Illustrator on new M1 MacBook Air or iPad Air ?

[andrew5CB8]

My wife is a graphic designer and uses illustrator a lot on her 27inch imac

its her birthday and trying to decide what's best to buy her as a gift so she can use illustrator on the road  .. iPad Air with pen or MacBook Air ? And will it run with the new apple M1 processor ??

thanks !

[davidem88197654 · Accepted solution]

Get her an iPad Air (latest model) or the 12.9 inch Pro, with Pencil, she will love it. As a designer myself using an iPad Pro, I can guarantee it's amazing to work with and be a huge help in any kind of task. There are some amazing apps on iPadOS ( Procreate, Affinity Designer, Affinity Photo, Adobe Illustrator, Vectornator)and for when she needs to work on desktop apps (eg. Photoshop) it can be natively paired with her iMac and work as a graphic tablet 

[andrew5CB8]

Got a MacBook Air M1 yesterday !

[Dedvyned]

Hello, what configurations did you get with your M1 McBook air? I mean how much memory space on your SSD.

Thanks

[andrew5CB8]

I went for the base model - 256gb ssd - she's not used it yet so can't say if it's ok .. but I'm sure after reading the reviews it will be fine - I can always add an external

drive if needed ..

[Test Screen Name · Accepted solution]

An iPad is NOT a Mac and can't run Mac apps. There is a brand new Mac Illustrator app but it is significantly limited compared to a Mac. This would not be a gift I would make without careful approval, it might be absolutely useless. The question of whether AI files can roundtrip is crucial. 

It's way too early to be considering an M1 Mac for production use... to start with they run Big Sur and it's way too early to run with that. Things might be settling down by Christmas.

[andrew5CB8]

Took the plunge and got a MacBook Air ... she'll love it - and after reading reviews yesterday it should work with creative cloud just fine ... hopefully! Thanks 

[davidem88197654]

She does already have a Mac. Considering this, the iPad would be a great companion machine ( can't be a main machine yet but it's getting close). I've personally tested and used Illustrator on iPad since release and it works beautifully, exports AI files just fine to carry on the work on the Mac when needed, and drawing vectors with the Pencil is an amazing experience. 

[davidem88197654]

She does already have a Mac. Considering this, the iPad would be a great companion machine ( can't be a main machine yet but it's getting close). I've personally tested and used Illustrator on iPad since release and it works beautifully, exports AI files just fine to carry on the work on the Mac when needed, and drawing vectors with the Pencil is an amazing experience.