Look, Chuseok is just around the corner, which means millions of people are about to embark on the great annual pilgrimage back to their hometowns. Driving yourself can turn into an absolute marathon of traffic, and even the trains are packed to the brim. Once you finally arrive and catch up with the family, you might actually find yourself with quite a bit of spare time on your hands.

If your family home is equipped with a proper gaming rig, you are sorted. But if not, gamers have to get creative with their hardware choices. Even if you own a shiny modern smartphone, thermal throttling and battery drain during a long journey or a gaming session at the homestead mean a dedicated gaming tablet is pretty much the sensible alternative.

If you want something versatile enough for video streaming, lectures, note-taking, sketching, and actual gaming, screen size matters, but it also needs to be comfortable to hold for hours. So, let us look at three recommended tablets under 10 inches across different price points that we reckon are worth your consideration.

During our actual testing, even with titles like Wuthering Heights that are notoriously rough to run smoothly on mobile, the device handled high-resolution sessions for over two hours without a hint of thermal throttling. With just a tiny bit of external airflow from a desk fan, the panel temperature hovered comfortably around 37 degrees Celsius. Other heavyweights like Delta Force and Honkai: Star Rail ran without a hitch even at maximum settings.

The price of the REDMAGIC Astra 2 sits at around 1.2 million KRW for the 12GB RAM and 256GB storage model, and roughly 1.4 million KRW for the 16GB RAM and 512GB version. Given the top-tier processor, display, thermal management, and soaring memory component costs lately, it is a rather solid proposition.

If you want high-end gaming stability without completely emptying your bank account, the Lenovo Legion Tab Gen 3 is a brilliant shout. Lenovo’s Legion tablet lineup has technically reached its fifth generation globally, with this third-entry model originally launching in 2024. It packs an 8.8-inch LCD display hitting 500 nits of peak brightness and a 165Hz refresh rate, driven by a Qualcomm Snapdragon 8 Gen 3 chip and cooled by a generous vapour chamber.

Utilising the exact same silicon found in flagship smartphones like the Galaxy S24 Ultra, it has more than enough grunt for pretty much any game you throw at it, making it an exceptional all-rounder and arguably the definitive starting point for high-performance mobile gaming. While newer generations exist overseas, prices have crept up, and the fourth generation skipped an official release in South Korea, the third generation launched locally with full domestic after-sales service and still holds a very sensible price tag.

The Lenovo Legion Tab Gen 3 comes in two configurations: 12GB RAM with 256GB storage, and 16GB RAM with 512GB storage. They will set you back about 600,000 KRW and 800,000 KRW respectively.

Tablets vary wildly in price, but if you are hunting for an ultra-budget contender hovering in the 300,000 KRW bracket, the iPlay 70 Mini Pro is worth a nod. It runs on MediaTek's Kompanio 900T processor, featuring an 8.4-inch LCD panel that supports a 90Hz refresh rate.

Naturally, budget hardware forces compromises across the board, so you cannot expect flagship performance at this price point. Casual games will run without a fuss, but heavier MMORPGs like Mabinogi Mobile will demand some serious graphical concessions—and even then, the experience might not entirely satisfy purists. That said, if you factor in the bargain price, the inclusion of LTE connectivity, and its utility for everyday media consumption, it is a perfectly adequate piece of kit. The current model packs 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage, retailing for roughly 240,000 KRW.