Kindle Scribe is maturing into an all-round productivity device

With regular updates, Amazon responded to negative feedback received when Kindle Scribe was first released.

E-notes should cater for e-book reading, note-taking and PDF document support. Note-taking and PDF document support were weaknesses when Kindle Scribe was first released. Hence, to remedy the device’s limitations, three software updates were released. The first two updates improved note-taking, and the third focused on PDF support.

Considering other e-notes neglect PDF support, it is encouraging that Amazon has decided to change track. With the third update, the PDF features of side-loaded documents (changing display orientation, looking-up words, margins adjustment, highlighting and entering annotations) are now supported with wirelessly sent ones. A further scrolling up and down feature was added when navigating PDF pages in landscape orientation. The lasso tool feature can also cut and paste handwritten input into and out of PDF documents.

While there remain discrepancies between side-loaded and wirelessly transferred PDF documents, there is now better uniformity between them. However, there is still no support for writing with the pen and turning off full refresh in side-loaded documents. In the case of wirelessly transferred documents, there is still no support for double tap to zoom and the ability to lock a zoom level to easily navigate a document (currently, the user has to zoom out before turning to the next page).

Onyx BOOX devices are the best option for those wanting to do more; for example, word processing, advanced PDF features and the ability to install third-party applications. However, a device like Kindle Scribe has a place as a user-friendly productivity device (especially for those already invested in the Kindle ecosystem). After three updates, Kindle Scribe is now the device it should have been when first released. Amazon is not known for sending regular updates for their e-readers. Thus, it appears the Kindle software team were forced into prioritising updates due to how Scribe was first negatively received, considering its limitations. With the updates and its competitive pricing, Kindle Scribe is now maturing into an all-around productivity device rather than being a bigger Kindle with basic note-taking capabilities.