Called the iPad Pro, the tablet has a 12.9-inch display with 5.6 million pixels, meaning it has more pixels than a 15-inch MacBook Pro with Retina Display. 

However, Apple set tongues wagging with a controversial accessory -a $100 Apple 'Pencil' stylus - a tool Steve Jobs once described as 'yuck' and declared that 'nobody would want.'

Making the announcement, Apple's boss Tim Cook said: 'iPad is the clearest expression of our vision of the future of computing.'

'In just five years, the iPad has transformed the way we create, the way we learn. 

'We've been amazed with the new and unexpected things people have done with the iPad, so we asked ourselves, how can we take the iPad even further?'

'This is the biggest news in iPad since the iPad. It's called iPad Pro.'

The iPad Pro's width is the same height as the iPad Air, and it is marginally thicker than last year's iPad Air 2 at 6.9mm, compared to 6.1mm. 

Aside from its 'monster' size, the iPad Pro is more powerful than its predecessors. 

It features the new A9X chip, which Apple's senior vice president of worldwide marketing Phil Schiller said is 1.8 times faster than the A8X in the iPad Air 2. 

He also said that the iPad Pro is faster than 80 per cent of the PCs that shipped in the past six months, and its raphics are faster than 90 per cent of those PCs.

For the first time, Apple's flagship tablet has been fitted with four speakers. 

These speakers balance the sound based on how it is being held. 

It also comes with two new accessories - a case with a keyboard built in that resembles the one sold with Microsoft's Surface range, and a stylus called Apple Pencil. 

The introduction of the Pencil will surprise many long-standing Apple fans because the tool was hated by the late co-founder Steve Jobs. 

Mr Jobs once famously said that if a company makes a stylus for a tablet, then 'they blew it'. 

Apple's Newton platform originally came with a stylus when it launched in the 1990s and the trend took off with the launch of the PalmPilot. 

But, at the 2008 Macworld event, Steve Jobs slated the stylus. 

He said: 'Who wants a stylus? You have to get 'em, put 'em away, you lose 'em, yuck. Nobody wants a stylus.'

He added: 'So let's not use a stylus. We're going to use the best pointing device in the world. 

(Daily Mail)