The new iPad Air is only a few days old and buzz is already circulating about its next iteration: the OLED M3 iPad Air. It’s no surprise that people are speculating about when we might see an M3 iPad, given that most of Apple’s product lineup features the latest in-house silicon.
The iPad Pro is equipped with M4 processors, which means there’s essentially only one product slot left for the debut of the M3 chip, and people seem confident that the M3 will appear in an OLED iPad Air. According to MacRumors, the speculation comes from a “private account with a proven track record of sharing accurate Apple subscription information.” While that adds some credibility to the claim, we can’t really be sure of anything so soon after a product launch.
MacRumors notes that Apple could introduce a 10.8-inch OLED iPad Air among them 2026 and 2028! That’s so far away I can’t even comprehend it. Even assuming this rumor is true, why would Apple push the launch of an M3 iPad so far ahead of the release of the M2 and M4 iPads?
A long wait ahead
Apple uses TSMC (Taiwanese Manufacturing Company) for all M-series chip orders, and bringing an entirely new line of chips to market so soon after the launch of the M3 (and subsequent product launches) is a tall order. It would make more sense to produce more M3 chips, update the entire product range, and save any M4 chips for iPad Pros or Macs.
There is potentially a lot of M3 inventory that can be used and sold, and given how quickly the M4 chips were launched after M3’s release, this supports our theory that there is only a surplus to be used. So there is no huge conspiracy theory here: this probably all has to do with production logistics.
However, if true, the rumor suggests that we may be in for a long wait for M5 chips, as TSMC is still currently marketing M3 chips. Honestly, I’m pretty happy about that, because the constant cycle of producing new products every year is incredibly wasteful and unnecessary. Waiting for supplies to run out and boosting sales of M3 products is a completely fair move here – especially since the iPad Air is a lighter device that doesn’t necessarily require more power than the M3 chip provides.
Apple has talked at length over the last few events about how committed the company is to being environmentally friendly – and if this rumor is true and we don’t see any more hardware updates for a long time, I know it’ll be fine.