Android tablets are really going head-to-head with the iPad?

In 2010, Apple released the first iPad. To be honest, when I first saw the iPad, I was a bit confused. This kind of digital product between mobile phone and laptop always feels like "four different". For the original iPad, I believe many people are as skeptical as I am.

This skepticism is not just because the iPad is a new form of digital product, but more because it is doubtful of its functionality. Because the iPad at that time almost overlapped with the iPhone in terms of function. What exactly can an iPad do? What features are unique to iPad? This was all questioning the iPad at the time.

But in fact, Apple's ultimate expectations for the iPad are probably a few points: to provide an unforgettable simplicity, beautiful shape, and simple enough interaction design. Jonathan wants to design a product that meets the user's needs: as long as the user has it in his hand, he can instantly understand how to use it, and the whole process does not need to be explained, let alone additional learning costs.

Looking back now, the iPad has undoubtedly done these few things, not only did it, but also did it very well.

Just two months after its first release, the iPad sold more than 3 million units, and Apple's success in the tablet market has attracted a large wave of Android manufacturers. But Apple eventually captured 83% of the market share and became the absolute boss of the tablet market.

Although Apple accounts for the absolute majority, But Android manufacturers are not willing, Xiaomi, Huawei, Samsung and other manufacturers have launched tablet computers. But it turned out that none of them could replicate the wonders of the iPad. It is even no exaggeration to say that the Android tablets at that time were pressed to the ground by the iPad and rubbed, without the ability to fight back.

In the following years, Apple's iPad product line continued to enrich, and successively launched iPad mini, iPad Air and more high-end iPad Pro products to adapt to different groups of people. On the other hand, After experiencing the initial blind follow-up, the Android tablet market has fallen into a long period of silence. Even Xiaomi, the vanguard of the Android tablet camp, came to a standstill after launching the Xiaomi Tablet 4 in 2018.

But since the end of last year, the situation seems to have changed somewhat, and the release of the Xiaomi Mi Tablet 5 seems to indicate that the Android tablet will glow a second spring. Lenovo followed suit with the release of the Small New Pad series, and Huawei and Honor also launched new tablets again after many years. Among them, there is also a new force to join: oppo and vivo have recently launched their first tablets.

Is it true that Android manufacturers are still not dead hearted? After many years, are you planning to make a comeback and fight the Apple iPad? For a time, so many flat plates were released in a pile, which really gave people the illusion of a strong killing back. Many self-media have said that today's Android tablets have made great progress compared with a few years ago. Of course, I don't deny this, but does the Android tablet really have the strength of a hard iPad?

Unfortunately, the gap between the current Android tablet and the iPad is still very obvious, and this gap is all-round.

First of all, in terms of hardware, Apple's A-series processor performance has been significantly ahead of other chips of the same era, and the chips used on the iPad will have excellent performance due to better heat dissipation. Since last year, Apple has directly stuffed the desktop performance monster M1 into the iPad Pro, making the tablet computer have the strength of a laptop in theoretical performance.

Then, Apple further downgraded the M1 to the new iPad Air, and even the iPad mini of less than 4,000 yuan used the A15 chip.

On the other hand, the Android tablet camp, even the newly released OPPO Pad and vivo Pad have adopted the Snapdragon 870 chip two years ago, and this is already a chip from two years ago, and today, the performance can only be said to be enough, and Apple's M1 There is at least two generations of generation difference. And this generation gap cannot be compensated in a short period of time. It is also this huge generation difference in core hardware that makes it difficult for Android tablets to have the strength to compete with iPad.

To put it bluntly, the iPad with the M1 chip is a dimensionality reduction attack for other Android tablets.

The same problem is also reflected in the screen, today's iPad Pro has used the most advanced mini LED display technology, with Apple's ProMotion high brush and excellent color management, the iPad screen can be said to be the ceiling of the current tablet.

Although the Android tablet also partially supports high brushing, it still appears to be stretched in multiple dimensions such as resolution, color reproduction and color accuracy, and there is a gap compared with its own flagship mobile phone, not to mention the industry benchmark of iPad. The adaptation of third-party apps to high brushes is also imperfect.

In addition to these gaps in the parameters floating on the surface, there are also gaps in texture, quality control and detail that are not easy for everyone to perceive. Recently, the well-known digital blogger @Blood Jingqi said that the two OPPO Pads he received had obvious quality control problems such as screen degumming and power button warping. For OPPO, a manufacturer with strong supply chain control ability, it is true that such a low-level mistake should not be made.

Imagine if the average consumer can buy such a product, then the shopping experience is undoubtedly very bad.

In contrast, the exquisite and excellent workmanship of the iPad is obvious to everyone. The all-aluminum alloy body, coupled with the tight seam process, makes it more like a work of art. I have to say that iPad has never disappointed in detail.

In the software part, iPad has crushed almost all of the current Android tablets. Evolved from ios, iPadOS is almost perfectly adapted to the iPad, which not only has a reasonable UI layout, a new multi-tasking interface and a multi-window mode. More importantly, Apple's strict control of app makes almost all apps exclusively adapted to iPad.

Although many Android tablets are also known to be targeted adaptations, the reality is that due to the uneven quality of third-party APP, many APP multi-tasking and split-screen modes are not perfect, and some APP cannot even be displayed in full-screen horizontally. What is more fatal is that most of Android's app does not have a Pad version, and some Pad versions have not been updated or even removed for a long time, such as the Taobao HD version in the early years.

In fact, this is a vicious circle, because the Android tablet market share is small, APP developers are not willing to invest energy and time to do special adaptation, because the lack of special adaptation leads to poor experience, consumers naturally do not buy it.

If you look at the deeper level, the iPad also has the advantage of the peripheral product ecology, and today's iPad can be seamlessly connected with the iPhone and the Macbook, such as sharing the clipboard with the iPhone, acting as the second screen of the Macbook through the carrier and other advanced functions. With the Macbook fully embracing the ARM architecture of the M1 chip, the iPad app can even run on the computer, which allows the iPad to be more deeply integrated into Apple's product system.

Most domestic mobile phone manufacturers simply cannot establish a complete and mature product ecological chain, so the deep integration of tablets and other products cannot be discussed at all. For example, neither OPPO nor vivo has PC products, and their tablets are far less compatible with their own mobile phones than Apple.

I often hear friends around me say that "Apple Family Barrel" is very useful, in fact, this also reflects the advantages of Apple's software and hardware ecological integration.

Before buying productivity, buying after iQiyi is a lot of people's ridicule of iPad, it is true that the productivity of iPad can not be compared with PC, but it is undeniable that in the field of tablets, iPad still has the strongest productivity. At least, compared to a number of Android tablets stronger than a star and a half.

The Apple Pencil and magic keyboard make the iPad's productivity stand out on tablets. In recent years, android tablets have also begun to roll in terms of productivity, unwilling to lie flat, commendable, but after actually using it, I found that the so-called productivity of Android tablets is not worth mentioning compared with iPad: the writing delay of the stylus, the feel of the supporting keyboard, and even the adaptation of the productivity APP, in short, the gap is still obvious.

Huawei once relied on Hongmeng Ecology to single-handedly let us see the hope of the revival of Android tablets, but now it is difficult to face US sanctions. When the Xiaomi Tablet official blog announced its return, we were excited. When OPPO and vivo successively entered the tablet computer market, we were also very happy.

But the thinking of manufacturers has not fundamentally changed. It is not difficult to find that whether it is Xiaomi, vivo or OPPO, or even Huawei, their positioning of their own tablets or as a supplement and expansion of mobile phones is not like a product that is fully committed. This can be seen in the classification of tablets on various websites. On the official website of vivo, vivo Pad is only classified as a subordinate category of intelligent hardware.

The status of iPad in Apple's product ecology is pivotal, and it is not even lost to the iPhone. In this regard alone, the iPad and a number of Android tablets are no longer in the same dimension.

In the past six months, major manufacturers have come together to release new Android tablets, which really gives people the illusion that Android tablets have "done". However, after careful experience, you will find that although the iPad is expensive, it is still the most cost-effective tablet on the market in terms of comprehensive software and hardware.

The price of Android tablets generally does not exceed 3,000 yuan, and the price is much lower than that of iPad, is it not cost-effective? In my opinion, the low price of this sacrifice of comprehensive experience is not considered to be cost-effective, but pure low-end.

Apple has been deeply involved in the tablet market for many years, and the advantages of the iPad are all-round, especially in this era when tablets are increasingly moving closer to productivity, Android tablets still have a long way to go.

Produced by ZAKER Technology

Text / Tan Zhaofei