Apple's 9.7-inch iPad Pro with Apple Pencil support is official

Besides unveiling the 4-inch iPhone SE, Apple at its Spring event in Cupertino, also introduced a smaller iPad Pro that comes with 9.7-inch display. The smaller iPad Pro shares quite a few specs with its 12.9-inch sibling, that was introduced last year.

Just like the 12.9-inch iPad Pro, the 9.7-inch iPad Pro comes with Apple Pencil comparability, and houses a connector on its side for attaching smart keyboard.

The 9.7-inch iPad Pro offers a display resolution of 2732 x 2048 pixels, which make it sharper than the 12.9-inch model. It features a new TrueTone display technology that adjusts the screen temperature depending on ambient light.

The tablet is powered by Apple's to-of-the line A9X processor, that made its debut with the 12.9-inch iPad Pro. It will come in three storage models 32GB, 128GB and 256GB.

Camera-wise, it offer 12-megapixel iSight camera with a TrueTone LED flash, Focus Pixels and 4K video recording. On the front there is 5-megapixel camera with Retina flash. The tablet also comes with Apple ToucID fingerprint sensor that is built into the home button and runs iOS 9.3. It packs 7.5 watt hour rechargable battery that offers up to 10 hours of web surfing on WiFi, video and music streaming on a single charge. 

The 9.7-inch iPad Pro will be available in WiFi only and LTE variants, and come in Silver, Gold, Space Grey and Rose Gold color. The WiFi variants of 32GB, 128GB and 256GB storage models are priced at $549, $799 and $899 respectively. The prices for the LTE variant starts at $729 for the 32GB model.

The Smart Keyboard cover and Apple Pencil should be purchased separately for $169 and $99 respectively.  

The 9.7-inch iPad Pro will be available to order starting March 24 from Apple.com and Apple's retail stores. It will go on sale starting March 31 in Australia, Canada, China (Wi-Fi models only), France, Germany, Hong Kong, Japan, New Zealand, Puerto Rico, Singapore, the UK, US Virgin Islands and the US and will be available in early April in India and several other countries.