The Kindle Colorsoft is my favorite color e-reader, and it just hit an all-time-low Prime Day price

ZDNET's cardinal takeaways

• The Kindle Colorsoft is usually $279, but is connected merchantability astatine Amazon.
• It has a agleam show (even successful nonstop sunlight), customizable colour settings, and zippy show portion browsing titles and turning pages.
• It could beryllium a spot larger to get the afloat effect of the colour display.

The Amazon Kindle Colorsoft Essentials Bundle is connected merchantability for $211 up of Amazon Prime Day, a 42% discount and the lowest terms we've seen connected the device. The bundle gets you the device, a plant-based leather lawsuit successful Jade, Raspberry, oregon Black, and a wireless charging dock.

To avid readers, the Kindle has been a mainstay since its inception successful 2007. Each caller Kindle exemplary gives readers much precocious features and faster performance. But now, with the caller Kindle Colorsoft, readers get a vivid colour show to bask their books successful a caller way.

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The Kindle Colorsoft is the latest iteration successful the Kindle lineup. It features the aforesaid 300 ppi show that's modular for e-readers, but it besides has a 150 ppi show for colour images, on with 120 nits of brightness to truly marque your pages pop. Depending connected your colour preferences, you tin customize the colour settings to modular oregon vivid. 

Amazon dubs the instrumentality arsenic "color without compromise", and arsenic idiosyncratic who's tested galore e-readers this twelvemonth alone, I was impressed by the Kindle Colorsoft arsenic a invited summation to the colour e-reader world.

Fresh retired of the box, the Colorsoft proudly displays its colour capabilities, since adjacent erstwhile turned off, the show dims to 1 of Kindle's built-in backgrounds. Alternatively, you tin take to show your book's screen successful standby mode truthful you tin spot the creation however it was meant to beryllium seen.

After turning connected the instrumentality and mounting it up (super casual to do, particularly if you've owned a Kindle before), the archetypal happening I truly noticed was the performance: it's fast. Compared to my basal exemplary Kindle (2022 version) it zips done the Kindle room erstwhile choosing a book, and pages successful your publication crook accelerated without immoderate annoying lag effects. 

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Like the Kindle Paperwhite, the Colorsoft is ace agleam and tin beryllium work successful nonstop sunlight without drowning retired the colour connected the screen. To trial however the Colorsoft's 120-nit brightness held up successful nonstop sunlight to competitors, I placed it extracurricular connected its highest brightness adjacent to 2 different colour e-readers astatine their highest brightness: a Kobo Libra Colour and a Boox Note Air C 3. The Colorsoft's colour show and brightness outperformed the Kobo Libra Colour successful nonstop sunlight, and it had little lag erstwhile moving betwixt titles.

The Kindle Colorsoft adjacent to the Kobo Libra Colour successful nonstop sunlight.

Allison Murray/ZDNET

Compared to the Colorsoft, the Boox Note Air C 3 had the aforesaid precocious brightness and was arsenic speedy arsenic the Kindle erstwhile moving done pages, particularly erstwhile speechmaking a colour magazine. However, upon seeing the Boox and the Kindle broadside by side, you tin decidedly announcement the pixelization connected the Boox's colour display, arsenic opposed to the creaseless colour that the Kindle provides.

The Kindle Colorsoft adjacent to the Boox Note Air 3 C.

Allison Murray/ZDNET

The Colorsoft's colour features don't halt there: you tin besides item passages successful your books successful antithetic colors and signifier them into categories (i.e., quotes successful yellow, facts successful blue, characters to retrieve successful purple, etc.).  

While I'm not a instrumentality of speechmaking comics, Keeley Boehmer, Principal Product Manager for Kindle, told maine that the Colorsoft provides panel-by-panel speechmaking for comics, making it casual to spot the elements the writer intended for each panel. In addition, a pinch-and-zoom diagnostic allows you to truly spot the colour images successful detail.

Another awesome diagnostic of the Colorsoft is that it's h2o resistant (rated IPX8), truthful you tin work it by the beach, pool, oregon successful the bath. Plus, it has wireless charging, a diagnostic antecedently lone disposable successful the Kindle Paperwhite.

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I person virtually nary complaints with this Kindle but possibly its tiny size. The size itself is casual and comfy to hold, but speechmaking colour books oregon magazines, a bigger size similar that of the Boox Note Air C 3's 10.3-inch show makes a greater impact, and you tin truly spot and admit the colour images amended erstwhile seeing the full page.

ZDNET's buying proposal

In the satellite of colour e-readers, the Kindle Colorsoft is simply a apical rival acknowledgment to its customizable colour display, accelerated show successful downloading books and page-turning, and wireless charging. The colour show isn't pixelated similar immoderate different colour e-readers, and its item diagnostic enables caller ways to work books.

If you're idiosyncratic who reads a batch of books oregon comics with color, the Colorsoft is decidedly worthy it. However, if you work chiefly successful achromatic and white, you tin prevention immoderate wealth and opt for the caller Kindle Paperwhite, which has conscionable arsenic accelerated performance. 

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