The first Apple Pencil was a bit silly. Make no mistake, it was compact, well balanced, and had great features. It was a joy to use. But charging it? That was ridiculous. You could either use a small adapter to plug it into a Lightning cable or you could plug it into the bottom of your iPad. It turned your iPad into a giant lollipop.
It was silly.
But the new Apple Pencil features one flat side. This side can magnetically attach to the side of your iPad. There, it can wirelessly charge. It’s super easy and convenient. It’s the way the Apple Pencil should have been from the beginning. What’s more, Apple added a new double tap gesture, which allows you to quickly switch tools in apps. Plus, it has a nice matte texture. No matte black yet, mind you, but the matte white is a nice touch.
The Apple Pencil 2 is better than the first generation Apple Pencil in nearly every way. Except price, it does cost $30 more. So is that enough to make it a substantially better product?
Well, yeah. It’s still the best stylus you can get for your iPad.
In This Article:
Writing, Drawing, and More
The Apple Pencil is a fantastic stylus on its own, not just for how well it syncs up with iPadOS. It features a highly accurate tip that combines readings from the screen along with pressure sensors in the tip and Bluetooth to tie it all together. The end result is a stylus that can have a fine point, despite the capacitive nature of the iPad display.
The tip of the Apple Pencil is also unique. Not only is it pressure sensitive, allowing you to change line thickness or opacity with different levels of pressure, but it can also detect pressure on the side. This allows you to emulate drawing with a pencil on its side, fantastic for wide lines and shading.
The tips are replaceable, and they will wear down over time. This will depend on how much you use your Apple Pencil and whether or not you have a matte screen protector on your iPad. If you draw and write often, especially with a matte screen protector, the nib will wear down much faster. Apple used to include an extra nib in the first Apple Pencil box, but the Apple Pencil 2 didn’t come with one. Still, they’re not too expensive. Apple sells a four-pack for $20. I found one nib would last me, for general note taking, over a year. For me, that’s at least five years of nibs for $20 (counting the first one). Still, I wasn’t using my iPad for art, just note taking. Those who draw with their Apple Pencils may find they wear down more rapidly. It doesn’t disappear or anything, just will reveal a darker gray part underneath that can feel rough.
Wear on an old Apple Pencil Nib (from my first Apple Pencil).
The Apple Pencil works seamless with the iPad so seamlessly that it’s easy to forget they’re separate products.
But they Are Separate…
Don’t forget, the Apple Pencil 2 is for the iPad Pro (11-inch or third or higher generation 12.9-inch) and iPad Air 4. It will not work with older iPads, even if they had support for the original Apple Pencil. Furthermore, the original Apple Pencil won’t work with the new iPads. Because they have a USB-C port, instead of a Lightning port, it simply won’t sync. And, I know what some of you clever readers are thinking. But what about using cables and adapters to go from USB-C to Lightning to the Apple Pencil Lighting adapter to the Apple Pencil? Will that charge and sync it? No, it will not. I tried. Apple only still sells the Apple Pencil for the base model iPad, current iPad mini, and older iPad Pro models. It was a perfectly good tool, but the Apple Pencil 2 is a clear upgrade, and there’s no backwards compatibility.
Comfort
Apple Pencil 2 grip is from Uppercase Design. Works with charging and double tap gesture.
I have a terrible pen grip. I’ve played with a few different ways of holding a pencil over the years, but my preferred grip creates a bit of force. It can be painful to use a pen or pencil for a long period of time. Some of my favorite pens for writing and appearance, Parker’s Jotter pens, are also incredibly uncomfortable to use over time. I am highly critical of comfort.
The Apple Pencil 2 actually isn’t too bad. Better than the aforementioned Parker. I needed to use a grip for the first Apple Pencil, but don’t find it quite as necessary on the Apple Pencil 2. I think this is thanks to the matte texture and flat side providing better grip. Still, as you can see from many of these photos, I still use a grip. I prefer the larger, softer shape.
If you didn’t struggle with discomfort using normal pens and pencils without a grip, then this won’t be an issue. If you did, no size or texture for the Apple Pencil would be good enough without a silicone grip. That’s where I find myself. While the Apple Pencil 2 isn’t perfect, it’s not the worst writing implement I’ve used. Still, a grip makes all the difference, and you won’t catch me using my Apple Pencil without one.
Double Tap Gesture
The double tap gesture, when first unveiled, was an even bigger deal to me than the wireless charging. I hated having to reach up to tap the undo or erase button every time I made a mistake. With a simple double tap on the flat side of the Apple Pencil 2, right up by the end, I can switch between tools or activate the undo function automatically. It’s fantastic… when it works.
Apple went out of their way to make sure the Apple Pencil almost never registers false positives. So far, in fact, that it doesn’t always register actual double taps. This can be very frustrating when you’ve now tried three times to select the eraser, and, instead, your Apple Pencil continues to draw lines over the text you wanted to erase. Usually, it works. I don’t even have to think about it. Just a quick double tap, I erase what I did, and another double tap and I’m writing again. It’s muscle memory, and even easier than flipping a pencil over. However, sometimes it’s not that easy. When it fails, its incredibly frustrating. Right after you made a mistake is not when you’re in the mood for your technology to stop working properly.
Apple definitely needs to improve the sensitivity of the double tap, or at least make it customizable. People are going to use grips or want to tap with different levels of force. Apple should be better at detecting this.
This is a fantastic feature. 90% of the time, it works seamlessly. But when it doesn’t, you’re definitely not going to be happy about it.
Battery Life
I found I have to charge my Apple Pencil 2 about once ever four days or so. I keep it in a nice Apple Pencil stand, specifically to resist the urge of topping it off every night. Keeping the battery fully charged all the time will hurt its longevity, meaning it could eventually last only a day or two in a few years if I’m not careful. Because the first Apple Pencil charged in a ridiculous fashion, I never worried much about charging it too frequently. I used that until it was almost dead every time. That’s what I intend to do with the Apple Pencil 2.
Because it’s so easy to charge the Apple Pencil 2, even top it off between usages, it’s easy to forget about battery life entirely. Still, if you’re like me and planning on using this Apple Pencil for many years to come, you need to be sure you’re careful. Don’t charge it up constantly. You can easily get four days out of a charge for general note taking. Perhaps 2 or three if you use it very frequently. For me, it’s so good I don’t even have to think about it. Some artists may want to charge it daily as they’re using it more. This is likely why Apple doesn’t focus on battery life. It’s more than good enough for a full day of work, even under more extreme circumstances, and it’s so easy to charge, you never need to think about battery life.
Overall
Because I take handwritten notes for meetings, interviews, and projects I’m working on, the Apple Pencil was a necessity. I use Notability, an app for iPad, iPhone, and macOS, that makes note taking incredibly easy. Writing, sketching, inserting photos, shapes, even audio makes it a perfect notebook. Furthermore, it’s searchable. I used to keep detailed tables of contents for my Moleskine and Leuchtturm notebooks. This was so I always had a place to go when I wanted to look up how I did a project in the past so I could copy those techniques for a future project. Now, I can just search for it. Notability’s handwriting recognition even works on my chicken scratch.
The Apple Pencil 2 has made this part of my daily life a breeze. I even like taking notes with it for articles and reviews now as well. The original Apple Pencil was an extension of the iPad Pro, and I loved it. The Apple Pencil 2 is a slight, but noticeable, improvement. Unless you really hate switching tools by tapping on an icon, the upgrade between the Apple Pencil and the Apple Pencil 2 wouldn’t be enough to, say, trade in a first or second generation iPad Pro for an iPad Air or newer iPad Pro. However, it is the only version that works on the flat-sided models, and the upgrade you get by going with it is certainly a great selling point if it’s not the only selling point. Fortunately, there are plenty of reasons to upgrade to an iPad Air 4 or iPad Pro.
Oh, but you may want to wait. Because this week, Apple may reveal the Apple Pencil 3 alongside a new iPad Pro. But at least you know that a cheaper Apple Pencil 2 might be worth the price in a few days.