Now that Amazon has discontinued the Kindle Oasis and stopped selling it from their website (at least in the US; it’s still available from some international Amazon websites until they sell out), people are looking for an alternative to the Kindle Oasis.
Fortunately, if you like the asymmetrical design of the Kindle Oasis with the page buttons on one side, there are a few ereaders that have copied that design. However, none of the copies have as nice of a design with the metal back and glass front layer as the Oasis, but not everybody likes the cold metal anyway.
If you really want a Kindle Oasis, keep an eye on the Kindle Oasis product page at Amazon. Since it was just recently phased out they still might sell some now and again, and they’ll will probably have some refurbished units available occasionally. Woot is also another good source for refurbished Kindles.
Kindle Oasis Alternatives
Kobo Libra 2 – The Kobo Libra 2 has a 7-inch E Ink screen just like the Kindle Oasis, but it’s the newer Carta 1200 version with better contrast. Kobo’s software is more customizable than Kindle software, and the Libra is a lot less expensive than what the 32GB Oasis sold for, but with the cheap plastic casing on the Libra 2 the build quality isn’t anywhere close to the same level as the Kindle Oasis. It’s still a nice ereader, though.
Kobo Sage – The Kobo Sage has a larger 8-inch E Ink screen, and the overall design has more of a premium feel than the Libra 2, and it also adds the option to use a stylus to write notes (but a stylus is not included). The main complaint people have with the Sage is battery life isn’t very good, much like the Oasis.
Onyx Boox Page – The Boox Page is another Oasis clone with a 7-inch screen and page buttons on one side. It has some hardware advantages over the Oasis, like having a memory card slot, and it runs Android 11 so it can install Android apps, including the Kindle app, so it can actually be used to read Kindle ebooks without having to jump through hoops to get your ebooks onto a non-Kindle device.
Bigme B751C – The Bigme B751C is a new device that was just released. I has a 7-inch color E Ink screen with 300 ppi for black and white content and 150 ppi for color content. Like the Boox, it runs Android 11 and is open to installing apps. It also comes with a capacitive stylus for taking notes, and it has 64GB of storage space, a microSD card slot, 4GB of RAM, and it has a fingerprint reader.
PocketBook Era – The PocketBook Era is another 7-inch ereader. It probably has the nicest design of all the Oasis clones. It’s not quite on the same level as the Oasis but it’s still really nice and feels like a quality device in your hand. However, when I tried to review the Era it had one of the worst screens I’ve seen in the past decade. The flush layer is poorly implemented and reduces contrast by a lot. Until PocketBook fixes that problem, I would not recommend any PocketBooks with a flush screen.
I bought a Sage a few months ago. I really like it. Except for the battery life. Then again, you have to eat, sleep, shower and other things, so you can’t really read longer than a charge will last. My Scribe has spoiled me though with its EXCEPTIONAL battery life.
I’m looking to replace my aging Kobo Aura One and I’m thinking of the Sage (don’t mind about the poor battery issue). In a few months Kobo will be releasing two new models so I’m waiting for that.
Only Onyx Boox Page and Bigme B751C are real alternatives as they support the Kindle App. The other ereaders have no possibility to read books bought at amazon (especially the new ones are difficult to DeDRM).
I would buy Pocketbook Era, but then I would dismiss my huge backlog….
I read Amazon books on my Kobos all the time.
How? Since last year they are using a new encryption system…
There are three different methods of decrypting Kindle books at the moment. I got my info from mobileread.com, which is a great place to get information about this. I don’t think I should go into more details here.
Big advantage of Android readers to me is that they support Kindle immersion reading. So if you own both Kindle book and Audible audiobook, you can read and listen at the same time and it will highlight words that are just being read. Or when you stop reading at a certain spot, you can continue listening from the same spot… Kindles don’t support immersion, so in this regard Onyx is even better Kindle than Kindles 🙂
Apparently there’s a new 7″ color ereader coming from Boox named leaf 3c. I tried to send you the link to it but cannot find a way to contact you…
It’s most likely one of their China exclusive models so it doesn’t really matter unless you live in China; that’s why I didn’t post about it. They don’t sell the Leaf models from their main website anymore and haven’t for a while, but maybe they’ll release a color Page for the international market at some point, although I don’t think there’s much of a market for 6-7″ color ereaders. Even their 7.8″ color models haven’t been nearly as popular as their 10.3″ models.
Made the mistake of buying a refurb Oasis & 8″ Fire from Woot. Never again. Both have glitches which show up, irritating tbh (non-indexing Oasis, sometime ‘vibrating’ screen on the Fire). & you realize refurb means ‘just good enough’ to ship out the door.