Amazon Kindle Paperwhite 16GB (12th Gen) vs Kobo Libra Colour

The Kindle Paperwhite is the reader most people should buy, because it adds the three things the basic Kindle leaves out without changing what makes a Kindle easy. The screen grows to 7 inches at 300 ppi, so a page holds more text at the same font size. The front light shifts from white to amber, and the warm tone can run on a schedule, which matters if most of your reading happens after dark. It also carries an IPX8 rating, which Amazon defines as 2 meters of fresh water for 60 minutes, so the bath, the beach and a spilled drink are survivable.

Amazon rates the battery at up to 12 weeks, based on half an hour of reading a day with wireless off, double the basic Kindle's figure. Charging is USB-C.

The costs are real but small. At 211 g it is heavier than the basic model and less pocketable. There is no auto-brightness; Amazon keeps that for the pricier Signature Edition. There are no physical page buttons, so one-handed reading means a thumb across the glass. And the store lock-in is the same as on every Kindle.

The Kobo Libra Colour is the e-reader for people who want to own their books rather than live inside one store. It reads EPUB natively, so titles bought from most shops other than Amazon load without conversion, and public-library loans through OverDrive are built into the device instead of routed through a phone app.

The hardware answers the Paperwhite's gaps. Two physical page-turn buttons sit on a thick grip edge, and the screen rotates so they work in either hand. It is IPX8 rated, which Kobo specifies as 2 meters for 60 minutes, and storage doubles to 32 GB, which matters once Kobo audiobooks are in the mix. The 7-inch Kaleido 3 color panel shows covers, comics and highlights in color, and it supports the Kobo Stylus 2 for margin notes, though the stylus costs extra.

Color E Ink has a trade. Black-and-white text stays at 300 ppi, but color content drops to 150 ppi and looks muted next to a tablet, and owners often note the color layer makes the page a shade darker than a monochrome screen. The Kobo Store is also thinner than Amazon's in some genres.