Amazon Kindle Scribe review

Amazon is credited with popularising the eReader with its first Kindle in 2007, but the company has been slow to embrace change within the line-up.

Most Kindles are iterations on older models, with the latest versions simply being smaller and lighter devices designed to solely read books bought direct from Amazon.

But e-ink technology can be used for a lot more. There are several successful note-taking e-ink tablets from companies like reMarkable, which introduce a Wacom layer under the screen to enable pen input for notetaking. Goodbye, paper notebook.

I’m surprised it has taken Amazon until 2022 to release its first notetaking Kindle, the Kindle Scribe. I’m also a little disappointed with the product – given Amazon’s dominance in the eReader market I feel the Scribe is half-baked, with annoying software and some baffling restrictions.

It feels like the result of Amazon’s monopoly. When you’re the undisputed eReader leader, maybe you don’t have to try that hard.

The Kindle Scribe is a good product, but it’s not a great one. The fact it’s a better eReader than notetaking tablet is also quite damning.

Design

While Amazon’s other Kindles generally look to shrink the eReader to the smallest possible size, the Scribe goes in the opposite direction. This is a luxuriously large design that manages to pack in a big screen into a thin and relatively light body.

The device is only 5.8mm thick and 433g, made from 100% recycled aluminium. It’s a lovely feeling thing, though you will need two hands to comfortably hold it to read on for any length of time.

It’s asymmetrical with a thicker bezel on the left or right depending which way up you hold it, as the software can tell and flips the orientation for you. It looks a little like a larger Kindle Oasis, though the Oasis has page turn buttons on its larger edge – the Scribe does not. The Scribe is also one thickness whereas the Oasis is a wedge shape.

That big screen is there to be used with the new pen, which is very thankfully included with all models at all prices. You can either get the basic pen with the 16GB version or the premium one I was sent for review with 32GB or 64GB. The premium pen has an assignable shortcut button on the side and an eraser nub on the top.

The pen is nicely matt and grippy and never needs charging. It can clip magnetically to the thin bezel edge of the Scribe when not in use, though you can also buy a case for the Scribe which has a pen loop on it for safer storage.

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Sold separately, the case is close to a necessary purchase. It protects the screen, stows the pen, and can prop up the device for writing or reading thanks to the folding design. The Scribe attaches magnetically to it, and you can get it in fabric or leather.

There’s just one button on the Scribe, a power/wake button, next to a USB-C port for charging. Thankfully Amazon has abandoned the ancient microUSB port.

Display

The design all revolves around a lovely big 10.2in screen. If you want a larger eReader, look no further.

This is a very good e-ink display with 300 pixels per inch – that’s high definition for the technology, and words look just as sharp here as they do on any smaller Kindle or Kobo eReader available.

As there are no page turn buttons, you must tap the screen to turn pages, just as you must to interact with it to use the on screen keyboard, scroll through menus, or tap into books or notebooks. It’s responsive and fends off fingerprints thanks to its matt finish.

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I devoured a novel in a day when I first got hold of the Scribe such is its inviting, word-filled canvas. If you’ve ever thought eReaders were too small and you want to get a lot more words on the page, the Scribe is for you.

On the flip side you might have impaired vision, so the large screen might be welcome as you can adjust the font size much larger. With a display this big you can still fit a decent number of lines onto it.

The Scribe also benefits from 35 LED front lights, the most on any Kindle ever (the current cheapest Kindle only has four). This means you can read or write in the dark, and there’s an auto-brightness function so you don’t have to keep adjusting the levels. You can also set the light to a warmer tone for less harsh blue light.

Reading experience

Reading books on the Kindle Scribe is a joy. Adjust the font size to your liking and away you go – the beautiful simplicity of the eReader remains, even in a Kindle this large.

It’s a good choice if you do most of your reading at home or sitting down for long periods as you can hold it with both hands or cradled in your lap. If you read a lot on your commute, you might prefer a smaller device to be held in one hand or easily placed in a jacket pocket.

As far as reading books bought from the Kindle Store goes, this is the same experience as you’ll get on any other Kindle, just larger! Though most people will be served fine enough by the cheapest Kindle or the Kindle Paperwhite, so you really will want to be taking notes to justify the spend on the Scribe.

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Writing experience

The real differences are when it comes to writing, as the Scribe is the only Kindle with a pen. The pen has excellent latency, which means the lines are drawn quickly without delays onto the screen.

The idea is you can write notes in books you are reading or separately create notebooks in which to make notes on whatever you want. The bottom line is you can do this, but neither experience is very well optimised.

A major issue is you cannot notate directly onto books (though you can directly onto imported PDFs). On rival products like the Kobo Sage, you can write with a pen directly onto e-books like you might onto the page of a real book. On Kobo, your notes are saved even if you have rented a library e-book, and will appear on your copy if you end up buying that book.

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Not so with Kindle Scribe. If you want to make a note in a book you’ve bought, you must tap on a word or highlight a passage and then tap on the hand icon that is permanently on the screen and select the note icon. You can then write in the pop-up sticky note which then attaches to the highlight you’ve made.

I found this system clunky. If scrolling through a book it’s easy to miss where you’ve made a note as the icon that appears in the passage is tiny. It’d be much clearer if you could write onto the book over words or in the margins. Having to highlight and tap several times to make sticky notes is a jarring thing to do and takes the flow out of notations.

You can’t even add sticky notes to bought comic books or magazines, a huge oversight in my opinion.

Better is the notebook function, which Amazon has added as a tab to the Kindle’s home screen software. You can create notebooks and select one of many different lined templates to write away to your heart’s content.

Thanks to the matt screen and matt pen nib, it feels as close to as writing on paper as digital technology gets and is miles nicer than using an Apple Pencil on a smooth iPad screen.

With good palm rejection I found I could write for several minutes straight with no issues. There are five pen thicknesses to choose from and a highlighter, but no pencil option. With the premium pen you can turn it around and use the top as an eraser, which works very well.

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But the software support for the writing part of the Scribe is lacking. There’s no handwriting conversion software, something found on the reMarkable 2 that works well. You also can’t draw straight lines in notebooks, and while you can create notebook folders, you can’t put folders inside folders like you can on the reMarkable.

This massively put me off making the Scribe my daily notebook device because once the notebooks start piling up, the filing system gets very messy as you can’t organise it well. You also can’t insert pages midway through notebooks, another basic feature on other e-ink noting products that Amazon hasn’t thought about.

It means writing on the Scribe feels somehow both freeing in the fact it can be done, but also very restrictive in the things you imagine it should be able to do but cannot.

I came to think of the Scribe as a Kindle with a notebook built in – I barely ever used it to write notes in books.

Amazon is also lagging when it comes to note syncing. With reMarkable there’s a polished smartphone app for viewing your notes on your phone or tablet, and early functionality to make notes on those devices that then sync with the notes on the tablet.

All notes made on the Scribe can only be edited on the Scribe. You can view your notes via the Kindle app on smartphone or tablet, but you can’t edit them – you view them as an image file. You can email notebooks to yourself from the Scribe too, but there must be a better system than this.

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Specs & performance

The Scribe has excellent performance with immediate response to page turns in books, and it moves through menus as quick as the page-refresh nature of e-ink allows.

Despite being the most expensive Kindle the Scribe is not waterproof in any way, which I find disappointing. There is also no option to buy one with a free cellular connection, something Amazon seems to be phasing out of the Kindle lineup. Wi-Fi will have to suffice.

You can opt for 16GB, 32GB, or 64GB storage. Even the lowest option will be enough for thousands of books and notebooks. A reason to get more is if you download a lot of audiobooks from Amazon-owned Audible as these MP3 files take up much more hard drive space. With no headphone jack though you’ll need to connect Bluetooth headphones.

Software & features

Setting up the Kindle is a doddle as Amazon lets you do it via the Kindle smartphone app. This makes it a lot easier to connect the Scribe to your Amazon account and get it connected to a Wi-Fi network.

One of the best things about all models of the Scribe is that none come with lock screen ads. On other Kindles, you must pay for models without these irritating ads. For some reason, the Scribe escapes that fate.

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See also  Pinter 3 review

Unfortunately, Amazon has not ever really improved the Kindle’s software in the 15 years of the product line’s existence. The size of the Scribe’s screen, coupled with the new notebook stuff, amplifies that.

It’s not intuitive at first, and I dislike how Amazon spams the ‘Home’ tab with algorithmic recommendations for books, comics, and other content.

Given there are now notebooks to fit into the equation, it’s a faff to switch between functions. There should be a quicker way to flick between different notebooks, but you must crawl back through menus via a back button that is a tap away.

You have to tap twice just to find the brightness slider – this sums up the clunkiness of Kindle software. It’s a bit easier to ignore on simpler Kindles but when the Scribe is meant to do so much more, it makes daily use frustrating.

Getting documents such as PDFs onto the Kindle is also a little annoying using Amazon’s Send to Kindle software. You can download smartphone, PC, or Mac apps for this, or use a dedicated website.

Battery life

The Scribe’s battery life is outstanding, though you’d expect that from the size of the thing. Amazon promises ‘months’ on a single charge but I can only assume this is with Wi-Fi switched off.

I used the Scribe every day for a week with Wi-Fi on and brightness fairly high when in use, and the battery went from 100% to 58%. This is still excellent, but if you want to last several weeks you’ll have to flick airplane mode on.

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Price & availability

The Amazon Kindle Scribe costs from $339.99/£329.99 for a 16GB model with the basic pen.

This is expensive, but a reasonable price for an e-ink notetaking device. The reMarkable 2 is the best notetaking e-ink tablet on the market, but it costs $279/£279 without a pen that costs at least $79/£59. It also has no backlight, and no direct connection to an ebook store – it’s not designed to be an eReader.

For all the Scribe’s software annoyances, it’s still great because it’s a Kindle. Reading is a pleasure on it, and books are easy to come by.

The Scribe goes all the way up to $419.99/£409.99 for 64GB with the premium pen.

You can buy it from Amazon US or Amazon UK.

Verdict

The Kindle Scribe feels very much like what it is – a first-generation product. It’s as though Amazon knew it had to challenge other notetaking e-ink devices but decided to do the bare minimum.

The Scribe does what it says it can do, but not in thoughtful or clever ways. It highlights how lazy Amazon has always been with Kindle software, reeking of a company that doesn’t have to try that hard because it already dominates the eReader market.

When notetaking e-ink products like reMarkable exist, the next version of the Scribe will have to try a lot harder with simple additions like folders in folders, cross-device note editing, or even the simple ability to write directly onto books. These are things that could be added to this Scribe with a software update, too.

For simple notetaking and doodling, the Scribe is great. It also might be my favourite Kindle for reading books because of the luxuriously large, quality lit screen and insanely good battery life.

But when judged for what it sets out to do and against other products, the Scribe falls short.

Specs

• 10.2in 300ppi e-ink display
• Wacom layer for pen input
• 35 LED front lights
• USB-C charging
• Wi-Fi
• 16/32/64GB storage
• Amazon Kindle Store
• 5.8mm thick
• 433g