iQOO Pad Pro keeps the Ultra’s screen but changes the chip
The iQOO Pad Pro 8.8 keeps the Ultra’s screen, battery and active cooling while reportedly switching to a less powerful Snapdragon platform.
iQOO is preparing a smaller sibling to its Pad Ultra gaming tablet, and the Pad Pro 8.8 keeps most of the headline hardware while reportedly trimming the silicon to make the device a more accessible option. The company has confirmed the tablet’s core design and cooling details on Weibo, according to GSMArena. 12
What iQOO has confirmed
The iQOO Pad Pro 8.8 is set to use an 8.8-inch OLED display with a 165Hz refresh rate. It is listed at 298g and 5.74mm thick, with a 9,020mAh battery. Those numbers match the Pad Ultra, suggesting iQOO is keeping the compact, high-refresh gaming-tablet formula intact rather than turning the Pro into a cheaper but fundamentally different model. 1
Cooling is another shared feature. The Pad Pro is expected to use iQOO’s Ice Dome system, including a 30-by-30-by-3.5mm active fan, a claimed 23,253mm² heat-dissipation area and three intelligent fan speeds. That is a serious cooling brief for a tablet this small, particularly one aimed at sustained gaming rather than short benchmark bursts. 1
The key difference is the chipset
The main distinction is currently reported rather than fully confirmed: the Pad Pro is expected to use Qualcomm’s Snapdragon 8 Elite Gen 5 with iQOO’s Q3 gaming chip. The Pad Ultra uses the more powerful Snapdragon 8 Elite Extreme Gen 6 and Q4 combination. 1
That split would give iQOO a clear two-tier range. The Ultra can remain the no-compromise model, while the Pro could deliver the same screen, battery and active cooling at a lower price. Until iQOO publishes the full specification sheet, however, the performance gap and final pricing remain unknown.
Reservations are already open in China, and the Pad Pro is expected to launch later in October alongside the iQOO Neo12. No international launch has been confirmed in the available announcement material, so UK availability is also still an open question. 12
Our opinion
The Pad Pro makes more sense than a cheaper tablet that cuts the features gamers actually notice. Keeping the 165Hz display, low weight, large battery and active fan gives it a distinct purpose; using a less extreme chipset is a sensible place to reduce cost. The catch is that iQOO still needs to explain the price difference. If the Pro is only marginally cheaper than the Ultra, the faster model will be the obvious buy. If iQOO gets the gap right, this could be one of the more interesting compact gaming tablets of the year.