Apple’s CFO Just Hinted at a Delayed ‘iPad 12’
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Apple has already cranked out a surprising number of new products this year, from the iPhone 17e and M4 iPad Air to the MacBook Neo and AirPods Max 2, but there’s one product that’s conspicuous by its absence: a new entry-level iPad — and there’s no sign it’s coming anytime soon.
Rumors of a 12th-generation iPad have been circulating for months, and many expected it would make an appearance during Apple’s big week in March, yet the month ended without a peep about any tablets other than the mildly refreshed M4 iPad Air.
Other than two very notable periods of silence, Apple’s standard iPad has seen mostly annual refreshes. That’s why we’re on the 11th-generation model.
The first four generations came between 2010 and early 2013, followed by two years of the original iPad Air in 2013–14 which, despite the name, was still Apple’s entry-level tablet. After two years of focusing on the new iPad Pro lineup, Apple returned to the plain old “iPad” name in 2017 with a fifth-generation model (choosing to number generations solely by name). From there, it had a steady run of annual updates until a redesigned 10th-generation model arrived in last 2022.
It was after this that we saw an 18-month drought. 2023 marked the only year since the birth of Apple’s tablet that no new iPads were released, and that silence was broken only by the higher-end iPad Pro and iPad Air in early 2024. We didn’t see another entry-level iPad until early 2025, when Apple gave us the current 11th-generation model.
While that timing makes it entirely possible that Apple may have intentionally planned to space out its standard iPad models, the current iPad is something of an aberration in the lineup. On the heels of the iPhone 16 lineup and Apple Intelligence, the “iPad 11” was released with a non-AI capable A16 chip, making it the only new device to be left out of Apple’s flagship features.
That’s led to the common belief that it’s more than due for a refresh, with at least an A18 chip or possibly even an A19. That’s the only way it could logically go, since Apple skipped over a standard A17 version. While the latest iPad mini packs in an A17 Pro chip, those are undoubtedly “binned” leftovers from the iPhone 15 Pro era, and Apple may not have enough to go around.
When Will We See the Next iPad?
Some speculated that Apple avoided announcing a new iPad simply because it didn’t want to undercut its shiny new $599 MacBook with a $349 Apple Intelligence-capable iPad running on a very similar chip. There’s likely some truth to that, as the March events set that $599 price as the “baseline” for Apple Intelligence — the price of not only the new MacBook Neo, but also the A19-powered iPhone 17e.
In that case, it makes sense for Apple to wait for the excitement around the MacBook Neo to fade before quietly slipping out the $349 iPad, and Bloomberg’s Mark Gurman believes the new iPad is ready to go and expected to ship this spring. However, comments from Apple’s chief financial officer during yesterday’s earnings call may have thrown some cold water on that prediction.
It’s the usual “business-speak” we hear on these calls, but CFO Kevan Parekh called out “the A16-powered iPad” as something Apple will be drawing comparisons to in the next quarter:
We expect our June quarter total company revenue to grow by 14 to 17% year-over-year, which comprehends our best view of constrained supply. ?On iPad, keep in mind, we face a difficult compare driven by the launch of the A16-powered iPad in the prior year.
Reading between the lines, Parekh is essentially predicting that Apple’s year-over-year revenue growth — between Q3 2025 and Q3 2026 — will potentially be lower due to the lack of a new iPad arriving during the quarter. Although the current iPad arrived in early March 2025, that was already two-thirds of the way through Q2, meaning Q3 would have been the first full quarter that it was on sale.
To be clear, this doesn’t entirely rule out a new iPad showing up later in the quarter. Apple’s Worldwide Developers Conference (WWDC) keynote is on June 8, and while it would be unusual to announce a new iPad during what’s otherwise a developer-focused event, that might still be a good week to quietly push it out via a newsroom announcement. A June release would still make for “a difficult compare” as it’s unlikely to drive huge sales numbers in the remaining two or three weeks of the quarter.
However, if Parekh’s comments mean we won’t see a new iPad at all in Q3, then we’ll likely find ourselves waiting until September. Apple rarely releases new products over the summer, and shifting the “iPad 12” to the fall would actually put it back on Apple’s recent track for new iPad releases — putting what’s largely an education-focused device on sale near the start of a new school year and in time for the holiday season.
