The LeapPad Ultimate is a 7″ children’s educational tablet from LeapFrog that has a shatter-resistant screen with a resolution of 1024×600 pixels. It comes with a protective bumper available in green and pink that is intended to reduce the chance of damage if the tablet is dropped.
The LeapPad Ultimate is not an Android tablet, instead running Brio OS, so it does not have access to Google Play or any other Android app stores, only being able to download content from the LeapFrog App Center. The Ultimate has 8 gigabytes (GB) of internal memory but doesn’t have a memory card slot. The tablet has front-facing and rear-facing cameras, both with 2.0-megapixel (MP) resolution.
For wireless communication, the tablet has WiFi but lacks Bluetooth. It has a micro USB port, 3.5mm headphone jack, single speaker and a mic. The tablet’s listed battery life is five plus hours, but as always this will depend on what sort of use the tablet is put to. The Ultimate has a cartridge slot, suitable for taking LeapFrog cartridges. It also has a stylus that has a tether point on the tablet and a slot to store it in.
The Ultimate’s resolution of 1024×600 pixels is definitely at the lower end of the scale for children’s 7″ tablets; there are a number of tablets with higher resolutions but the only ones with lower ones are those with smaller screens. The camera resolution is also on the low side; an increasing number of children’s tablets have a rear-facing camera with a resolution higher than 2.0 MP, but there are still a lot available that don’t. Front-facing cameras rarely exceed 2.0 MP resolution in children’s tablets.
The 8 GB of internal memory is now definitely on the low end, especially as much of this will already be used by the tablet’s operating system. Very few modern children’s tablets have an internal memory this low, and the majority of children’s tablets have memory card slots that give at least some additional storage. At five hours, the listed battery life is not the best, but it also isn’t the worst.
Does the LeapFrog Ultimate Have Any Educational Uses?
Parents will often state that education is a primary reason for purchasing a tablet. Like all tablets from LeapFrog, education is the primary function of the Ultimate. The available content in the LeapFrog App Center, and on cartridges, is primarily educational in nature, and the sites that the Ultimate can visit also tend to be educational.
The Learning Library from LeapFrog teaches many different skills, both core subjects, such as reading and writing, and a stated 2,600 others. The Ultimate also features Just for Me™ learning technology, which personalises games, remembers progress and adjusts automatically to learning levels.
The tablet does not have access to the LeapFrog Academy however, as that is only available on Android devices, but it is in educational capabilities that the tablet excels.
What Included Content Does the LeapPad Ultimate Come With?
At the time of writing, the Ultimate comes with the following content, stated to be worth $110, although the specific items are subject to change without notice.
- Pet Pad Party – Create a pet, part of the handwriting curriculum.
- Photo Fun Ultra – Photo editing software, part of the creativity curriculum.
- Sing Along Read Along Video – Sing and read along software, part of the phonics curriculum.
- Letter Factory Adventures™: The Great Shape Mystery – Solve what a machine is intended to do, part of the geometry curriculum.
- Letter Factory Flash Cards – Flash cards with upper- and lower-case letters, part of the alphabet curriculum.
- Pet Pals: Dog Show Detectives Interactive Storybook – Interactive storybook, part of the reading curriculum.
- Cosmic Cleanup Science Game – Clean an alien world, part of the environmental science curriculum.
- Pet Pals Hide & Seek Puzzle Game – Use logic to solve puzzles, part of the puzzle/logic curriculum.
There are also 5 Utility Apps and 5 Game Demos included.
Does the LeapPad Ultimate Have Any Parental Controls?
Parental controls are how parents keep their children safe online and are therefore very important. Like the parental controls on many of the LeapFrog tablets, those on the Ultimate are very strong, very safe and very rigid. Parents can control the amount of time a child spends on the tablet, but the true controls are deeper.
Rather than having unrestricted internet access, the Ultimate can only use LeapSearch. This is LeapFrog’s own search engine, which allows a child to only view content that has been approved by LeapFrog as being suitable for children, stated as being over a thousand pieces of various types. This makes the controls very safe, but inflexible, as additional content cannot be added by a parent, should they decide that it is suitable for their child.
Finally, the tablet doesn’t have access to the more open app stores, such as Google Play. The only content that can be installed on the tablet is LeapFrog’s own, which is all designed to be child-safe and with educational aims, even that which is intended to be a game or entertaining.
Are Cartridges Purchased for Other LeapFrog Tablets Compatible with the LeapPad Ultimate?
The Ultimate has a cartridge slot, allowing the use of cartridges that contain content that is also usually available as digital downloads from the App Center. The cartridges will typically be compatible with the LeapPad Jr., LeapPad Academy, LeapPad Ultimate, LeapPad Platinum, LeapPad Ultra, LeapPad2 and LeapPad3, meaning that cartridges purchased for the other listed LeapFrog platforms will typically work with the Ultimate as well. This is good, because the cartridges are comparatively expensive to purchase.
What is the LeapFrog App Center?
With the LeapPad Ultimate not being an Android tablet and not having access to Google Play, or any other Android app store, the LeapFrog App Center is the only source of digital content. Some of the apps are available in cartridge form as well; given the low memory capacity of the Ultimate, it may be necessary to take a look at getting cartridges to save on memory usage.
Not just apps are available from the App Center, as it also has other content such as ebooks and videos. All the content, whatever it is, is designed with education being its primary use, even those items that are considered to be games.
There are a number of apps available in languages other than English, but this is a comparative minority, and apps in other languages cannot be installed from other sources.
Can Children Play Games on the LeapPad Ultimate?
The ability to play games is rarely stated as being a primary purpose for buying a child a tablet, but it can be a secondary one. With the Ultimate not having access to the more popular app stores, only the LeapFrog App Center, nor to much of the internet, the ability to play games on it is limited to the apps and cartridges available from LeapFrog themselves. Although this does include material marketed as games, these games are intended to be educational in nature, rather than purely entertaining. The tablet also does not have access to many of the popular games around. It does not truly qualify as being a gaming platform.
Can Children Watch Streaming Media on the LeapPad Ultimate?
The Ultimate does not have access to any stores where streaming media apps, such as Netflix or YouTube, can be downloaded. Nor, as it isn’t an Android or iOS tablet, is it possible to give it access to such. In addition, the extremely rigid parental controls mean that streaming media sites also cannot be visited using the tablet. This does mean that there is no chance that a child will come across inappropriate material on such sites, but it is also limiting.
Summing Up the LeapPad Ultimate
The 7″ size of the tablet is still pretty standard for a child’s tablet, even though such are trending towards larger tablets. The internal memory, at 8 GB, is rather low for a children’s tablet these days, and the lack of a memory card slot means that there is no way of expanding the storage. This means that storage space is limited, especially as much of the memory is already taken up by the tablet’s operating system and other installations. This will limit the number of LeapFrog apps, and other, probably user-created, content, that can be installed on the tablet. The rear camera resolution is now at the bottom end of children’s tablet camera resolutions; the front-facing camera’s resolution is fairly typical.
The battery life isn’t terrible, but it isn’t great either; it could be worse but it could also be better. Battery life does depend on what the tablet is being used for though. The tablet is specified as being useful for ages 3-9 years, but children at the older end of that scale are probably not going to be as content with the comparatively limited range of content and abilities that the tablet has. Overall, the hardware specs are pretty poor for a child’s tablet nowadays.
The Ultimate excels as an educational tablet, but is let down by technical capabilities that are now definitely subpar. It fails as a more general tablet, given the strict parental controls that limit the web content that can be accessed and only having downloadable content from the App Center available. This is an educational tablet and has no real use other than for educational purposes.
Learn more about the LeapPad Ultimate.