As per Centers for Disease Control and reports generated by World Health Organization in 2023, 1 in 36 children show signs of cognitive and social disorder which typically links to early signs of a neurodevelopmental disorder known as ASD.
ASD, better known for its complete terminology, Autism Spectrum Disorder correlates to symptoms such as impaired social interaction and communication behavior and anyone diagnosed with such a disorder may require assistive devices.
While the vast universe of medicine has evolved to facilitate therapy through Sensory and auditory enhancement tools such as fidget toys and virtual reality, Tablets on the other hand, have shown quite fruitful therapeutic results.
Therefore, if you are already familiar with its benefits and are searching for the best tablets for Autistic Children for leisure or casual hours, or simply to encourage their therapy through education or recreation reform, this article could serve as the cornerstone for your desires.
Things we should consider before buying a tablet for autistic child
Before you take a glance at the list of best tablets for Autistic Children curated by me, here are a couple of factors you need to consider first.
Toughness & Resilience
Children, at the age of around 8-12 tend to be erratic especially if they are medically diagnosed with Autism Spectrum disorder, henceforth, their irregular or rigid behavior can have a direct impact on how they use a tablet or a device.
Durability and build quality play a huge role in how long a tablet will last in worst-case scenarios where a child with such a neurodevelopmental disorder is not regular.
Usually, tablets provide countermeasures against impacts by providing a silicon casing or simply have cutting-edge technologies in their screen such as Oleophobic coating or scratch resistivity up to certain levels.
Additionally, tablets tend to provide water resistance up to certain feet as an additional safeguard against accidental hazards.
Ease Of Use
As mentioned above, Autistic children usually have impaired cognizance and require special assistance for learning and adapting to a scenario.
Thus, ease of use plays a huge role in the educational reform of autistic children as a complicated User interface may not be as appealing to them and even confuse them altogether.
Try picking a tablet that has a neat user interface with less cluttered configurable menus and unnecessary bloatware as that could make things way complex even for a person that isn’t even dealing with such disorder at all.
Make sure you look out for tables that utilize clear fonts, so your child can easily learn, communicate and visualize and easily interpret to encourage their therapy.
Battery Life
Try to pick a tablet that provides at least 6-7 hours of runtime upon mixed internet usage, anything below such runtime won’t be optimal as it will make you go through the nuisance of charging every now and then which might not be as helpful if your child is going through educational therapy through visual learning.
Price Factor
While price tags may not have any sort of direct correspondence towards how they can positively affect the learning capabilities of an autistic, if you are on a budget and are looking for the best tablets for an Autistic child then after evaluating it through all the points I mentioned above, go for the one that is within your financial standing.
The reason for my implication is that most tablets and devices tend to be priced reasonably, but aren’t suitable for special needs children both physically and software-wise.
Top 4 Best Tablets For Autistic Children
| Product | Screen Size | Storage | RAM | Price |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| SAMSUNG Galaxy Tab A8 | 10.5 Inches | 32 GB-128 GB | 3 GB | Check Price |
| Lenovo Tab M10 Plus (3rd Gen) | 10.61 Inches | 32 GB-128 GB | 3 GB-6 GB | Check Price |
| All-new Fire HD 10 tablet | 10.1 Inches | 32 GB, 64 GB | 3 GB | Check Price |
| Apple 2021 iPad (9th Generation) | 10.2 Inches | 64 GB, 256 GB | 3 GB | Check Price |
1. SAMSUNG Galaxy Tab A8
The Samsung Galaxy Tab A8 has Tons of features you won’t find elsewhere that highly caters to special needs children to its wide array of sensory and auditory features.
Kids Mode
The most outstanding feature of the Samsung Galaxy Tab A8 is its ability to completely control and provide a safer ecosystem for your child in case you aren’t monitoring him or her every now and then.
When this mode is enabled, Samsung automatically toggles age restriction and only allows certain applications, games, and educational sites to be viewed or are allowed by the parents.
This mode also allows parental lock and time lock, so you can easily prepare a healthy routine for your child and train them through therapeutic exercises.
Samsung Kids also has a number of educational games and applications available right off the bat so you don’t need to download it from an external application which may pose a threat to your child’s safety.
Display Size
Furthermore, the Tablet also has a generously large LCD screen of 10.5 inches with a maximum resolution of 1920 x 1200 pixels providing gorgeous and lush colors across every angle you look at it.
This makes it quite easy for a special needs child that is diagnosed with Autism spectrum syndrome to learn through visual shapes and color patterns appearing on the screen because the wider LCD screen is optimized to provide top-notch color accuracy regardless of the ambient lighting.
Hardware Specifications
Under the hood, the tablet is powered by Unisoc Tiger T618 (12 nm) which is an Octa-core processor that works in conjunction with Mali G52 MP2 to house all your media files and games for recreational use, it even comes with 128GB built-in storage space.
Battery Life
The Samsung Galaxy A8 offers a 7300 mah battery and provides 10 hours of light to moderate usage on a single charge.
Each cycle of its lithium-ion battery can be topped off in around 3 hours, so your child’s educational or casual hours won’t be interrupted for longer periods and they can easily entertain themselves with ease.
2. Lenovo Tab M10 Plus (3rd Gen)
Lightweight, snappy, and Incredibly Budget-friendly, the Lenovo Tab M10 Plus is a sight for sore eyes.
Display Quality & Resolution
Let’s start the review with its impeccable 10.61 inches display which boasts a maximum resolution of 2000 x 1200 pixels and provides crisp and detailed visuals through its IPS Full HD Display that mesmerizes anyone looking at it.
Such High-resolution screen output is incredibly helpful and provides fruitful results in visual aid for educational purposes as kids diagnosed with Autism can easily understand and adapt without getting distracted.
As an added bonus, the screen is also TUV certified and prevents eye strain even after long hours of use regardless of which ambient setting you are using this tablet at.
Sound Quality
As far as the auditory sensation is concerned, the Lenovo Tab M10 plus is by far the best tablet for autistic children because it offers not just one but two stereo speakers which provide an extremely crisp quality sound that is then tuned by Dolby Atmos Technology which provides an immersive experience to your child’s ears.
To top it off, the built-in equalizer lets you tweak its audio settings or you can simply set it to a dynamic mode that lets the system automatically adjust its sound whether you are listening to music or watching videos on Youtube kids
Battery Life
The Lenovo Tab M10 Plus is advertised to provide an average battery life of 14 hours, however, some reviewers have attained at least 10 hours of battery runtime upon mixed usage which is still close to the manufacturer’s claims.
So it’s safe to assume that your child can easily use it to attend educational classes, perform neurodevelopmental therapy through basic and advanced learning methodologies and even bask in their leisure time and watch a couple of cute cat videos along the way and it would still have some charge left in it.
To top its battery reserves, the 7700mah lithium-ion battery cell uses a 20W proprietary fast charging capability to replenish its reserves in around 2 hours.
3. All-new Fire HD 10 tablet
The Fire HD 10 tablet comes with top-of-the-line hardware specifications, easy to understand user interface, and a massive library of educational books and videos to navigate through.
Versatile & Easy to Use
Pair it with a keyboard or simply use it hands-free by utilizing its standing cases, the Fire HD 10 gives complete liberty to its consumers so they can have their own way with it without feeling restricted.
Although it is certain that the tablet doesn’t really ship out with a wireless keyboard or the fabric standing case, the convenience it provides especially for the kids that are diagnosed with Autism makes it well worth the investment because it enhances the ease of use even if they are routinely monitored.
Furthermore, to cater to special needs children efficiently and provide aid through educational reform and therapy, the HD 10 also has some nifty accessibility option that allows you to change the fonts to make it look clearer on the screen.
And to further amplify the effect, these fonts can be also changed to have desired effects and tweaked through the contrast color option.
Text to Speech & Alexa Integration
Individuals with autism usually have a hard time organizing and remembering everyday tasks, henceforth, Alexa integration easily provides a remedy by acting as a personal assistant and can even set up reminder lists to prevent forgetfulness.
To make larger paragraphs and texts easy to read, understood, and interpreted, Text to speech technology also reads words out loud with full clarity to assist users with visual impairment.
Battery Life & Performance
The Fire HD 10 is a perfect assistive technological tool to facilitate your child even if they are homeschooled because it provides a perplexing sum of battery runtime that could last easily up to 12 hours, as advertised by the manufacturer.
On the flip side, the hardware is also backed by a robust octa-core processor through which you can play countless games, and videos without having to deal with nuisances like lags or stutters.
And if you are inclined towards keeping your tablet in offline mode for the protection of your child, you can easily accommodate media files, educational books, and games as the Fire HD 10 supports SD card expansion up to 1TB.
4. Apple 2021 10.2-inch iPad
Moving on to our next contender which is considered one of the Best tablets for autistic children as it has sturdy build quality and hardware specifications that could last a couple of years without going obsolete.
Display Quality
The Apple 2021 iPad is the most sought-after tablet for all the right reasons, let’s take the display quality for instance, it has a generously wide 10.2-inch Retina display with a pixel density of 264 PPI.
The retina display technology is embedded with indistinguishable pixels so regardless of your viewing angle, you would also have super accurate colors that are close to real life.
Alongside such magnificent technology, the 2160×1620 Pixel screen also offers true tone calibration to properly adjust colors according to the ambient lighting that the tablet is kept in.
Such color tone calibration highly facilitates children that have a visual impairment or focus impairment as the screen builds up such a level of immersion that the end user never gets distracted, which is quite beneficial, especially for therapeutic uses.
Connectivity Aspect
Based on your preferences, you can opt-out for the WIFI and Cellular Apple iPad if you don’t mind shelling out extra cash, however, if being in the budget is your priority, then inclining towards the base variant with WIFI might not be a bad idea.
Regardless of the choices you make during your investment, you or your child would be able to enjoy recreational and educational videos on Youtube Kids in Full HD, as the iPad 2021 supports WIFI 6 technology to provide a seamless experience.
Apple Pencil Support
Autism certainly acts as a hurdle in the neurodevelopmental aspect of a child, however, don’t let such a disorder stop your child from being creative because, with the power of an Apple pencil in their hand, they can unleash their inner creativity without feeling restricted.
The best part is, that Apple’s Proprietary app store offers some of the most defining applications for sketching, illustration or simply creating doodles such as Procreate, Art Set, Adobe Fresco, and SketchBook.
Read More: Best iPads For PUBG Mobile
Bottom Line
Investing in the right assistive device can play a crucial role in your child’s behavioral and social development. Thanks to technological advancements, we have access to virtual educational classes and books to encourage therapy and reform.
However, finding the best tablets for autistic children might still be a hurdle to face which is why I felt obliged to cherry-pick some tablets through the internet so you won’t have to waste your time elsewhere.
That being said, thank you for stopping, I hope you found this article beneficial for your child and well worth the read.
