Apple’s M6 iPad Pro will feature the company’s own 5G modem, while the M5 one, releasing later this year, will stick to Qualcomm.
iPad Pro with M6 to Get Apple-Designed Modem, M5 Model to Stick with Qualcomm
The news was shared by Bloomberg, and they say Apple is already working on the M6 iPad Pro, and it will ship with the company’s own 5G modem instead of Qualcomm.
I find this news rather strange, and let me explain why.
The thing is, the iPad Pro never had mmWave 5G despite its premium features. This means the C1 modem is already a great fit for a device like iPad Pro, which is limited to just sub-6GHz 5G.
Apple can make the switch to C1 this year with the M5 model if it wanted to.
Unless Apple is testing its chip with users of the iPhone 16e before bringing it to any other device. And so far, the chip has been doing pretty great in scenarios where you expect the modem to do its magic the most – in poor cellular reception areas.
For a lot of people, this news basically means nothing because an average iPad buyer goes for the Wi-Fi-only version of the device. Unless you really, really need that Apple modem in your iPad Pro, you can dismiss everything you read above.
But I care about this news a lot. Because my iPad Pro eats through battery life on cellular and barely gets me through the day, especially when I’m working on it exclusively.
The iPad Pro with M5 is set for release in the second half of 2025. We can expect the M6 one with Apple’s modem to arrive in 2027, given how long Apple usually takes to refresh the iPad Pro.
