I’m a lover of physical books but I’m looking to get an e-reader as well, for those books that are hard to find physical copies of, or are just very expensive.

I’ve ruled out Onyx, because I try to avoid Chinese tech as it’s usually poorly made. But I’m not sure whether Kindle or Kobo is best. Is being tied to Amazon’s ecosystem too restricting? Are the Kobo e-readers compatible with everything you need? Which ones have the best screens, ideally how a physical book would look?

So many questions, but hopefully some of you can help. 😁

  • Thelsim
    6•6 months ago

    I used to own a Kobo Aura One and was very happy with it, until the battery decided to balloon and it got destroyed.
    I did a bit of research for the replacement. Initially I was happy to go with another Kobo, but the Mozilla Privacy Not Included article about Kobo e-readers made me reconsider. It’s from 2021 so maybe by now they’ve changed their policies but it prompted me to look a bit further.
    In the end I bought a Pocketbook Verse Pro and I’m very happy with that one. It has a nice screen, is small and fast enough and comes in pretty red (which is already covered up again with a protector :) It supports all the usual formats and that’s about all I really need from it.
    Pocketbook is a Swiss company, so I’m not sure if you can get them easily in the US.

    • @[email protected]
      2•6 months ago

      Well, you don’t need to give your Kobo network access to get ebooks on it. Transferring ebooks via USB cable works fine.
      Their privacy policy might still be bad or they may have improved it.
      Either way, they can’t collect data if the device isn’t online.

      • Thelsim
        2•6 months ago

        That’s true, and I’m not saying that Kobo is a bad buy or anything. For me the reasoning was that if there’s another company that has a better privacy policy and delivers a similar or better product. Then I prefer to choose the other one on principle.

        • @[email protected]
          2•6 months ago

          Your reasoning makes sense.
          I just wanted to point out a way to use Kobo readers without privacy issues for people who already own them. I should’ve stated that more clearly.
          People still looking for an ebook reader should consider leaning onto your reasoning.