Amazon’s First Color Kindle Is Here
Like tissues and napkins, the Amazon Kindle brand has become synonymous with e-books in general. That’s why it’s surprising that the Kindle has been missing one important feature until now: color. Companies like Rakuten’s Kobo have been offering color products for months, but with today’s announcement of Kindle Colorsoft, Amazon is finally catching up. Don’t care about the color? The company is also adding artificial intelligence to Kindle Scribe, as well as making other models a little faster.
Overall, it’s a relaunch of the entire Kindle line with new additions for four devices. But Colorsoft is perhaps the most interesting. Shipping October 30th for $279 (and available for pre-order now ). This is the third color e-ink release from a major brand, following Rakuten and Remarkable . It features a seven-inch adjustable front-lit display, and while Amazon doesn’t specify exactly how many shades it can display, it’s built on E Ink Kaleido technology but with “specially designed coatings between the display layers to enhance color.”
In a hands-on test with Colorsoft , Lifehacker sister publication PCMag wrote that the “color is quite muted,” so it’s definitely not for everyone. It’s also not certain that Amazon’s custom additions make much of a difference to fidelity: PCMag states, “Color appears to be on par with other e-readers we’ve tested.” However, there may be something here for enthusiasts – perhaps those who use a lot of color highlights or want a more natural-looking comic (at the expense of brightness). Amazon promises that Colorsoft not only improves colors, but also delivers faster page turns thanks to its oxide backplane. PCMag says the screen is “very fast,” just “maybe a little slower than the new Paperwhite.” This may make Colorsoft more user-friendly than other color e-readers.
I’ll get to that new Paperwhite, but first the new Kindle Scribe. This is Amazon’s second attempt at a digital note, with the same 10.2-inch screen as the previous model, but now with a white frame and a texture that’s supposed to be more paper-like. There are also some generative AI tricks under the hood, as well as a new Active Canvas feature that should make it easier to place notes in text.
Active Canvas appears to be a way to compensate for the inability to write directly in most documents, which the new Scribe surprisingly still doesn’t have. It allows you to write on the screen, after which your text is placed in a small frame and the text of your document is aligned around it. You can also expand fields to anchor your notes to text without changing it, and Amazon promises that you’ll also eventually be able to write notes in the sidebar and quickly hide them.
It’s a little strange that the most obvious use case for electronic notes—the ability to write directly in books—is still missing, especially since this is Amazon’s only Kindle with a stylus. Instead, you have two new additions to generative AI, including one that summarizes your handwritten notes and another designed to make your handwriting more readable. PCMag didn’t have a chance to test them, so keep an eye on Scribe’s Dec. 4 release date for more information. The eNote will cost $399 and pre-orders are available now .
Finally, there are a couple of small updates to Amazon’s simpler ereaders. The 12th-generation Paperwhite is essentially the same, but with a slightly larger seven-inch display, a slightly thinner body and, according to Amazon, “25% faster page turns.” The standard Kindle, meanwhile, has a new light green “Matcha” color that’s slightly brighter and faster. Both the 12th generation Paperwhite and the updated standard Kindle are available now, with the Paperwhite starting at $159 and the base Kindle starting at $109 .