If You’re Thinking about Buying a Kindle, Read This First
Amazon’s Kindle Paperwhite is a great eBook reader for most people. For about $150 USD (without special offers), it’s waterproof and has Bluetooth connectivity for Audible listening. But its screen is only 6 inches, not much bigger than many smartphones these days.
Amazon’s fancy new (for 2019) Kindle Oasis has a 7 inch screen and starts at $270 USD (also without special offers). It has 25 LEDs so you can adjust the temperature of the screen to your liking.
So why are eBook reader sales on the decline while eBook sales have gone up every year?
Remember, that Paperwhite screen is about the size of your average smartphone screen. It turns out that most people are reading eBooks on their phones and tablets. Even though it’s not as good as for their eyes as E ink, they’re using the devices they already have. It makes sense. A smartphone can do so many things, while an eBook reader can do one thing — read books. And in the case of the Kindle eBook reader, it can only really read Kindle books.
Many people are using Amazon’s Kindle app on their phones and tablets instead of (and sometimes in addition to) reading on Kindle eBook readers. This means Amazon isn’t making much money selling Kindle eBook readers, but it is making money selling Kindle eBooks. In fact, Amazon’s Kindle Store is the accounts forover 80% of all US eBook sales.
More importantly, Amazon is making money selling you a Kindle Unlimited subscription for $10 a month, and a Prime membership for $120 a year. Don’t forget about Audible, with plans starting at $150 a year. Amazon is making money by keeping you locked in to its system with its services, not its devices.
So what is a voracious reader to do? What is the alternative to getting locked into Amazon’s ecosystem a little bit more with a new Kindle eBook reader?
If you like to borrow digital eBooks from your local library, try the Libby app with Kobo’s Clara HD eBook reader. The Clara HD is close in price and features to the Kindle Paperwhite without the Amazon straight-jacket. You can even buy it on Amazon.
And if you’d like your eBook reader to take notes, too, check out the Onyx Boox Nova Pro. For a little more than the price of the Kindle Oasis, you can install Android apps (yes, including the Kindle app), and you can take notes and mark up PDFs using the included stylus. You can even use text-to-speech to listen to your eBooks. It’s a little bigger than the Oasis, too.
Sure, it takes a little more technical know-how to use than turning on a Kindle device and logging into your Amazon account, but it’s worth it.
