At Amazon’s fall hardware event on Tuesday, the company unveiled its newest Kindle Scribe and its first-ever color Kindle Scribe. Both devices are launching with new AI features.
The new Kindle Scribe has a larger 11-inch glare-free display. It is just 5.4mm thick and weighs only 400g. It is also 40 percent faster when writing or turning pages. Amazon says it features a new texture-molded glass to improve the friction when the pen glides across the screen, making it feel like you are writing on paper. The device also comes with a new quad-core chip, more memory, and the company’s latest Oxide display technology to make everything feel smoother.
There are two versions of the Kindle Scribe. One version has a front light system and one does not. The Kindle Scribe with a front light will be available later this year in the U.S. starting at 499.99 dollars. The version without a front light will be available early next year for 429.99 dollars.
As for the Kindle Scribe Colorsoft, Amazon says it features display technology that creates colors which are soft and do not hurt your eyes like an LCD display. The company also developed a new rendering engine that enhances the color and ensures writing is fast and natural. Amazon notes that the Kindle Scribe Colorsoft provides weeks of battery life. The Kindle Scribe Colorsoft will be available starting at 629.99 dollars.
The devices feature a new Home experience that lets users jot something down and open recently opened and added books, documents, and notebooks. Amazon anticipates both devices being used for handwritten notes. The devices include significant product integrations to enhance that experience. One feature will let users search their notes across their notebooks and get simple AI summaries. Next year, users will be able to send their notes and documents to Alexa and have a more involved conversation about them.
Additionally, the Colorsoft allows artists to create smooth gradients and subtle tones with a new shader tool. Users can write, draw, and annotate in one of 10 pen colors or highlight in one of 5 highlighter colors.
The devices will also feature new AI reading features. A new Story so Far feature will let users catch up on the book they are currently reading up until where they have read. An Ask this Book feature will let users highlight any passage of text while reading a book and get spoiler-free answers to questions about things like a character’s motive or the significance of a scene.
These features will be available on books users have purchased or borrowed on the Kindle iOS app later this year and on Kindle devices early next year.