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Adonit ships new Pixel stylus to compete with Apple Pencil

Stylus maker Adonit on Tuesday launched its latest model, the Pixel, advancing its own technology and responding to new competition provided by Apple Pencil.

One of the most important improvements is predictive touch, which should boost accuracy and reduce latency, two of the main perks of choosing Apple's stylus. The Pixel also has 2,048 levels of pressure sensitivity, offset correction, and palm rejection in supported apps. Full feature support must be implemented by app developers using a provided SDK — compatible apps so far include titles like Astropad and Autodesk SketchBook.

One distinguishing design trait is the 1.9-millimeter "Pixelpoint" tip, which is said to offer "paper-like" drag. Another is a set of shortcut buttons for erasing, undo, and redo actions. To preserve battery life, the stylus turns on when it's picked up, and shuts off when it's put down.

Perhaps the main advantage of the Pixel over the Pencil is that Adonit's stylus can be used with any Bluetooth 4.0-compatible iOS device, whereas the Pencil will only pair with an iPad Pro. When an app doesn't offer support, the Pixel should still operate as a "dumb" stylus.

The Pixel goes on sale today in black or bronze at a price of $79.99, about $19 cheaper than the Pencil.