Kindle Scribe Is One of the Best E-Readers You Can Buy
Despite all of Amazon’s bad practices, the company produces fantastic e-readers, especially when it comes to the Kindle Paperwhite. However, if the Paperwhite is too small for you or you need something that can also take notes, it might be worth looking at the larger, more expensive Kindle Scribe. It may be more expensive than the Paperwhite, but the price is worth it, especially if you enjoy reading comics, manga, or writing.
Kindle by any other name
If you put a Kindle Paperwhite and a Kindle Scribe side by side, you’ll see a lot of similarities. In fact, the two devices are almost identical, except for the larger Scribe display. Both devices feature a fantastic e-ink display that makes reading at any brightness extremely easy and enjoyable.
So what makes Kindle Scribe so special? If you’re looking for something for regular book reading, the Paperwhite is all you need for that, at an exceptional price. However, Scribe is designed for people like me who want to read things like comics—something many will appreciate once Amazon completes the merger of the Kindle Store and the Comixology app .
The 10.2-inch display perfectly displays both electronic ink books and pages of various comics and manga. While the Scribe may be a little bulkier than the smaller Paperwhite, the extra size makes it feel more like a book. It also allows me to display more text on the screen without having to reduce the font to a nearly illegible size.
Add a stylus and everything gets better.
Scribe takes some cues from other large-screen e-readers like the ReMarkable 2 by adding a stylus or “pen” you can use with it. When you’re done reading, you can create notebooks that you can then write in.
It’s ideal for easily jotting down anything that comes to mind, such as notes about a story you’re working on or things you want to remember from specific books. You can also draw using a laptop, although it’s not as good as a real drawing tablet, so I wouldn’t recommend buying one just for that purpose.
The “pen,” as Amazon calls it, is just a stylus with interchangeable nibs, but the company offers both a basic and a premium option, the latter of which comes with a clickable button to trigger certain actions. To be honest, I didn’t expect much from the pen, but I was pleasantly surprised by how easy it was to write with it. This made taking notes on Scribe extremely easy and enjoyable, and quickly helped the device become my go-to option for taking notes, saving me money on paper and sticky notes.
However, the system also allows you to use some more advanced tools beyond just writing and taking notes. You can also convert any handwritten notes into text and then easily share them via email with various contacts. There’s also a Lasso tool that lets you resize, move, copy, or paste notes from the notepad or books you’re working on. You can take notes in various notepads or if you want to write down something important while working. While reading a book, you can create notes in your books at any time and return to them later. You can also easily organize all your notes into folders and subfolders for future reference.
When you read in landscape mode, you can see two pages of a book side by side, creating the illusion that The Scribe is a real book. It’s a nice feature that makes my daily reading experience even more exciting, and I’m happy with the decision to switch from the smaller Paperwhite to the Scribe.
Expensive update
But all these pros don’t change the fact that the Kindle Scribe is a very expensive upgrade, especially if you already have a Kindle Paperwhite from the last few years. The new Paperwhites are not only cheaper, but they have something the Scribe doesn’t: they’re waterproof. So, it’s hard to recommend the Scribe over the Paperwhite to everyone.
However, this doesn’t change the fact that Scribe is a fantastic way to read and is undoubtedly one of the best Kindle versions Amazon has released to date. The device is worth the $339.99 base price (for the cheapest 16GB option) and can be found on sale frequently. In fact, it’s on sale now: Amazon is offering 29% off for Black Friday, which works out to just $239.99 for the 16GB Kindle Scribe .
If you’re looking for a great big-screen ereader that offers the same readability and access to the Amazon Kindle store as the Paperwhite, then Scribe is an option worth trying.