M4 iPad Pro bendgate won't be a thing despite it's incredibly thin design, here's why

Last week Apple announced the brand-new iPad Pro complete with a super-fast new M4 chip and an OLED display that is brighter than anything the company has put into a tablet to date. It's the best tablet that Apple has ever made, and it also has one other accolade to go with all of that - it also happens to be the thinnest device that Apple has ever made, too.

Apple made quite the big deal about the new iPad Pro's lack of thickness when it was announced at the Let Loose event alongside the new M2 iPad Air. The 11-inch iPad Pro measures 5.3mm while the 13-inch iPad Pro is even thinner, coming in at just 5.1mm thick. That's incredibly thin and it makes the new tablet even thinner than the iconic iPod nano. But when you make something that thin - especially something as physically big as the 13-inch iPad Pro - there is one obvious problem that needs to be overcome. How do you make sure that something like that won't bend in the middle? Apple, it says, has the answer.

The news came via someone who really should know the correct answer, too. Apple SVP John Ternus told YouTuber Arun Maini that Apple has redesigned the iPad Pro's internals to try and make sure that it's as rigid as possible. One of the changes includes a new metal cowling that sits above the logic board and then runs down the middle of the tablet to essentially form a sort of rib. That rib then adds additional rigidity to a device that could otherwise flex in ways that would be problematic.

Apple is of course no stranger to devices that bend when they shouldn't. The iPhone 6 and iPhone 16 Plus famously bent in the middle whenever someone put one of those devices into a back pocket and then had the misfortune to sit down. Then, more recently, some previous iPad Pro models were found to be a little more flexible than they were likely designed to be - although that was discovered by YouTubers whose sole job seemed to be to try and break the tablets.

Whether or not you're a fan of the new, thin design, there is no denying that the M4 iPad Pro is everything people have been waiting for. Now we just need to wait for the early reviews to arrive so that we can see just how great these things really are.