- ESR has launched an alternative to the Apple Pencil that costs $30
- The Geo Digital Pencil can charge quickly and has Find My support
- It lacks many features of the Apple Pencil, but is less than half the price
The Apple Pencil is a great accessory for the best iPads, but it doesn’t come cheap thanks to its starting price of $79 / £79 / AU$139 (which extends to $129 / £129 / AU$219 if you want the Apple Pencil Pro). If you’re looking for an alternative stylus for your iPad that won’t break the bank, ESR has just introduced a much cheaper option.
The ESR Geo Digital Pencil is a $30 pen for iPad that can replicate many of the functions of the Apple Pencil. For example, it comes with tilt sensitivity that allows you to easily adjust the thickness of your print by adjusting the angle of the pen.
Additionally, you can tap the Geo Digital Pencil to quickly interact with your iPad and view the pen’s battery level. This is similar to the Apple Pencil Pro’s ability to switch tools when you tap it and is something that’s not available on the entry-level Apple Pencil.
ESR says the Geo Digital Pencil is compatible with a variety of iPads, including the iPad Air with M2 chip, iPad Pro M4, iPad 10th generation, and iPad mini with A17 Pro chip.
Missing?
One of the most useful features of the Geo Digital Pencil is its Find My integration. This will allow you to connect it to your iPhone and locate it using the Find My app. Find My is an incredibly useful tool for Apple devices, so it’s encouraging to see ESR built it into their iPad pencil.
To charge the pen, you can connect it to a power outlet using a USB-C cable. This allows for fast charging, which will bring the battery to full power in 30 minutes. You can also magnetically attach the pencil to your iPad, but doing so won’t charge it, something you can do with the Apple Pencil Pro (but not the regular Apple Pencil).
At $30, it’s no surprise that ESR’s device lacks some of the features of the Apple Pencil, and it also doesn’t have the scroll feature that lets you preview a pencil mark before making it with the Apple device. You also don’t get the barrel twist, haptic feedback, or compression functionality of the Apple Pencil Pro, although that pencil costs more than four times the price of the ESR Geo Digital Pencil.
Still, at less than half the price of the standard Apple Pencil, you might decide that ESR’s alternative is worth the gamble; We’ve certainly had some joys before with more affordable rivals.
We don’t know yet how it compares to the Apple Pencil in terms of accuracy and latency, but if it turns out to be a solid device, it could take its place among the best Apple Pencil alternatives.
