Apple has a lot in store for this fall, headlined by the iPhone Ultra and iPhone 18 Pro launching next month. Alongside these flagship phones, Apple is preparing to release a new iPad mini this October.

Known internally under the codenames J510 and J511, the upcoming tablet is expected to succeed the iPad mini 7, which launched over 21 months ago. Apple first released the original iPad mini in 2012 as a smaller "concentration" of larger iPad models. Today, the product line is preparing for one of its most substantial modernizations.

Design and Display Overhaul

The most notable hardware upgrade involves a complete display transition. Apple's plan to shift the iPad mini from a traditional 60Hz LCD to an OLED display is widely rumored. According to a leaker with supply chain sources, Apple has already evaluated a Samsung-made OLED display for the device.

With the adoption of OLED technology, a separate report suggests the tablet's screen could increase in size from 8.3 inches to 8.7 inches. It remains unclear whether the new model will feature a higher refresh rate than the 60Hz display used in the existing iPad mini 7.

Specs and Real-World Performance

Information found in mistakenly shared code indicates the new iPad mini will likely be powered by a mid-tier A19 Pro chip. This is the same processor anticipated for the iPhone Air, which uses one fewer GPU core than the higher-end version found in the iPhone 17 Pro and Pro Max.

Apple built the A19 Pro chip on an upgraded third-generation 3-nanometer N3P process, yielding modest speed and efficiency improvements. The chip architecture features an upgraded 16-core Neural Engine designed specifically for AI tasks.

Users can expect robust graphical performance, as the GPU boasts an upgraded architecture with a larger cache, more memory, and Neural Accelerators built into each core. Apple says this change provides three times the peak GPU compute over the prior-generation chip, alongside next-generation dynamic caching and unified image compression.

Alternatively, a tipster report suggests an outside chance the device could adopt the A20 Pro chip. Fabricated on TSMC's advanced 2nm process, the A20 Pro is the primary processor expected for the iPhone 18 Pro. However, because the iPad mini has not always received Apple's newest A-series chip during updates, the A19 Pro remains the most likely candidate.

Value and Lineup Placement

The previous iPad mini 7 runs on an older A17 Pro processor equipped with a 6-core CPU—featuring two high-performance and four efficiency cores—along with a 5-core GPU. At the time, that A17 Pro CPU was up to 30% faster, and the GPU was up to 25% faster than previous iterations.

The transition to an A19 Pro or A20 Pro will represent another substantial leap in both efficiency and compute capacity for the small form-factor tablet. The new iPad mini is priced at $499, which includes 128 GB of storage.