and you had the choice of either the 12.9″ or the 9.7″.

Based on the specs, which would you take and why?

I would be using it for general academic-type work duties.

Responses of current users particularly welcome.

EDIT: Jump straight to column comparison.

Sketching on it, or marking up documents? Get the larger one with the pencil.
(Not a user, but know someone who’s enjoying her 12.9″…)

If it’s strictly a work thing then go for the one that will be easier to work with, which I suspect would be the bigger device.

If it’s something for use and to carry around more then the smaller one makes a lot of sense.

As an aside, I wish they would put OSX on one of these things!

The larger one.

My wife has one with a ‘keyboard case’ and it doubles as a fairly decent small laptop.

I have a Note Pro with 12″ screen – the ipad pro is basically a copy of it – the extra size of the screen over a 10″ tablet is very nice and it is still easy to carry around, so I’d recommend the larger device.

Large one vote here too.
And get the keyboard too..
And MS Office on it..

The 9.7 has better cameras – if you’re the sort of person to take pictures with a giant viewfinder, or skype in HD – that might be of interest to you

How likely are you to be carrying it around? Smaller = lighter and more portable. If it’s going to live on a desk all day then get the bigger one (or a laptop).

I’ve had a 9.7 for a few weeks and it’s a nice size. Just big enough for most hands to type but not the lump that the 12.9 is.
Depends what you want to do with it and how portable you need it to be.

but you can’t edit the config.sys file!!!11

larger is good, I ave one, and I loves it. (with logi keyboard – slightly thicker than apple keyboard but better action, has function keys like volume etc, and they are backlit).

Splitscreen working on the big iPad is genuinely fabulous, it makes it, for most worky things, better then a laptop. If only powerpoint made it easier/possible to work on multiple ppt decks at the same time, I’d never open my hateful windows dell pish again.

Only downside – games that require you to hold and either tilt the machine, or use virtual dual sticks, are a bit daft on sucha big machine.

movies look awesome, although if your travelling the whole flight can watch with you = carefull with content! (true blood was a bad idea…)

Oh I’m torn – for all practical reasons I’d got for the 12.9″ with ‘cellular’ and as much storage as possible, I’ve got this far without one, but one of the guys in the office has one and says it’s better than his Surface Pro which he really liked (both with Office 2016).

But…

Only the 9.7″ comes in Rose Gold…

Large as screen estate is king.

Why better than a laptop Big_Scott?

the fact that both screens are ‘active’ at the same time, and super fast to flick between other split apps. Genius. And that they do this with a resolution and screen clarity that is beautiful, with the simplicity of iOS. YMMV! 🙂

Certianly compared to my shitbox dell that work also gave me.

FWIW – split screen is also well implemented in OSX

id ask for the 12.9 as I’d expect it to sell better on ebay.

12.9″ here it’s bloody superb I’ve got a pencil one too it’s great for work as I do staff reports, save them as a PDFs and email them to my work account. Fantastic bit of kit.

I carry it in a man bag so the size issue for portability hardly matters.

Save the cost of cellular and buy a mifi box.

Ooh – forgot about that Drac – EXACTLY that – reviewing and editing/marking up documents, signing contracts etc etc – all lovely with the apple pencil and incredibly simple.

EDIT: although, tbf, you can do that on the smaller one now as well (apple pencil is waaay better than other rubber or BT styli)

I’d get a surface 4 pro for similar money but a fully functioning PC…

Academic work? I’m genuinely dissaponted by how awkward it is to read pdfs of science papers on a bog standard iPad without a lot of zooming and scrolling..I’d get the big one every time for that reason.

Disclaimer… I might be getting old and knackered on the optical department