Apple Retail Store Signage Confirms 8:00 AM Launch for New iPad on Friday
Yesterday, we noted that Apple's grand opening of its new Highland Village retail store scheduled for 8:00 AM on Friday hinted that the company was likely to planning to launch the new iPad at that time rather than in a late afternoon launch as was seen with the iPad 2.
We received word soon after that visual merchandising staff at Apple's retail stores were scheduled for an overnight shift on Thursday night into Friday morning in order to prepare the store for a morning launch, and now 9to5Mac posts a photo from a retail store source showing some of the new signage going up this week confirming an 8:00 AM launch for the device on Friday.

Apple's product launches have historically been scheduled by local time, so customers in any of the iPad launch countries with Apple retail stores should expect those stores to open at 8:00 AM in their local time zones. With Apple having sold out of its initial batch of online pre-orders for Friday delivery, those still looking to secure an iPad on launch day will need to wait in line at an Apple retail store or other launch retailer in hopes of obtaining one.
Popular Stories
Apple has unveiled a whopping nine new products so far this March, including an iPhone 17e, iPad Air models with the M4 chip, MacBook Air models with the M5 chip, MacBook Pro models with M5 Pro and M5 Max chips, the all-new MacBook Neo, an updated Studio Display, a higher-end Studio Display XDR, AirPods Max 2, and now the Nike Powerbeats Pro 2.
iPhone 17e features the same overall design as...
iOS 26.4 isn't the major update with new Siri features that we hoped for, but there are some useful quality of life improvements, and a little bit of fun with an AI playlist generator and new emoji characters.
Playlist Playground - Apple Music has a Playlist Playground option that lets you generate playlists from text-based descriptions. You can include moods, feelings, activities, or...
While the iPhone 18 Pro and iPhone 18 Pro Max are not expected to launch for another six months or so, there are already plenty of rumors about the devices.
It was initially reported that the iPhone 18 Pro models would have fully under-screen Face ID, with only a front camera visible in the top-left corner of the screen. However, the latest rumors indicate that only one Face ID component...