For those who caught the Apple event last week, one device peculiarly absent from the mix is the iPad Air 3.

With the iPad Pro and iPad Mini the focus of the event, not a trace of the iPad Air 3 was found. So could it have been forgotten? Better yet, is there an actual iPad Air 3 in the midst?

It turns out that the iPad Air 3 is not totally out of the picture. Apple seems to have purposely held off the said device and chances are it may be coming out soon.

Some say it could come out before 2015 ends but seeing that Apple has no scheduled events for the rest of the year, it seems unlikely that the company would hold an event solely for the iPad Air 3.

Hence, a safe bet for the iPad Air 3 to come out would probably by early 2016. If so, that could happen alongside the MacBook/iMac, although it seems a bit odd to see a table debut alongside the aforementioned devices.

How about simply appearing with no event at all to properly launch? Well, that could happen, but seeing that the iPad Air 3 is something that consumer electronics people look at highly, it seems a bit out of place for it to just pop out in the open.

Regardless, all these are speculations but the bottom line is that there will be an iPad Air 3. The only thing missing though is the release date and the actual specs which have to be confirmed.

For now, it looks like the iPad Air 3 will most likely don the same specs that freshly released tablets have.

That includes an A9X processor, 2 to 4 GB of RAM; storage variants of either 16 GB, 64 GB, or 128GB; an eight-megapixel iSight camera; and a front-facing 2.1-megapixel FaceTime shooter. Perhaps it would be safe to consider these as base specs for now until Apple does come up with official specs for the almost forgotten iPad Air 3.