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Gear Review | Apple Pencil

Apple's new $99 Pencil stylus changes the tablet drawing game. It really is like you're putting ink on paper, says WIRED's David Pierce. It does a better job than almost any other stylus, ever, at sensing and responding to pressure, or angle.

Released on 11/11/2015

Transcript

(techno music)

[Narrator] The Apple pencil is special.

Whether you like it is a different question.

Some people don't like it's plasticy feel.

Maybe you don't like the super hard tip.

But it's definitely special.

When you use the pencil, there's no lag at all.

It's really like you're putting ink on paper.

It does a better job than almost any other stylus ever

at sensing and responding to pressure or angle.

You turn this thing on it side and rub and it feels like

you're shading with an actual pencil.

There's so little latency because Apple's actually

retrieving data from the pencil

at twice the speed it would if you touched the screen

using your finger or with another stylus

and it's software can even predict where you're going

to draw and because it's refreshing so fast,

you'll never notice if it guesses wrong.

The iPad Pro can measure the angle of the pencil,

how hard it's pressing and more all in real time.

You just can't get that kind of data out of

any other stylus.

Even small things like being able to charge the pencil

through the iPad Pro's lightning port

make a huge difference.

The Apple pencil cost $99 and it feels like

one of the best stylus's ever.

Not because it's a great piece of hardware,

but because Apple can make it do things no other

stylus can.

It's definitely special.

Starring: David Pierce