“Can the iPad mini make phone calls?”
The iPad mini cannot make phone calls right out of the box but you can add that functionality with an app. The most popular app for using the iPad as a phone is ‘Skype for iPad’.
You can download ‘Skype for iPad‘ from Apple’s App Store.
Creating a Skype account is free, but unfortunately you’ll need to buy ‘Skype credits’ before you can use the iPad mini as a phone to call someone on a regular phone (landline) or mobile phone number.