iPad vs Chromebook Comparison and Review: Chromebook Winning Battle In Schools
Schools across the United States are increasingly turning to Chromebooks over iPads as they find them cheaper. Additionally, Chromebooks come with free access to the education apps which allow students and teachers to work in the cloud.
This ability to work in a cloud-based environment is a big plus point for the Chromebook as both Microsoft and Apple do not offer anything that is as cheap or has the same amount of features.
Using a Chromebook a student can log onto Google and complete a particular work stored online. This is something the iPad does not offer. Because of this feature, Chromebooks can be easily reused by many students while iPads cannot.
Forbes notes that in the third quarter of this year, 715,500 Chromebooks were sold to schools compared to a slightly lower figure of 702,000 iPads. What makes this number significant is that the Chromebook only arrived in the market around two years ago. There are also additional indications that the market share of the iPad has started to drop off in schools from the high of 94 percent it witnessed a year ago.
The Chromebook is also a major winner when it comes to price because at $199 after educational discounts are deducted, it is much cheaper than the $379 tag price for an iPad Air. In some cases schools even ended up paying $770 for just one iPad with accompanying software for education purposes.
Another pain point for educators over the years has been that the iPad encourages children to download games from the App store and play them. The Chromebook has a more businesslike approach and encourages students to concentrate on their studies, spreadsheets and presentations.
Finally many schools are finding that the Chromebook is a better option because it comes with a physical keyboard which is extremely useful especially when students have to take the Common Core tests. On the other hand, an additional keyboard has to be purchased for the iPad and then connected to it via wires.
