While the iPad Air 2 appears to have little to no competition, budget tablets, including the Samsung Galaxy Tab A 9.7, have their own avid followers which have given these cheaper tablets the chance to chip away at the popular Apple device. Here is how these two tablets compare.

Design

Apple devices are famous for their aluminum build and the same can be said for the iPad Air 2. There is no doubt that the iPad Air 2's premium metal body gives it a definite advantage over other tablets in the market. It also comes with a fingerprint scanner, a feature not present on its competitor. It comes in three colors options, gold, silver and space gray.

As for the Galaxy Tab A 9.7, it has a plastic build but it feels premium as it has a fine gloss. Its back panel also has a smooth finish which makes it easy to hold. It also comes in three colors, white, blue and titanium.

Display

There is a TFT screen measuring 9.7 inches on the Galaxy Tab A 9.7 and it has a resolution of 768 x 1024 pixels and a density of 132 pixels per inch. On the iPad Air 2 is an IPS LCD screen measuring 9.7 inches with a resolution of 1536 x 2048 pixels and a density of 264 pixels per inch.

Specs

The specs of the iPad Air 2 are similar to that of the Galaxy Tab A 9.7. The device from Apple comes with an Apple A8X chipset and a CPU with three cores clocked at 1.5 GHz while the Galaxy Tab A 9.7 has a CPU with four cores clocked at 1.2 GHz.

Memory

There is no memory slot on the iPad Air 2 while the version on the Galaxy Tab A 9.7 allows for the addition of 128 GB of external storage. When it comes to RAM, the Galaxy Tab A 9.7 has either 1.5 GB or 2 GB while the iPad Air 2 has 2 GB.

Price

The iPad Air 2 with 16 GB onboard has a price tag of $500 while the Samsung Galaxy Tab A 9.7 is sold for $279.