, Apple will sell the new iPad mini starting at $499 with orders kicking off today. Buyers will see their new iPad mini arrive next week.

Oliver Haslam has written about Apple and the wider technology business for more than a decade with bylines on How-To Geek, PC Mag, iDownloadBlog, and many more. He has also been published in print for Macworld, including cover stories. At iMore, Oliver is involved in daily news coverage and, not being short of opinions, has been known to 'explain' those thoughts in more detail, too. Having grown up using PCs and spending far too much money on graphics card and flashy RAM, Oliver switched to the Mac with a G5 iMac and hasn't looked back. Since then he's seen the growth of the smartphone world, backed by iPhone, and new product categories come and go. Current expertise includes iOS, macOS, streaming services, and pretty much anything that has a battery or plugs into a wall. Oliver also covers mobile gaming for iMore, with Apple Arcade a particular focus. He's been gaming since the Atari 2600 days and still struggles to comprehend the fact he can play console quality titles on his pocket computer.