Meet the Galaxy Tab S6, Samsung’s latest stab at Apple’s iPad Pro

We've seen the rumors and Samsung's preliminary announcements, but today we finally got our look at the Galaxy Tab S6. It's nothing revolutionary, of course, which is why it didn't get its own event; but with that being said, it's a powerhouse of a tablet, and is still hands down going to be the best Android-powered alternative to Apple's iPad Pro.

Serious hardware, productive software

Samsung's latest take on the high-end Android tablet idea is no slouch. Unlike the Galaxy Tab S4, this time around Samsung is packing in a top-shelf Snapdragon 855 chip. Nothing outdated this time around. It's paired with either 6 or 8GB of RAM, up to 256GB of storage, and a 2560 x 1600 OLED display that's sure to wow just about anyone.

The Tab S6 is also picking up some S-Pen improvements, including the BLE connectivity from the Galaxy Note 9. This allows the S-Pen to do much more for your productivity, like taking photos and controlling media playback. It also wirelessly charges right on the device.

There are dual-cameras on the back of the tablet, plus a fingerprint reader in the display on the front. You can expect some focus on augmented reality with that camera setup, but Samsung says the photo quality shouldn't be bad, either.

Samsung Knox is present with its industry-leading security, there's a new feature to double-tap the screen to wake the tablet, and a few other Samsung-specific improvements to Android.

Galaxy Note 10 hints

There are some other interesting little bits about the Galaxy Tab S6 that give us a look ahead at the Galaxy Note 10. The tablet sports an improved DeX mode that allows users to wirelessly sling content to other screens instead of needing a cable or a DeX dock.

But despite being a large tablet with a ton of extra space, the Galaxy Tab S6 has done away with the headphone jack. We're expecting the port's removal on the Galaxy Note 10, so the move isn't terribly surprising, but it doesn't really make sense. You can at least make the argument, however dumb, that in a phone there's not enough room to cram in everything you need plus that headphone port; new tech requires more room, and old tech gets pushed aside for that. But if we take that argument, it doesn't really hold up when you're dealing with a 10.5-inch tablet. I'm sure there's a lot of fancy stuff under the hood, including that spacious 7040mAh battery, but it's not as cramped as a phone.

Like it or not, the tablet is going to take some comparisons to Apple's iPad lineup, which does still have a headphone jack, at least in most models. The iPad Pro does skip the headphone jack, like the Galaxy Tab S6, but that seems to just make this decision a weird attempt to copy the bad parts of Apple that always irk us on the Android side of the fence. At least the tablet doesn't have a notch.

Galaxy Tab S6 vs. iPad Pro

So which device comes out better? Well, there's a lot to love about the Galaxy Tab S6. DeX is great for productivity, and that OLED screen with AKG-tuned speakers, custom software features, and integration into Samsung's ecosystem with Bixby and SmartThings is really tempting. But we don't know the pricing just yet, only that Samsung plans on releasing it in late August.

Apple's iPad Pro, on the other hand, is a known quantity, and it's a beast of a tablet. It's expensive, but the high-refresh rate screen is something else, and the Apple Pencil is a pretty worthy rival to the S-Pen. Apple also takes its tablet ecosystem a little more seriously than Google, and the newer versions of iPadOS look like they'll finally make Apple's tablets a serious competitor to some other laptops and PCs.

But if you absolutely need the highest-end Android tablet that cuts no corners, the Galaxy Tab S6 is your answer, and it's not even close.