Apple recently announced its newest crop of iPads and, as usual, they look great with excellent screens, a minimum of 64 gigabytes of storage with the option for a lot more and, of course, the ability to run millions of iOS apps. For many tablet buyers, the only question is which iPad to buy, especially for those who have an iPhone and a Mac who want consistency across their devices or who need to run iOS apps. The new iPads start at $329, which is pretty good by Apple standards, or you could pay as much as $1,099 for an iPad Pro with plenty of options in-between.
But before you buy any tablet, think about how you will use it and what you really need. If you’re in one of those categories where the iPad makes the most sense, then of course that’s what you should buy. But if you’re like many tablet users, you may be just as happy with a much less expensive tablet or no tablet at all.
I do have a couple of tablets, but I could easily fit into that “no tablet” category. One reason is because my current smartphone has a 6.34-inch (diagonal) display which is about 3/4 the size of the Apple iPad mini display. It’s clearly not a tablet but — for most things I do — it’s big enough. Sure, a larger screen means a larger on-screen keyboard, the option for bigger text and a more immersive video experience, but it also means having to carry an extra device with you. My phone is almost always with me so, when it’s time to do something that might be a little better on a tablet, I usually stick with the phone because it’s so handy.
The other reason I rarely use a tablet is because I have a light and small notebook PC. A lot of today’s notebook PCs, including the MacBook Air and the HP Spectre x360, weigh under three pounds, and although they might not run iOS, they do run an enormous number of programs, including web browsers that can do nearly anything someone might do on a tablet. When I sit down in my backyard to watch a video, I’ll either use my phone if it’s a relatively short one or my laptop if I want the larger screen and better speakers to watch a movie or TV show. I find the experience better than using a tablet.
In theory, a tablet is better than a phone for reading a book, but I almost never bother to get out my tablet for reading because my phone is so much more convenient. Even my wife, who is an avid reader, rarely bothers to use her tablet. If you want an electronic version of a near-book experience, you’re better off with a Kindle or other e-reader that has black text against a white background on a screen that works well in bright sunlight.
Less expensive tablets
Most people mainly use tablets for entertainment, reading or email, and if that’s the case, you don’t need to spend hundreds of dollars on an iPad. There are plenty of Android tablets that are significantly less expensive than similar Apple offerings that run all the Android apps that also run on phones. It is relatively rare to find an iOS app that isn’t also available on Android. PCMag reviewed “The Best Android Tablets for 2021.”
From my perspective, the best tablet deals are Amazon’s Fire Tablets that start at $49.99. The least expensive of these have “special offers,” which is Amazon’s euphemism for advertisements. They really aren’t intrusive and go away as soon as you start using the machine, so I don’t mind them. The $49.99 model costs $64.99 if you want one that doesn’t display ads on the lock screen.
Fire Tablets run FireOS, which is based on Android but doesn’t run regular Android apps by default; however, there are ways to run Android apps which you can learn about by Googling “Install Google Play store on Fire Tablet.” But before you do that, explore Amazon’s app store, which has a great many apps including most of the major streaming services. I’ve been using various Fire tablets for several years and have never felt a need to install standard Android apps.
Tablets for Kids
You can give your kid almost any tablet and figure out a way to make it child friendly. Or you can buy a Fire Tablet Kids that is pre-configured for children with free parental controls and a free year’s subscription to Amazon’s Kids+ service that renews automatically at $2.99 a month for Prime members ($4.99 for others) if you don’t cancel after the first year. Kids+ provides 20,000 apps, games, books, videos, songs, and Audible books, according to Amazon, including educational content from National Geographic, Rabbids Coding and LEGO.
Amazon also has a Parent Dashboard, which is always free, that enables parents to use an app or a webpage to add content to their child’s library, limit web activity, adjust the child’s age filter and monitor how your child is using the device or other compatible devices including Alexa, Fire TV, Kindle Readers and Amazon services on the web or mobile devices. The content filters only apply to Amazon Kids+ and Amazon-curated web browser content, but many apps have their own parental management tools.
In addition, Fire Tablet Kids comes with a ruggedized rubber case and what Amazon calls a “2-year worry-free guarantee,” instead of the 1-year limited warranty on the standard Fire Tablets.
Kids tablets are a bit more expensive. For example, the Fire Tablet HD 10 Kids costs $199.99 compared with $149.99 for the standard version without the content, ruggedized cover and “worry free guarantee” that includes breakage. The Fire HD 8 Kids costs $139.99 compared with $89.99 for the standard version or $49.99 for a refurbished standard 8-inch tablet.
All Fire Tablets, including the less expensive standard versions, can be configured for multiple family members, including adults and kids. Parents can install the kids experience on any Fire Tablet or the adult experience on a kids tablet, protected by a passcode so that your child can’t access the parents’ content.
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Disclosure: Larry Magid is CEO of ConnectSafely, a nonprofit internet safety organization that receives support from Amazon, Google and other tech companies.