The Reader’s Edition is targeted at readers, and its highlight feature is Blue Shade, a display optimization program that limits exposure to blue light at night. The display brightness switches to an ultra-low level, while still making the text visible enough to read with comfort. The feature, which can be turned off, also offers warm color filters and lets users fine-tune the color settings to their preference.
However, Blue Shade is not exactly exclusive to this new device. The feature was pushed to Amazon’s Fire HD 8, 10, and the $50 Fire tablet in the beginning of December as a part of the Fire OS Bellini update.
Along with Blue Shade, the Reader’s Edition doesn’t exactly offer anything new. You’ll find all the same highlights such as the Bookerly Font and the speed reading feature “Word Runner” that rolled out to the other Fire tablets as a part of the Fire OS 5 update.
The Reader’s Edition offers the same hardware as the Fire HD 8, including the 8-inch 1,280 x 800 pixel screen, quad-core processor, 5-megapixel rear camera, and up to 128GB of expandable storage via MicroSD. We weren’t favorably impressed by the Fire HD 8, and gave it a 3 out of 5 for its inconsistent performance and bland design. You can check out the full review here.
The Reader’s Edition tablet doesn’t offer anything new on its own. Amazon’s biggest selling point for the Reader’s Edition is the price of the bundle, which is supposed to be $350, but the company is offering all three items for $250. By itself, the new tablet costs $150, the leather cover is $70, and a year of the Kindle Unlimited subscription — which is $10 a month –comes out to $120. So you’re saving up to $100 by going for the bundle. The Fire HD 8 tablet that was released in September costs $130.
If you’re interested in the bundle, you can pre-order the Amazon Fire HD 8 Reader’s Edition here, and the device will be shipped on December 9 in time for the holidays.
