iPad Mini 6 announced with new design, colors, Touch ID, 5G, Pencil support and more

During its special event today, Apple announced the latest generation of the iPad Mini, the 6th one in the family. This is a pretty major update for the iPad Mini, bringing a new design, new colors, and plenty of new features including 5G support.

First off, the new iPad Mini (6th generation) features an all-new enclosure design with minimal bezels all around, similar to the iPad Pro. The new design also comes in a range of four colors, including purple, pink, starlight, and space grey.

Because of the smaller bezels, there’s no longer a home button under the display, and instead, Touch ID is built into the power button at the top. The iPad Mini also has a larger 8.3-inch Liquid Retina display thanks to the smaller bezels. The display can reach up to 500 nits of brightness and has the usual features like true tone and wide color support.

The big news with the display is the addition of support for the second-generation Apple Pencil. This Apple Pencil features a magnetic charging connector and it attaches to the side of the iPad Mini when you’re not using it.

Another big feature in the 6th generation iPad Mini is the addition of a USB Type-C port to replace the Lightning connector used before. This upgrade is similar to what the iPad Pro got in 2018, and it also means you get up to 5Gbps transfer speeds using this port, which is 10x faster than on previous generations. And speaking of higher speeds, the new iPad Mini also supports 5G with download speeds up to 3.5Gbps.

This is all thanks to the new chipset inside, the Apple A15 Bionic. This is debuting today, and it’s also inside the new iPhone 13 series. It has a 6-core CPU that promises up to 40% more performance compared to the previous iPad Mini, and a 5-core GPU delivers up to 80% more performance for graphics. There’s also a 16-core Neural Engine for AI-related tasks, which Apple says will result in 2x more performance for machine learning tasks like the new Live Text feature in iPadOS 15.

Moving on to the cameras, there’s now a 12MP sensor on both the front and back of the iPad Mini (6th generation). The rear camera features Focus Pixels, a wider aperture, and True Tone flash for more natural lighting in photos. On the front, Apple is using an ultra-wide 12MP camera, which enables the Center Stage feature introduced with the latest iPad Pro. This allows the camera to focus and zoom in on the user as they move around during a video call, and it can also accommodate new people joining in.

The 6th generation iPad Mini will launch with iPadOS 15, which brings a whole suite of features to the platform. In addition to the aforementioned Live Text, there’s Focus, Apple’s take on Do Not Disturb, new widget layouts, and more. You can read all about iOS and iPadOS 15 here.

The iPad Mini is available to order today on the Apple Store starting at $499, and it will begin shipping on September 24.

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