Apple Pen and Goodnotes
Will my Apple IPad Mini 2 work with Goodnotes and an apple pen?
iPad mini, iOS 12
Question marked as
No. Your iPad mini2 cannot be used with GoodNotes. The iPad mini2 also does not support Apple Pencil.
The Apple App Store shows that the currently available version of GoodNotes (GoodNotes 5) requires iPadOS 15.4 or later.
An iPad mini2 cannot be updated beyond iOS 12.5.7. Apple ended major update support for the iPad Air, mini2 and mini3 in September 2019 - although they continue to receive occasional “point” security updates, the most recent being released January 2023. These devices cannot be updated to iPadOS 13 (or any later major versions of iPadOS) as the internal hardware does not meet the minimum technical requirements (CPU capabilities and available RAM) for newer versions of iOS/iPadOS.
Some App developers have dropped support for iOS versions preceding iOS 13.x for technical reasons (often because APIs or software libraries upon which they rely have been updated in the new version of iPadOS, making their App incompatible with earlier versions).
Whilst many App titles remain compatible with your iPad, if you want or need to access to Apps requiring the most recent versions of iOS, you’ll need to consider replacement of your iPad with a newer or current model that supports iPadOS16.
As for Apple Pencil, here is Apple’s definitive compatibility list:
Apple Pencil compatibility - Apple Support