Devices

Surface Go 2 vs iPad Air

Published

3 years ago

May 6, 2020

Karl Sorensen

Microsoft officially announced the Surface Go 2 today and we posted our initial take on it earlier. We made a comparison between the new Go 2 and the iPad Air in just display size, networking and price, this article will dive deeper into that comparison.

Microsoft appears to be positioning the Surface Go 2 as a direct competitor to Apple’s iPad Air as it also has a 10.5″ display, magnetic keyboard connector, stylus support all for $499. Surface Go 2 starts out at $399 for the Pentium model, $629 Core m3 powered model and $729 for the m3 with LTE. In comparison, an LTE equipped iPad Air costs $629.

	iPad Air	Surface Go 2
OS	iPadOS	Windows 10 Home S Mode
Display	10.5-inches (2224 x 1668)	10.5-inches (1920 x 1280)
CPU	A12 Bionic	Intel Pentium GOLD 4425Y 8th Gen Intel Intel Core m3-8100Y
GPU	Neural Engine	Intel UHD Graphics 615
RAM		4GB, 8GB
Storage	64GB, 256GB	64GB eMMC 128GB SSD
Security	Touch ID	Windows Hello facial recognition
Connectivity	x1 Lightning Port	1 x USB-C 3.5 mm headphone jack 1 x Surface Connect port Surface Type Cover Port MicroSDXC Card Reader
Networking	Wi-Fi (802.11a/b/g/n/ac); simultaneous dual band (2.4GHz and 5GHz); HT80 with MIMO Bluetooth 5.0 technology UMTS/HSPA/HSPA+/DC-HSDPA (850, 900, 1700/2100, 1900, 2100 MHz); GSM/EDGE (850, 900, 1800, 1900 MHz) Gigabit-class LTE (Bands 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 11, 12, 13, 14, 17, 18, 19, 20, 21, 25, 26, 29, 30, 34, 38, 39, 40, 41, 46, 66, 71) Data only Wi-Fi calling eSIM	WiFi: 802.11a/b/g/n/ac/ax Bluetooth Wireless 5.0 technology Nano SIM Tray 4G LTE Advanced (Bands 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 7, 8, 12, 13, 17, 19, 20, 25, 26, 28, 29, 30, 38, 39, 40, 41, 66) GPS/GLONASS: Standalone and assisted GNSS, accuracy up to 3 meters
Weight	Wi-Fi 1.0 lbs. LTE 1.02 lbs.	Wi-Fi 1.2 lbs LTE 1.22 lbs
Price (Wifi model)	$499	Starting at $399 for Pentium $629 for Intel Core m3
Price (LTE model)	$629	$729
Keyboard Price	$159	$129
Pen Price	$99	$99

We were told that the marketing campaign will be centered around remote learning, the broadband gap with the benefit of built-in LTE and Microsoft Teams, it looks like from the video that our source was correct.