Nowadays you can already read your books digitally for just 80 euros. However, the Kindle Oasis is aimed at avid readers with higher demands: a bigger and better screen than entry-level ones, chic build quality, plus the ability to drop it into the bath without worry. We started working with the latest luxury Kindle.
Amazon Kindle Oasis3
Price From €229 (Amazon.de)Screen 7” E-Ink 300PPI
Storage 8GB or 32GB
Extras IPX8 Waterproof, Bluetooth (for audiobooks)
Website www.amazon.de
10 Score 100
- Pros
- Browse buttons
- Software and bookstore
- Build quality
- Screen and backlight
- Negatives
- Little news compared to Oasis 2
Giant Amazon holds the lion's share of the world's book and e-reader market and only Kobo is still offering some resistance. And while the fluctuating emotions about Amazon's dubious global domination are understandable, there's no question that they have their products, plus the range of books, extremely well organized.
The third generation Kindle Oasis may sound pricey at around 229 euros, but the reading experience really leaves nothing to be desired. 7 inch is a nice size, the metal build is excellent, it's waterproof, the physical buttons make reading more pleasant, and the LED-lit 300 ppi e-ink screen is very good, slightly better than the high in our experience -end alternatives. The glass top layer clearly looks finer and is more resilient than the plastic top layers of loafers. Legibility is excellent even in bright sunlight, in the dark the backlight shows no blemishes, and we only charge once every week or two.
Little real news
New in the latest Oasis is that the lighting now offers multiple color options, from daylight white to candlelight yellow. Competitor Kobo already had that, for example on the Kobo Forma. Our opinions on this are divided, one likes the warm option, the other prefers a colder setting. If you fall into the latter category, you can consider saving 30 euros and buying the older Oasis 2, because apart from that screen color option, there is nothing new to discover. Due to the lack of competition, the urge for innovation at Amazon seems absent. For example, a USB Type-C connection would have been a logical novelty, although our criticism ends there.
Excellent software
Amazon's software is still excellent. Managing your library is easy, as is resizing text, taking notes, looking up words in the dictionary, and translating words or paragraphs. Access to Amazon's gigantic library, nowadays also richly filled with Dutch-language books and comic books, is also made easy for you. Buying, borrowing, or downloading new books for free is easy. Do you have any books from another (hopefully legal) source? With the (free) Caliber software you can easily convert them, and send them to your own Amazon email address, after which they appear directly on your e-reader. Kindle-simple all, which makes their E-readers accessible to everyone.
Conclusion
The Kindle Oasis 3 unfortunately doesn't bring much news, but nevertheless leaves nothing to be desired in our daily reading experience. It is a top E-reader that makes you forget old-fashioned paper very quickly.
