Prime Day iPad deals are officially here as Amazon’s sale has begun in earnest, and already we’re seeing some really solid savings on a bunch of different models.
One early standout is a big discount on the most affordable model, letting you snag the still-capable 9th edition tablet for $80 less than normal at Amazon. Meanwhile, the price of the slick and compact iPad Mini has been slashed by $100 at Amazon. Things are likely to shuffle around plenty throughout the event, but as far as out-of-the-gate savings, these ain’t half bad.
Of course, Prime Day has become such a juggernaut that, ironically, it isn’t limited to just Amazon these days, as competing retailers have started slashing prices in an attempt to steal some of the attention from Amazon.
Similarly, iPads themselves have grown from basic streaming screens to much more versatile and powerful machines depending on the model, with some in particular making our list of the best gaming tablets on the market right now. That’s why we’ve been tracking Prime Day iPad deals for so many years; if you’re after a big-screen Remote Play or Game Pass Cloud Gaming device, there’s no better way to do it. We watch these prices all year, ticking off record lows and matching different retailers’ bundle options. That means we know a deal actually worth buying when we spot one, and you can be sure that there already are several for you to give a gander.
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Prime Day iPad deals FAQ
When will Amazon Prime Day iPad deals end?
In spite of what its name would suggest, the Prime Day iPad deals don’t just last for 24 hours; they run until midnight on Wednesday, July 17. Although a few discounts will persevere afterward, the majority of savings should disappear after that point.
Does Apple have a Prime Day discount?
Apple itself likely won’t be running ‘Prime Day’ discounts, but with the sale taking place in the summer there will hopefully be plenty of direct savings to take advantage of. The official Apple website regularly offers annual discounts this time of year, to time in with back-to-school shopping. Usually, that’s around $100 / £100 off an iPad with education credentials, and sometimes with an extra App Store gift card included.
Do you need Prime for Amazon Prime Day iPad deals?
The short answer is yes, you’ll need an Amazon Prime membership to take advantage of this year’s offers. However, there’s a longer answer in here as well.
If you’re not planning on picking up a new subscription for the sale, it’s worth noting that other retailers often try to compete with the global online giant, launching their own sales over the same two day period. That means you’ll find many of the best Prime Day iPad deals price matched at a range of other sites. In the US, we’d recommend keeping an eye on Walmart, Best Buy, and Target, and in the UK we expect Currys, Very, and Argos to get involved as well.
Of course, you can always keep things simple and shop in one place without paying for the necessary Prime membership. Amazon often offers Prime free trials around its sales as a way to encourage more shoppers, so time it right and you could be browsing the virtual aisles without having a paid subscription.
What time of year is cheapest to buy an iPad?
In general, the absolute cheapest time to buy an iPad is when its next-generation model has just released. This is when we see the heaviest discounts on each device (just look at the rates on the M1 iPad Air over the last few weeks). However, these savings only last a very short amount of time and stock is incredibly fast-moving. If you’re looking to buy a new generation iPad, the cheapest times of the year are July, October, and November.
July typically hosts Amazon Prime Day and November carries the full weight of Black Friday / Cyber Monday. However, Amazon has also been doubling up its Prime Day efforts in recent years, adding another sale in October. In general, these events later in the year will yield slightly lower prices on iPads than the summer. Each tablet has been on the shelves a few months longer, and the holiday shopping frenzy can sometimes squeeze those rates even further.
We say sometimes because last year the M1 iPad Air was exactly the same price between both July and October Amazon Prime Day events and November’s Black Friday – $499. However, the 10th generation iPad dropped to $399 in July’s offers, with a further fall to $349 towards the end of November’s event. Similarly, the cheaper 9th generation model hit a respectable $279 last Prime Day, to fall a little further to $249 in Amazon’s October event and throughout the entire Black Friday / Cyber Monday season.
So when should you buy an iPad? If you’re looking for the absolute lowest price possible and you don’t need a new device right away, we’d recommend waiting for Black Friday (or at least, for a potential future Prime event in October). However, the price differences aren’t major and considering there’s generally only around $50 in it, those who need a tablet sooner rather than later wouldn’t be fools to shop in July.
Which iPad should you buy on Amazon Prime Day?
Thankfully, the current iPad lineup is easy to navigate in terms of who each model is aimed at. Apple’s luxury tablets span from $300 to well over $1,500 in some cases, but not everyone is going to need the power of those premium Pro models. Whether you’re hunting through this year’s Prime Day iPad deals for work, streaming, or study, we’re showing you exactly which models you should be looking for in this year’s sales just below with plenty more information on each device further down the page.
| iPad 10.2-inch / 10.9-inch | Web browsing, streaming, light gaming |
| iPad Air | Note-taking / study, heavier gameplay |
| iPad Mini | Web browsing, streaming, and gaming on the move |
| iPad Pro | Demanding apps, content creation, multi-tasking |
What are the latest iPad models?
The iPad models you need to watch out for this Prime Day are the following:
iPad Air 11-inch M2 (2024)
iPad Air 13-inch M2 (2024)
iPad Pro 11-inch M4 (2024)
iPad Pro 13-inch M4 (2024)
iPad 10th generation, 10.9-inch (2022)
iPad Mini 6th generation (2021)
iPad 9th generation, 10.2-inch (2021)
What we expect from Prime Day iPad deals in 2024
With four new iPad models on the shelves (two size options for both the Air and Pro), we’re not expecting too many major savings on 2024’s iterations. However, the 10th-generation iPad, 9th-generation iPad, and iPad Mini are all looking a little older compared to their newer siblings. While savings might be sparse further up the price range, then, we could see some particularly strong rates at the cheaper end of the scale.
We’re taking you through each model just below, with all our predictions in one place.
iPad 9th generation
The base-level iPad is always the go-to for any deal-hunter. With a relatively affordable price tag, and a jack of all trades nature, it’s the perfect starter device for anyone who just needs to browse the web, stream some content, and play some lighter games. Bumping up to a 64GB base storage (the previous generation only offered 32GB), the 2021 model has been a little more stubborn to price drops than its ancestors.
Thankfully we’ve seen that price crumbling even further than its predecessors in the latter half of 2023 and in the first months of 2024. The lowest we’ve spotted so far was $229.99 during Black Friday, an extra $20 off the previous $249.99 record (set during October’s Prime Day event). We’d expect that $229.99 rate to return to the shelves this summer. The 9th generation model has been available for $249.99 pretty much ever since Black Friday ended, so a further $20 coupon or on-page saving isn’t a stretch.
Over in the UK, things aren’t looking so hot. The 2021 iPad took an age to start dropping its price tag across the Atlantic, sticking close to a £319 RRP for most of its first year. We did see some reprieve in July’s Prime Day sales, though – in the form of a £299 sale price. That was dipped a little further to £287 later on in the year – giving us hope for a little extra off the £300 position we see day to day here.
10th Generation iPad
The latest base model iPad launched at a lofty $449 / £499 but those days are thankfully over now. Apple announced a price reduction on this model with its latest batch of devices, dropping that MSRP down to $349 / £349. Considering this tablet was on sale for $399 in previous Prime Day iPad deals that’s big news.
We were previously pitching at an expected price for $329 for this model on Prime Day, but recent sales have already beaten that – so we’re now expecting this device to stick to its current record low for $319 in the US. We’ve already seen savings reaching our expected £329 threshold in the UK, but there haven’t been any improvements on those numbers in the last week or so.
We’re not expecting big savings here overall. The US is generally still hugging close to $330 – $340 day to day. This won’t be a $299 / £299 device over Prime Day, but we could see around $30 / £20 off.
iPad Mini 6
The iPad Mini 6 doesn’t quite have the same urgency behind it as the 10.2-inch model. We don’t see annual refreshes on this line and there’s still some serious value packed into that price proposal. Still, in the US we’ve seen Black Friday’s $399.99 rate holding onto the shelves well over the last few months, sticking around well into 2024. That’s a $100 discount we would expect to see more of over Prime Day, potentially with a further $20 coupon code dropping us back down to the $379 record low we saw in last year’s sale.
We haven’t seen the UK’s record low £459 price on the iPad Mini 6 in some time, with the 64GB model holding onto a sales figure of between £465 and £475 for most of its life so far. That means we would expect to see that £20 discount over the £479 RRP return in the fall, though it would be slightly too optimistic to expect anything more from this year’s iPad Mini deals.
iPad Air
The new 11-inch iPad Air M2 has already seen a few taster discounts in the US, dropping down to $569.99 most recently. That means there’s certainly wiggle room for another discount during Prime Day iPad deals, but considering this is such a new device we wouldn’t expect to see much more off that final price. We’re expecting things to go back to $569 here in the summer. Over in the UK, the same model hasn’t seen any major savings yet. With US prices dropping quite quickly, we’re still optimistic for a smaller discount during the thick of this year’s sales with around £20 off.
The larger model has also seen similar savings, dropping to $769.99 in May and trickling further down to $754 in June. That means our previous prediction of a return to this $769.99 position might be a little shaky. If we’re lucky, those numbers could drop down to $749.99 in this year’s summer sale.
The previous generation M1 iPad Air is now all but stripped from the shelves, so we wouldn’t expect too much action here over Prime Day.
iPad Pro
The new iPad Pro M4 sits at a very similar MSRP to its previous generation, which means we can expect to see the kinds of savings in this first Prime Day as we did back in 2022. Considering the 11-inch model has already hit that $949.99 position we’re confident that a $50 discount is heading the US’s way come the summer – and that discount could even be improved with additional coupons on the day, shaving an additional $20-$50 off the price. We saw similar efforts in previous models, but we’ll have to see how 2024’s releases fare in the run-up.
The UK hasn’t seen any major discounts on the 11-inch model so far. That doesn’t mean they’re not heading our way, but we’re more conservative in our predictions across the pond.
We’ve gone a little more optimistic in our Prime Day predictions for the iPad Pro. The fact that the M2 model is still so powerful, even against the M4, and that the new wave of Pros doesn’t add too much additional functionality could mean we hit these kinds of sale prices a little quicker. The previous generation pretty much lived at this $1,199 / £1,199 rate – so it’s not too unreasonable to hope for a $100 / £100 discount in the summer.
If you’re more interested in picking up an older device you could stand to save plenty of cash. These 2022 models were on the shelves for far less than the new M4 versions when Apple launched its new tablets onto the scene. However, they’ve largely been picked off the market now and you might struggle to find them in stock. We’d recommend grabbing one of these before Prime Day – as availability is already pretty scarce and what little stock does remain likely won’t hold out for the summer festivities.
We’re also getting you prepped for all the best Prime Day laptop deals, Prime Day PS5 deals, and Prime Day Xbox Series X deals.
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