The new Apple Pencil Pro is harder to lose and better to draw with

Apple announced its third-generation Apple Pencil today during its “Let Loose” iPad event, adding Find My support and new capabilities for adapting the stylus to different creative tasks. Available to order today for $129 — the same price as the second-gen Apple Pencil — the new Apple Pencil Pro introduces features closer to what you’d find on pens for dedicated drawing tablets, like a “Barrel Roll” gyroscope feature and a squeeze gesture for switching between software functions.

This is the first real update to the Apple Pencil series since the second-generation model was announced in 2018. While the more affordable USB-C Apple Pencil that was released last year supported a wider range of iPad models than the Apple Pencil 2, it also ditched advanced second-gen features like pressure sensitivity and double-tap tool switching — making it less useful for tasks like graphic design and 3D sculpting.

The Apple Pencil Pro carries those advanced features over from its predecessor, alongside new ones like a squeeze gesture similar to the stem on the Apple AirPods Pro 2, which brings up a new palette for quickly switching between different tools, colors, and line weights, and haptic feedback, which pulses when users squeeze or double‑tap the stylus.

Adding support for Apple’s Find My device location system is also a welcome update for scatterbrained users who frequently lose their stylus. It’s easy to misplace a slim, pencil-shaped device, and I know firsthand how frustrating and expensive it is to replace an Apple Pencil that inevitably turns up months later after you’ve already torn your home apart looking for it.

App developers can also create their own custom interactions for the Apple Pencil Pro. Some examples provided by Procreate CEO James Cuda include brushes that “respond in entirely new ways” thanks to the Barrel Roll feature or using the squeeze feature to activate software shortcuts. The Barrel Roll feature also allows animators to move and rotate objects at the same time while recording actions in Procreate Dreams.

A notable drawback here is compatibility — the Apple Pencil Pro is only supported on the newly announced M2 iPad Air and M4 OLED iPad Pro models, so users with older hardware won’t be able to upgrade their stylus. And while the Apple Pencil Pro provides better access to software shortcuts than its predecessors, creative professionals will likely find that the pens on dedicated drawing tablets like Wacom’s new Movink 13 are better for comfort and customization.