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It's Wednesday, which means it's time for another Dealmaster. Our latest roundup of the best tech deals from around the web includes a discount at Best Buy that brings Apple's iPad Mini down to $400. While this deal is only around $25-$30 lower than the 8.3-inch tablet's average price on Amazon over the last couple of months, it's still $100 off Apple's MSRP, and it matches the lowest price we've tracked.
We gave the Mini a positive review when it launched last September. It's still a somewhat niche device, in that you really have to find value in owning a small tablet, and not just a larger phone, for it to be worth it. The iPad Air and iPad Pro models have faster M1 SoCs and bigger displays better suited to productivity, while the 10.2-inch iPad still provides the essentials at a lower price, even if its design is dated by comparison. We wish the base model here had more than 64GB of storage, too. But if the idea of a one-handed tablet for reading, watching videos, Apple Pencil doodling, and doing other iPad things is specifically what you're after, the iPad Mini is still the best one of those. Its A15 chip remains plenty performant for mainstream tasks, its display is accurate, and its iPad Air-like redesign, complete with squared edges and a USB-C port, makes better use of its available space.
It's worth noting that the previous-gen iPad Mini started at $399, but this newer model is a fairly significant upgrade all the same. If you want cellular connectivity, meanwhile, the model that supports that is on sale for $550, which also matches the lowest price we've seen. There's a chance Apple introduces a new iPad Mini later this year, too, potentially with the M1 chip, though we haven't seen many reports suggesting as much (unlike other Apple products), and any new model is unlikely to reach this deal price soon after launch.
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