Amazon has been slow to meaningfully change the Kindle, largely because it doesn’t have to. If you can read your books and, perhaps more importantly, purchase them for a cheaper price than they would cost from a bookstore, you’re probably happy with the company’s e-reader as it exists. The biggest change the company made to the Kindle last year was the addition of the Kindle Colorsoft to the lineup, the first of Amazon’s e-readers that has a color screen.

Color E Ink existed for years before Amazon adopted it and by adding it, the company was acknowledging a trend. This isn’t the first time Amazon has tried to keep up with the competition. The Kindle Scribe, the company’s major addition to the lineup before the Colorsoft, was an attempt to do the same thing.

The Kindle Scribe is an e-reader crossed with a note-taking device, with support for a stylus, and a screen big enough to display documents properly. Note-taking tablets like the reMarkable 2 or Boox Note Air 3 have satisfied those needs previously, but Amazon’s advantage is that your library of books and audiobooks are on the Scribe, too, without needing to download a separate app or side-load EPUB files.

While note-taking seemed like a bit of an afterthought when the device debuted, Amazon has continued to support the Scribe with new features, even updating its design alongside the Colorsoft. It’s a solid option if reading and writing matter to you equally, but it’s also limited in one obvious way: its size. You compromise on portability using the Scribe and Amazon should consider making a smaller device that can do the same thing.

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The Kindle Scribe makes books document-sized

A big screen is nice for notes, but not for pockets

Normal-sized Kindles can read PDFs and other documents if you’re willing to send them from your computer to your e-reader. The advantage of the Kindle Scribe over a Paperwhite or a Colorsoft is that you can view those documents at something close to the size of a real page, and write on them as naturally as a print-out you’d receive at work or school. In comparison to Amazon’s other Kindles, which have anywhere between 6- and 7-inch screens, the Scribe has a 10.2-inch E Ink Carta display, packed into a relatively light 15.3 oz aluminum body.

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The Scribe is easy to hold and feels nice to write on. Amazon gives you ample space to take notes and has come up with clever software workarounds to let you write directly on books without obscuring the text (a suite of features the company calls “Active Canvas”). The size of the Kindle Scribe only feels weird once you start reading. I love large fonts as much as the next person, but nothing about the experience of reading on the Scribe feels like reading a book. If anything, the most comfortable and easiest way to actually read on the device is sitting, propping up the Scribe on one knee.

This has less to do with weight or thickness, because the e-reader itself is only 0.22-inches thick, and more to do with how its screen size makes it awkward to hold in one hand, and a bit harder to accommodate in a backpack or bag. It takes up more space than a Kindle in a carry-on and when you look at the competition, it’s just bigger than it needs to be to offer all the features that make it great.

A more compact note-taking device

Boox and Kobo don’t limit their styluses to the big screen

When I think about the kinds of notebooks I enjoyed writing in before I started testing out note-taking tablets from Amazon, Ratta, and reMarkable, they were all a lot smaller. The ideal Moleskine notebook is pocketable, something you can slip into a back pocket or inside a coat jacket without thinking twice. That’s a much smaller size than a 10.2-inch Kindle Scribe. The ideal form factor for one of these note-taking tablets or e-readers is something smaller, less like a college-ruled notebook and more like a Moleskine.

Competitors to Amazon offer multiple devices that are around the same size as a Kindle, but support handwritten notes like the Scribe. If you want a color screen, you could get something like the Boox Go Color 7 Gen II or Kobo Libra Colour, for example. Or if you’re fine with traditional E Ink, you could do the Ratta Supernote Nomad or Kobo Sage. All of these devices offer the portability of a normal e-reader, around a 7-inch screen, and support for stylus input. They match the Kindle Scribe in terms of features, and in some cases, even go beyond what Amazon’s willing to offer (Boox’s devices run Android, for example).

Clearly, there’s a market for this size of device. Amazon’s just chosen not to address it yet. Besides portability, reading on a Kobo Libra Colour just feels better, too. You get actual buttons to turn pages, and the device is small enough to hold in one hand and use, something not as easily said about the Kindle Scribe.

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There’s more work to do on the Kindle lineup

Amazon shouldn’t rest on its laurels

Prior to the Kindle Scribe’s original release in 2022, I never would have expected Amazon to venture out of the “meat and potatoes” of e-readers that can play audiobooks. Somewhere inside the company there was a desire to try something new, though, and I hope that the same motivation exists to consider a smaller Kindle Scribe.

In the meantime, if you’re willing to do your reading in a Kindle app, it might be worth considering the Boox Go 7 Color. I found a lot to like when I went hands-on with the device. For something even more focused on reading, the Kobo Libra Colour is a great option, too.