Tablets can boost productivity, waste time, or both. You can slip one in your bag, take notes, review documents, binge on the latest Netflix show, play some games, etc. Black Friday sales are usually a good time to pick up a new gadget at a discount, and we’ve scoured Amazon across the US and Germany to bring you some of the best deals.
The Samsung Galaxy Tab S8+ is the most powerful Android version on this list: it’s not quite as premium as the Ultra, but with a Snapdragon 8 Gen 1 and a 12.4″ 120Hz AMOLED display, it can handle anything you throw at it. That display supports Samsung’s S Pens—in fact, one comes bundled with the slate.
It’s great for sketching ideas and taking notes, and can be enhanced with the Note View cover. The flap is transparent and has a paper-like texture, so the tablet looks even more like a notepad. This also protects the screen from scratches, of course, and has a place to store the stylus. You can also take notes with the Galaxy Tab S8+ tablet keyboard cover.
A cheaper option is the Galaxy Tab S8. It’s just as powerful (same chipset), but switches to an 11” LCD (120Hz). We’ve linked the 128GB model below, but you could go for the 256GB one, which is just $30 more (or not, there’s a microSD slot). There is an S Pen stylus included, unfortunately the covers above do not fit this model.
The Galaxy Tab S7 FE is larger than the vanilla S8: it has a 12.4″ display, but it’s a 60Hz LCD. This one notably uses the Snapdragon 778G chipset, so it’s in a lower performance class than the S8 models , but serves as the middle ground (in terms of price and performance) for the Serie A slates.
The Tab S7 FE also comes with an S Pen included, and you can pick up a protective book cover. This is not designed for drawing, however, it is for protection only.
The FE is much cheaper than the S8 slates, but if it’s still too high, the Galaxy Tab S6 Lite is even cheaper. Despite the model number, this is actually a new 2022 model. It’s less powerful (Snapdragon 720G), but has a good quality 10.4″ display (S Pen included) and AKG stereo speakers.
Here is the cheapest option: the Galaxy Tab A8 10.5. This is from 2021, and while its Unisoc Tiger T618 chipset is slower than the 720G, the 10.2″ 1,920 x 1,200px display and four speakers still make it a solid Netflix machine.
Now, if you’re looking for a rock bottom price, the Amazon Fire 7 is down to $40. It’s not powerful, the 7” HD display isn’t anything to write home about, but the 10-hour battery life is good. And did we mention it’s $40? Well, $55/€55 if you don’t want ads on your lock screen.
You’ll probably want the Fire 7 Kids edition anyway, as it comes with a thick, padded case to survive in the hands of a little boy. Even if the little one manages to crack the tablet, it’s still $55, so not a huge loss. Better yet, this version is ad-free.
For the consumption of content and light gaming by older children (and adults too), the Fire HD 8 tablet offers a better quality screen and a faster chipset. Note that this is the 2022 version with six 2.0GHz CPU cores (instead of four). Also, there is a Plus version that boosts RAM from 2GB to 3GB and costs $10 more. This doesn’t really matter for streaming, but games will definitely feel the difference. Note that these lists show ads on their lock screens unless you pay an extra $15/€15.
Fire HD 10 costs a little extra; however, the 10.1-inch 1,920 x 1,200px display is worth it not only for the size but also for the increase in sharpness. You also get two extra CPU cores and 3GB of RAM as standard. There’s also a Plus model (with 4GB), although that’s $30 more, which isn’t quite as straightforward an upgrade as the HD 8 Plus.
Amazon also offers a Fire HD 10 Productivity Bundle: For $145 (basically double the price) you get a Bluetooth keyboard including a free year of Microsoft 365 Personal subscription that you can use on up to 5 devices (normally this would set you back $70 ). Note that this is set up as an auto-renewing subscription, so you should cancel if you don’t want to use it beyond the original year.
That was the Android side of things; now let’s move on to windows. The Microsoft Surface Pro 8 is a premium 13″ tablet powered by an 11th generation Intel Core i7 (i7-1185G7) and comes with 16GB of RAM and a 256GB SSD. This also supports a stylus and keyboard (sold separately.) Plus, since it runs Windows 11, you can also run Android apps on top of it.
The Microsoft Surface Pro 7+ is an upgrade from last year (the original 7 series is from 2019). It’s a 12.3-inch slate with an 11th generation Intel Core i5 (i5-1135G7), 8GB of RAM, and a 128GB SSD. This comes with an included black Type Cover.
If you have software that doesn’t have a good enough Android version and you don’t want to spend the money on the Surface Pro, the Surface Go 2 is an affordable Windows 10 tablet (upgradeable to 11 for free). This 10.5-inch slate isn’t powerful with its Pentium Gold 4425Y, 4GB RAM, and 64GB eMMC storage, but it’s cheap.
There’s the newer Surface Go 3, which uses a 10th-generation (versus 8th) processor, a Pentium Gold 6500Y. This is much faster on some benchmarks (up to twice the performance); however, at $400 it’s perilously close to the true laptop category. It’s not a laptop, though; it’s a small portable tablet, which has its advantages. However, if it was between the Go 2 and Go 3, we might opt for the older model (saving $150 makes the time go by faster).
Start a new Thread