Amazon Kindle Colorsoft Review: It’s A First-Gen E-Reader–And It Shows

When I’m not gaming and working, I’m sprawled on my couch with my cats with a Kindle in my hand. Years ago, I was adamantly against having one, but I’ve since changed my tune. They’re lightweight, and I can hop on a plane and take my library with me without carrying a pile of books with me. But until the Amazon Kindle Colorsoft launched last month, I’d only had a taste of color E Ink on non-Amazon devices.

Now that the Colorsoft is finally here, I put it through its paces to see how this Kindle stacks up against its historical wins with the Paperwhite lineup–and how it compares with the Kobo Libra Colour, its main competitor in the color e-reader market. And of course, whether it’s worth that sky-high price tag. Here are my thoughts after testing, from design to performance and more.

Best for:

• Enjoying your comics on the go
• Color coding your notes in your ebooks for studying

Skip if:

• You don’t want to drop nearly $300 on an e-reader
• You don’t want to deal with QA issues (at the moment)

Amazon Kindle Colorsoft: Design

Is This A New Kindle?

At first glance, Amazon’s latest e-reader doesn’t look like a brand-new Kindle. Putting it beside my 11th Gen Kindle Paperwhite, I’m hard pressed to find a difference between the two when they’re completely off. Amazon clearly felt its design is solid enough to keep it mostly the same. I say “mostly” because once both devices are turned on, the Colorsoft springs to life with color during bootup. That’s in part thanks to an E Ink oxide backplane, which is how the Kindle gets its color.

That said, in comparison to my 11th Gen Kindle, the Amazon Kindle Colorsoft feels a smidge heavier. It won’t matter to those who absolutely want color, but I’m not convinced it’s worth the extra weight. As a tech journalist, my priority is traveling as light as possible while on the go, but your mileage may vary. I also miss the days of the buttons on the Kindle Oasis, but that’s a feature Amazon has tossed aside in favor of its touch screens. It’s not the end of the world, but I do miss it.

Amazon Kindle Colorsoft: Display

Let’s Talk About That Yellow Line

The E Ink oxide backplane is similar to its E Ink siblings in the fact that the backlight is fully adjustable. If you want a bright light, you can adjust two bars to exactly that—and the same goes with the warm light, and both can adjust up to 20 different levels for a myriad of combinations. But another factor enters the mix with this color display: color saturation. Thankfully, Amazon kept it simple, with two available options, standard and vivid. Odds are, depending on your preference, you’ll be firmly Team Standard or Team Vivid. I personally am enamored with the vivid style.

But aside from the color display, there’s another issue with the color display: a gradient yellow line glaring at the bottom of the screen. I personally found it barely noticeable when reading, but it’s there. I double-checked with my husband and asked him if he saw anything at the bottom. Immediately, he pointed to the yellow area. I really didn’t see it until I pulled up The Umbrella Academy, and then I could see the gradual shift to the yellow at the bottom. Now, I can’t unsee it.

I’m not sure if my initial “I didn’t see it” moment is my eyes beginning to fail me or if it didn’t bother me because I’m just happy to be reading. It’s worth noting that Amazon has shared that it will be releasing a software update soon to address the issues, its page saying, “A small number of customers have reported a yellow band along the bottom of the display. We take the quality of our products seriously—customers who notice this can reach out to our customer service team for a replacement or refund, and we’re making the appropriate adjustments to ensure that new devices will not experience this issue moving forward.” It’s also worth noting that at the time of this writing, Amazon has delayed all shipments of the Colorsoft by one week.

Amazon Kindle Colorsoft: Performance

A Snappy Upgrade

There are two cool features to the Kindle Colorsoft: color use and the upgraded processor. Yes, it’s nice that my books display in color; I find that delightful. But it’s not about showcasing my book covers in color, both in my library and when the cover screen sleeps. Comic books are infinitely better on the Colorsoft simply because they’re finally in color. But Kindle takes it a step further, and the software now allows you to focus on one comic panel to read at a time if you choose. (You can also zoom in, but you need to zoom out before you turn a page.)

I’m mixed on this. On one hand, I love that if I want to zoom in and admire a panel’s art, I can. But on the other hand, the comic book itself is larger in comparison to the Colorsoft’s display. I also tend to look at the panel as a whole; after all, since comics are visual in nature, there’s usually a reason the writers, illustrators and editors collaborated to make a page look a certain way. I’m inclined to lean toward the “love it” more than “hate it,” though. It’s also worth noting that the comics images load pretty fast when flipping pages.

But there’s another reason why I’m in the “love it” camp and, again, it has to do with color. Now, if I highlight text, I can color code my highlights. I can see this a massive boon to students who rely on color coding text to absorb the material. You can choose from one of four colors, too, which I found helpful.

The color features are strong, but as strong as the Colorsofts’s main competitor, the Kobo Libra Colour? To be blunt, in a side-by-side comparison, the Libra Colour is stronger, with better highlights and more details coming through the saturation and backlight. Some of the details get lost in the darker plane of the Colorsoft, and it has too blue of a hue, which I’m assuming is to compensate for the warm light. Kobo simply does it better.

Aside from color, Amazon increased the page turn responses by 25%. When I first read the news, I scoffed. Why does this matter? Well, it turns out, it definitely does. The processor reacts so speedily to touch commands like page flipping, that my 11th Gen Paperwhite feels like a turtle in comparison.

Amazon Kindle Colorsoft: Verdict

Is This Necessary?

To be clear: I’m not giving up my 11th Gen Kindle Paperwhite for this device. Yes, the color is nice, and the speed is a perk. But if I’m not reading comics, books with color or requiring extra study features like color-coded notes, then it doesn’t matter to me. I don’t need it, especially since my Paperwhite is still going strong three years in.

There’s also the cost factor. If I’m going to spend $280 on an E Ink color device, I would much rather focus on an all-around E Ink device like a Boox or a Kobo. That’s not a small sum for an e-reader. While its main competitor has a less robust library (or deals, for that matter)–the Kobo Libra Colour offers something the Colorsoft can’t at that similar price point: stylus compatibility. That’s huge. (It’s also important to note that the Kobo Libra Colour is $220, so $60 cheaper.)

And of course, there’s the big yellow elephant in the room right now. If you want to splurge on this device, wait a few weeks until the software update has been launched (and when it does, I’ll update this story). Right now, there are multiple reports of QA issues, so it’s best to hold off until those have been resolved. It’s also worth noting that some Reddit users have reported issues with the 12th Gen Kindle Paperwhite, too.

If you need a color e-reader for any reason, it may be worth getting the Colorsoft, especially to stay within the Kindle ecosystem. But if you’re not reading comics or color coding your texts for schoolwork, opt for the its grayscale sibling, the Paperwhite.

How I Tested the Amazon Kindle Colorsoft

I spent over a week with the Amazon Kindle Colorsoft, reading across multiple genres of books, including novels, comics, cookbooks and more. I evaluated its speed, its ease of use, its color saturation and more. I considered a variety of readers in my testing, from the casual reader to comics fans to students and others.

In addition, I compared it with two other devices, my own personal Kindle Paperwhite (11th Gen) and the Kobo Libra Colour to see how it stacked up against its predecessor and against the competition. I cross-checked speed, performance and display to gauge how it stacked up.

I also took a serious deep dive into the QA issues—double-checking real customer reviews on both the Amazon store page and Reddit—that are currently plaguing the device. I also looked for Amazon’s responses to customer concerns and combed the page to look for any updates, which is where the delayed shipping timeline comes from.

My Expertise

I’ve been involved in tech journalism for over five years, with about a year of that as the consumer tech and electronics editor at Forbes Vetted. In addition to working with home entertainment, such as testing the best gaming TVs, I have also tested most of the latest smart wearables currently on the market, from the Ray-Ban Meta Smart Glasses to the Apollo Wearable and more.

My time testing tech gear focuses on everyone, from the folks who want a simple e-reader for catching up on the latest casual beach novel to full-fledged bookworms who spend every waking moment soaking up literature. For this story, I focused on various features of the Amazon Kindle Colorsoft as it applies to both black-and-white text and colorful images, including reviewing the display, performance and more.

When I’m not testing the latest e-reader, I’ve spent plenty of time testing the newest mobile devices. I’ve deep-dived into the Apple ecosystem with the iPhone 15 Pro and reviewed plenty of Android devices, including the Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 6, the Samsung Galaxy S24 Ultra and the Google Pixel 8. Most recently, I tested the Google Pixel 9 Pro and the Samsung Galaxy Tab S10 Ultra.