What are the Best Graphics Drawing Tablets for Artists in 2023?

XP-Pen Artist 12 Graphics Drawing Tablet

XP-Pen Artist 12 is a mid-range graphics drawing tablet with a screen with a pocket-friendly price. This tablet doesn’t disappoint for the price, and you’ll find out in a bit.

This tablet is well designed and has some good features, like its IPS display and HD resolution, its sleek design, and lightweight. When it comes to doing what it is designed to do, it lives up to expectations.

It has a big 11.6-inch work area, providing you with precise accuracy to draw and paint naturally with your preferred art software. The tablet measures 13.84” in length x 8.87” in width x 0.35” in height, and weighs just 2 lbs. It also has up to 8192 levels of pressure sensitivity for enhanced drawing experience.

The included pen is battery-less – which means you can use it without ever worrying about it needing to be recharged, Also, this device has 6 Shortcuts Keys and 1-Touch Bar, all fully customizable. However, please note that the computer on which the device is to be used must have at least an HDMI port or a mini display port, which if it doesn’t have, you must use the supplied adapter to sort things out.

Another issue we found out is the fact that this is not a standalone tablet; it must be hooked up to the PC in order to use it. Well, we don’t really expect it to do much at this price. Another weakness is that the contrast ratio isn’t great. If you are using a Mac Book Pro, then you are better off switching off the tablet screen and using your PC screen.

Aside from these, and the bad location of the power button under the power plug, which is a bad location, this is not a bad tablet for the price.

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Microsoft Surface Book 2 13.5″

If you are an artist and need something that can crank out high-quality drawing performance with a stylus, while at the same time serving as a laptop, and a traditional tablet, and most of all, you love Microsoft products, then the Surface Book 2 is your man.

The Surface Book 2 is an improvement over the original Surface tablet, and it packs quite a punch in terms of hardware. What you are getting is a complete PC armed with an Intel Core i7 processor, NVIDIA GeForce GTX 1050 card with 2GB VRAM, 8GB of fast RAM, and a blazing fast SSD plus all the other bells and whistles you should expect in a modern PC.

The chassis is made of magnesium alloy, which gives it a distinctive feel and looks. It does a good job of not retaining fingerprints, but we were wondering why magnesium when aluminum is quite common and will probably do the job better. But then, that’s for the Microsoft R&D guys to figure out.

The screen is a 13.5-inch PixelSense Display with a display resolution of 3000×2000 pixels, which produces crisp, vibrant, and bright images. The screen also features a 10-Point multi-touch capability, which allows you to use it just like a smartphone – pinch, swipe, zoom, and pan.

Other features include Bluetooth and Wi-Fi for wireless connectivity. In a nutshell, you can use this device in four modes – laptop, tablet, studio, and view modes. To complement this device, you need to get the Surface Precision Mouse, the Surface Pen with 4,096 levels of pressure sensitivity, and the Surface Dial.

Drawing with the Pen is quite intuitive and effortless. It integrates nicely with the installed Windows 10 Pro, which also gives you the means to install your preferred art software and draw on the go. For a tablet this powerful, we would expect the battery life to be minimal. But no. this device has a fantastically impressive battery life, clocking up to 17 hours of continuous use watching videos. We expect a much lower battery life if you are drawing or doing some power-intensive operation like gaming.

The Surface Book 2 is a powerful tablet laptop for those who really need it and can afford it. However, we didn’t like the fact that you have to purchase the Surface Pen separately. This is not nice, considering the cost of this device. However, the Surface Book 2 is one of our best-rated digital graphics drawing tablets.

Wacom Cintiq 22 HD

The Wacom Cintiq 22 HD is another bold attempt by the major and oldest player in the graphics tablet business, aimed at the high-budget segment of design professionals.

This device lets you create with freedom and precision, and at the same time does the job exceptionally well. The Wacom Cintiq 22 features a 1920 x 1080 full HD pen display / graphic monitor with vibrant color for a detailed rendering of your art on screen.

The included Adjustable Stand lets you adjust how you want to work for maximum comfort and efficiency. With a large active area of 18.7 x 10.5 inches, your creative freedom knows no bounds. And with the scratch-resistant Anti-Glare surface, you don’t have to worry about distracting reflections as you work.

Now this device is not a standalone drawing tab but needs to be connected to a host PC or Mac to function. Its well-designed chassis is built from durable, scratch-resistant materials. The included super-responsive Wacom Pro Pen 2 is typical of what we’ve come to expect from Wacom – a delight to draw with. With 8,192 levels of pressure sensitivity and low activation force, it recognizes even the lightest pen strokes, and with reduced parallax, your cursor appears exactly where you would expect.

At just a little over 3 lbs, this device is not that lightweight though. However, since it’s going to be tethered permanently to your desk, it’s not really an issue. One of the things we didn’t like was the fact that the color gamut wasn’t that rich, compared to the Cintiq 27. Despite calibrating the screen, it still comes off a bit on the dark side with less saturation.

Another thing worth noting is the lack of USB C ports, which are found on less expensive brands. Another thing is the lack of customizable ExpressKeys™. You just have to get used to missing them on this model.