iPad? I have never heard of it.
I’ve been using Android tablets pretty much since the first one came out, and I’ve never felt the need for anything made by fruit companies. Android tablets make great “nice to have” entertainment centers, or they can be a perfect lightweight laptop replacement for on the go.
Whatever your use, I’ve tested almost every Android tablet out there, and these are the best, depending on what you need them for. If you want to see how these stack up next to those iPad items, check out our guide to every tablet on the market.
Be sure to check out our other buying guides, including Best Amazon Fire Tablets, Best iPad, and Best iPad Accessories.
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The Best Android Tablet
Photo: Julian Chokkattu
Photo: Julian Chokkattu
Photo: Julian Chokkattu
The best overall Android tablet I’ve tried is the OnePlus Pad 3. The Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite chip provides great performance, and plenty of power for gaming, photo editing, and 4K video viewing. The 13.2-inch LCD screen offers an excellent 3.4K resolution with a 144-Hz refresh rate (also good for games), and 12-bit color. Would I like to see an OLED screen? Yes, but no tablet at this price has it, not even the iPad Air. The Pad 3’s screen is one of the best LCD panels I’ve tested, and it’s easy to read even in bright sunlight. One of the good things about an LCD over an OLED screen is that the Pad 3 has excellent battery life. I’ve watched movies back to back on airplanes and never dipped below the halfway mark, and thanks to the 80 watt fast charging point, you can recharge to 50 percent in less than half an hour, with a full recharge taking about 1.5 hours. I also like that it loses power in standby mode. OnePlus estimates 70 days of standby mode, but that’s with WiFi turned off. In the real world, I can leave it lying around for a week, and it will still have a 70 percent charge.
Part of the reason I think the Pad 3 is the best tablet for most people is that it’s not just great for consuming content (which is how I watch most of the baseball games I watch), I can get work done on it too. OxygenOS software by OnePlus is the best UI with many functions for Android tablets. I even prefer Apple’s iPadOS because of its Open Canvas program. Using Open Canvas, you can put three apps side by side, which is admittedly crowded, but still usable, or you can do what I do and run both apps side by side and expand the third down and scroll down to get to it. For me, that means a text editor at the bottom, which I effectively use in full screen, and then I can scroll to get to my web browser and the second app, which sits side by side. It’s a great way to work; the only downside is the OnePlus Pad keyboard, which I don’t like.
The keyboard is sold separately for $200 (not currently available in the US), and while it’s a decent keyboard, with good key travel and a decent-sized trackpad, it really only works on a completely flat surface. In other words, it’s great if you’re sitting at a table of some sort, but not usable on your lap. It really limits the usefulness of the Pad 3, and I hope OnePlus improves the design in the next version. Unfortunately, that is unlikely as OnePlus is currently in a merger with Realme and its future is bleak to say the least. We’ve already seen the Pad 4 debut in India (with a chip and battery upgrade), but so far, nothing for the rest of the world.
Luxury Android Tablet
Photo: Julian Chokkattu
Photo: Julian Chokkattu
Samsung
Galaxy Tab S11 and Tab S11 Ultra
Samsung’s Galaxy Tab S11 and Tab S11 Ultra are the iPad Pro of the Android world. They have flagship features, and with a thickness of 0.20 inches (5.1 mm), the Ultra looks just as good. They are slightly heavier than the iPad Pro, but not enough that I actually notice the difference. Unlike the previous generation Tab S10 series, there is no longer a mid-range “Plus” model. You have the 11-inch Tab S11 and the biggie, the 14.6-inch Tab S11 Ultra. Both run Android 16 out of the box, have 120-Hz AMOLED displays, and can hit a maximum brightness of 1,600 nits. Samsung uses a MediaTek processor, the Dimensity 9400+, which is closely matched to the Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Elite in the OnePlus Pad. Both models get 12 GB of RAM (if you choose the 1 terabyte Ultra model, the RAM increases to 16 GB). Storage is expandable via microSD.
