It’s been nearly one month since Apple released its new, smaller version of the iPad Pro and we’re still learning more about it. A recent review by display experts suggest that the new iPad Pro has the best display on any mobile device.
Dr. Raymond M. Soneira, the President of DisplayMate, took a deep-dive into the 9.7-inch iPad Pro to see what the screen was made of. He found that not only was the device’s display a major improvement over the similarly sized iPad Air 2, but it was better than any of its competition.
“It is visually indistinguishable from perfect,” Soneira wrote. He suggested that the iPad’s screen is “very likely considerably better than any mobile display, monitor, TV or UHD TV that you have,” thanks to upgrades in its handling of color, reflectance, and brightness.
The new iPad Pro scored record marks for a mobile device for low screen reflectance. The iPad Air 2 was the previous record holder so it’s simply Apple building on its existing lead but it was still a marked improvement thanks to an anti-reflection coating that, according to DisplayMate’s testing, reflects just 1.7 percent of ambient light.
Soneira wasn’t as enthused about Apple’s two features that manipulate the display: True Tone and Night Shift. True Tone accounts for ambient light to make the display adjust to its surroundings like physical paper, while Night Shift reduces blue light throughout the evening to ease the eyes. Neither feature effects the actual capabilities of the display, though.
Of course, the high achievements of the 9.7-inch iPad Pro doesn’t mean there isn’t still work to be done; “visually indistinguishable from perfect” isn’t exactly perfect after all. Soneira suggested that preservation of image quality and readability in bright light were still major challenges for mobile displays, the iPad Pro included.
H/T DisplayMate
