Possibly more than most tech gadgets I’ve played with in recent years, Amazon‘s Kindle Scribe Colorsoft feels like the product of listening.
It’s a thinner, lighter, more open, smarter, and certainly more colorful product than the Scribe that came before it. The pen-ready ereader appears to answer virtually every wishlist update and maybe a bit more.
Granted, my time with the new $629 color E-Ink device, which Amazon unveiled on Tuesday (September 30, 2025) at its huge 2025 Devices Event, was limited, but I’m not gonna lie; I’m already impressed.
The specs tell part of the story. This Kindle Scribe Colorsoft manages to offer a larger screen, 11 inches as opposed to 10.2 inches on the 2024 Scribe, while still being 33 grams lighter and 0.4mm thinner.
The design is far more classic, tablet-like, with a balanced bezel surrounding the new color-ready screen. Aside from the Kindle logo and four tiny rubber feet, the back is unblemished. There’s a power button on one edge, and the bottom edge is just thick enough to house the USB-C charge port.
Paper-like design
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Holding the tablet in my hand, I was astonished at how light and thin it felt. I had no trouble firmly grasping a corner and supporting its weight with just two fingers. It’s so thin that the pen is now slightly thicker than the Scribe Colorsoft chassis. It’s a good thing Amazon increased the internal magnet power. I did my best to shake the pencil off the Scribe to no avail.
The touch-friendly screen is fast and virtually flicker-free, something I noticed as we quickly swiped through previous sketches and notes.
And, of course, it’s a color-friendly screen, which means that in addition to the sharp, 300ppi text and sketching, you can markup and sketch in a half dozen colors (there’s also a color-mixing wheel that I did not try) and view content in up to 4,096 colors (at 150ppi). There are a variety of pens, though I think the fountain pen is the most satisfying.
Reading and writing
Now, I’ve read some content on Amazon’s lovely Kindle Colorsoft, but being able to draw and markup in colors on an E-Ink device is a whole different thing.
First of all, the pen on the digital paper is remarkably responsive. It looked like pink, green, yellow, and black ink were pouring out of the included pen and right onto the screen. There’s no visible distance between the pen tip and the on-screen output. Additionally, the pen and screen performed exceptionally well in recognizing pressure. I marveled at how I could effortlessly switch from the thickest to the thinnest, almost hair-strand-thin line.
This kind of response set a benchmark for what you should expect from a color E-Ink device.
Colors, in general, also look vibrant and, in some ways, slightly brighter than what we saw on the original Kindle Colorsoft. This is likely because the image stack on the new device is thinner, and while Amazon miniaturized the LEDs on this device, there are actually more of them.
I’m also impressed that the new Kindle Scribe Colorsoft is more open than its predecessor, as it is ready to work directly with OneDrive and Google Drive for file import. The export, though, remains somewhat more limited in that both platforms will only receive PDF files from the Scribe Colorsoft. Eventually, you’ll be able to send notes back and forth to Alexa+.
There are other productivity features that, while I did not get to try them, promise to make this a more open, useful system. They include AI-powered search, Quick Notes, and Workspace for grouping books, PDFs, and other files.
The cost of cool
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Now for the bad news. This lovely piece of hardware starts at $629 for a 32GB model. The previous Kindle Screen (monochrome, obviously) started at $399. And that price doesn’t even get you the lovely maroon option.
Since it’s an E-ink device, it sips power (even with the LEDs turned on) and can last for 8 weeks on a single charge. If you write on it every day for 30 minutes or so, your battery life might be cut down to two weeks, which is still pretty good by my book.
It’s early days with the new Amazon Kindle Scribe Colorsoft. I like the look of it, the feel of it, and the performance of it, but I worry about the price. It’s clearly a powerful and colorful tool for those with deep pockets and an interest in seeing, creating, and getting work done in color.
We’ll know for certain if it’s worth the investment once we’ve run our full battery of tests.
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lance.ulanoff@futurenet.com (Lance Ulanoff)
