4 years after the primary colour e-readers launched, Amazon has lastly launched a Kindle with a colour display.
The $279.99 Kindle Colorsoft options the identical colour E Ink know-how utilized in e-readers just like the Kobo Libra Color however custom-made with a brand new show stack, brighter LEDs, and particular coatings. Colours seem extra saturated and slightly extra vibrant on the Colorsoft’s seven-inch display than they do on the Libra Color, whereas display refreshes are quicker and distinction is notably higher, making black strains and borders in comics look darker than they do on different colour e-readers. The upgrades additionally make looking Amazon’s retailer extra partaking, with ebook covers that higher seize your consideration.
Regardless of a problem with display discoloration affecting some gadgets, the Kindle Colorsoft has one of the best colour display of any e-reader I’ve examined. However its worth has me wishing for extra upgrades, like a bigger display and stylus help. The colour display doesn’t add sufficient to the Kindle expertise by itself to justify the additional value.
Once you’re studying in black and white, web page turns nonetheless really feel instantaneous, like they do on my Eleventh-gen Kindle Paperwhite Signature Version. They’re slightly slower when displaying bigger colour photos like comics, because the Colorsoft performs a full-screen refresh each time you flip the web page to maximise picture high quality. (Amazon says a full refresh solely occurs with “photos above a sure measurement,” nevertheless it occurs even on pages with smaller colour photos.) The Colorsoft’s refresh feels a bit quicker than different colour e-readers, although, and isn’t actually a distraction. It’s additionally a lot quicker than the Outstanding Paper Professional, which makes use of a distinct colour E Ink show know-how.
The Colorsoft’s pace enhancements are most obvious in terms of zooming and panning a web page, resembling enlarging a panel or textual content in a comic book. The e-reader quickly switches to a lower-quality picture whilst you’re transferring across the web page, earlier than re-rendering all the pieces at prime quality whenever you’re carried out. It’s a trick all e-readers use, and the Colorsoft does it extra responsively than different colour choices. It’s nonetheless a small step behind the efficiency of black-and-white e-readers and nowhere close to as quick and fluid as a pill with an LCD or OLED display, however the Colorsoft by no means feels prefer it’s struggling to maintain up.
Highlighting passages additionally advantages from the brand new colour capabilities. The Colorsoft helps you to select between 4 completely different spotlight colours — pink, yellow, blue, and orange — and filter them by colour. However Amazon ought to have taken this characteristic a step additional. There’s no method to label the highlighter colours, so it’s fully as much as you to do not forget that you utilize blue to avoid wasting inspirational quotes, for instance. The spotlight colours are carried over to the Kindle cellular app, and whereas highlighted passages are organized by colour when exported as a spreadsheet or PDF, you’ll be able to’t restrict the export to only a single colour.
On an e-reader as costly because the Colorsoft, I might have additionally appreciated the choice to focus on with a stylus like you’ll be able to on the Kindle Scribe, as an alternative of getting to faucet on the display, watch for on-screen controls to pop up, after which drag the spotlight field over the textual content. The dearth of stylus help makes the Colorsoft really feel a step behind the extra reasonably priced Kobo Libra Color.
One factor I didn’t count on to understand in regards to the Colorsoft’s display is the lack of customization. Opponents like Boox offer you intensive management over refresh modes, brightness, vividness, and distinction. I discover it overwhelming and far favor Amazon already optimizing the Colorsoft’s display for me.
The one possibility accessible on the Colorsoft is switching between normal and vivid colour modes — the latter of which boosts the depth of colours in less-saturated imagery. The distinction between the 2 is adequately subtle that I have a tendency to go away vivid mode on on a regular basis, however I did discover the impact whereas studying the primary quantity of Jonathan Hickman and Marco Checchetto’s Final Spider-Man: Married with Youngsters. The purple in Spider-Man’s swimsuit had extra visible affect in vivid mode, whereas the Inexperienced Goblin’s armor seemed extra grey than inexperienced in normal. I simply want Amazon hadn’t buried the choices in a menu that blocks a big portion of the show, making it onerous to do a fast before-and-after visible comparability.
Though Amazon’s upgrades genuinely enhance the Colorsoft’s display, they don’t clear up all the issues with E Ink’s Kaleido know-how. It’s nonetheless restricted to 4,096 colours, which leaves colour content material trying desaturated and flat in comparison with gadgets with LCD and OLED screens, which might show thousands and thousands of colours. If the iPad is like flipping by means of the shiny, vibrant images in a print copy of Nationwide Geographic, the Colorsoft is extra just like the washed-out colour images on the entrance web page of a newspaper.
Textual content and black-and-white imagery are displayed at 300ppi on the Colorsoft, however that decision is halved in colour mode. I had no concern studying Eiichiro Oda’s One Piece, however the nice print in speech bubbles in Spider-Man and Marvel’s Fortnite x Marvel: Zero Conflict crossover was tough to learn with out continually zooming in and panning round. Coloration E Ink screens generally even have barely much less distinction than black-and-white shows on account of the additional RGB filter layer that Kaleido depends on to show colour. With display lighting turned off, the Colorsoft’s show seems a bit darker than a black-and-white e-reader just like the Kobo Clara BW or the Paperwhite. The distinction is refined, although, and straightforward to compensate for by holding the Colorsoft’s gentle on, even outdoor.
Shortly after the Kindle Colorsoft began transport, some customers reported seeing a yellow discolored strip throughout the underside of the e-reader’s show. My assessment unit additionally displays the difficulty, however to a lesser diploma than others are seeing, primarily based on photos shared on Reddit. The discoloration on the Colorsoft I examined is so refined that I’m undecided I might have seen it had others not talked about it. My iPhone’s digicam picks it up higher than my eyes do.
It’s nonetheless not clear what’s inflicting the issue — some speculate it’s a problem with an adhesive used to fabricate the display — however Amazon has acknowledged it and says it’s working to repair the difficulty and to make sure that new gadgets received’t have the discoloration. The corporate can be providing refunds or replacements to those that have an affected Colorsoft, however Amazon’s product web page reveals an anticipated delay of three to 5 weeks. I like to recommend ready till Amazon confirms it has fastened the difficulty before you purchase one your self.
Amazon claims the Kindle Colorsoft can be utilized for round eight weeks on a cost (4 fewer than it claims for the Twelfth-gen Paperwhite), however that’s when studying for simply half-hour a day with the display brightness set to simply above half and wi-fi options disabled. In actuality, you’re going to be charging it extra often than that. I discover the colours on an e-reader’s show to be extra pronounced with a brighter display, so in my testing, I had the Colorsoft’s display lighting set to 75 p.c. After an hour of studying a comic book requiring full-screen refreshes with each web page flip, the battery misplaced 5 p.c of its cost. I estimate I’d get about three weeks out of the Colorsoft’s battery between fees — longer with a mixture of colour and black-and-white content material.
As with the newest Paperwhite Signature Version, the Colorsoft contains wi-fi charging along with its USB-C port. However with out magnets, correctly aligning a wi-fi charging puck is irritating and never well worth the effort. You’ll solely be charging it about as soon as a month, so plugging it in for a couple of hours isn’t an enormous inconvenience.
There are a variety of colour e-readers now, however by way of availability, person expertise, and display measurement, the Colorsoft’s major competitors is the Kobo Libra Color.
With out lighting changes, the Colorsoft’s display seems cooler and extra impartial than the Libra Color’s, which skews barely heat. However the distinction is negligible when you flip up the Colorsoft’s heat slider and the Libra Color’s pure gentle slider. The Colorsoft’s improved distinction additionally provides its display a darker general tone, with colours that look extra pure and vivid. On the Libra Color, imagery is hotter and brighter, which reveals extra particulars in darker areas of a picture. I favor the Colorsoft’s vibrancy and give attention to colour accuracy, however I wouldn’t describe the Libra Color’s method as inferior. It’s a matter of desire.
The Kindle Colorsoft additionally feels barely quicker than the Libra Color when turning pages, however the distinction is usually negligible until you’re zooming and panning photos. The Kindle feels extra aware of finger gestures and only a bit snappier when switching between the low- and high-quality variations of the photographs.
Whereas sideloaded content material seems nearly as good on the Colorsoft as content material bought from Amazon, I needed to depend on Amazon’s on-line Ship to Kindle service to protect the colour content material of PDFs. Copying them to the e-reader from a MacBook Professional over USB-C (by means of the Android File Switch app or Amazon’s lately up to date app) resulted within the PDFs exhibiting up on the Colorsoft in black and white, and others have skilled the identical. I didn’t have that concern when sideloading to the Kobo Libra Color, so in case you don’t supply your ebooks from Amazon, you’ll have to be taught to reside with a couple of further steps to get them on the e-reader correctly.
Amazon’s focus after discontinuing the Kindle Oasis could also be “touch-forward,” however mine isn’t
Total, I believe the Colorsoft’s display is healthier than Kobo’s, however there are another elements of the Libra Color’s design that I favor. Amazon’s focus after discontinuing the Kindle Oasis could also be “touch-forward,” however mine isn’t. I’m nonetheless an enormous fan of bodily web page flip buttons, and I favor the asymmetrical design of the Libra Color, with its bigger grip that makes it a lot simpler to carry in a single hand. On multiple event, I’ve by chance triggered a web page activate the Kindle Colorsoft when adjusting my grip. I additionally discover the Libra Color’s sleep / energy button, which is positioned on the again of the e-reader, more durable to hit by mistake. The Colorsoft’s button is positioned on its backside edge subsequent to the USB-C port, and I’ve unintentionally woken it up a couple of instances whereas attempting to plug in a charging cable with out trying.
And whereas the again of the Colorsoft has a clean, barely rubbery end, I really feel like I’ve a greater grip on the Libra Color, because of the etched texture on its rear panel.
In order for you a compact colour e-reader with entry to a strong e book retailer that can make comedian books and manga look good with out requiring a deep dive into display settings, the Kindle Colorsoft has one of the best colour E Ink display you may get. It’s additionally the perfect possibility in case you’re firmly entrenched in Amazon’s ecosystem.
When you’re not as involved with colour accuracy or don’t wish to be caught in Amazon’s world, the Kobo Libra Color is a less expensive various at $219.99 that also seems good and performs very nicely. It skips options like wi-fi charging however provides you the choice of utilizing a stylus ($69.99) for simpler highlights and primary note-taking, and it has web page flip buttons. Amazon’s bookstore is extra complete than Kobo’s, however I discovered it a lot simpler to sideload content material from different sources onto the Libra Color, together with ePUB recordsdata and colour PDFs, which confirmed up with precise colour when copied over utilizing USB-C.
As for whether or not that is the proper Kindle to purchase: the Colorsoft is mainly the wonderful Kindle Paperwhite Signature Version with a colour display, however for $80 greater than the Signature Version and $120 greater than the usual Paperwhite. That’s so much to spend on a colour display. Including options like stylus help, primary note-taking capabilities, or perhaps a barely bigger display to raised accommodate content material like comedian books — you already know, like a Kindle Scribe — would have made the Colorsoft simpler to justify.
Whereas I’m glad to see that Amazon tried to enhance the present technology of colour E Ink know-how, it’s nonetheless a bit disappointing, with washed-out colours and decrease resolutions. When you’re already a contented Kindle person, contemplate the Twelfth-gen Paperwhite as an alternative. A colour display simply isn’t a must have improve.
Images by Andrew Liszewski / The Verge
