Amazon Just Raised Kindle Prices $40–$50. Here's What to Buy Instead.
Amazon quietly hiked every Kindle $40–$50 overnight, blaming the memory shortage. Kobo held its prices — here's the better e-reader for your money now.
The best e-reader for your money changed last week — and Amazon changed it. On August 21, Amazon quietly raised the price of nearly every Kindle by $40 to $50, overnight, blaming the same AI-driven memory shortage that has been wrecking gaming handheld pricing all year. Kobo and the other e-reader brands didn't follow. If you were about to buy a Kindle, it's worth knowing exactly what shifted before you check out.
Why Kindles suddenly cost more
Memory got expensive, and Amazon passed the bill along. The company confirmed to Fortune that it raised prices on Echo, Fire TV, Kindle, and eero hardware to offset "significant increases" in memory costs — the AI-fueled DRAM and NAND crunch that has redirected the world's chip supply toward data centers. It's the same story we traced through gaming handhelds, where a memory tax has pushed some configurations to absurd highs.
The wrinkle: an e-reader uses a tiny fraction of the memory a handheld does. A $40 jump on the basic Kindle — a years-old, non-waterproof model with no warm light — reads to a lot of people as margin, not cost. Amazon also appears to have removed price-history data from many of these listings, which makes the increases harder to see. However you read the motive, the sticker is what you pay.
What changed, model by model
- Basic Kindle: $109.99 → $149.99 with ads ($169.99 without)
- Kindle Paperwhite (2025): $159 → $199
- Paperwhite Signature Edition: up $50 to $249
- Kindle Colorsoft: $249 → $289.99 (Signature Edition now $319.99)
- Kindle Scribe: unchanged — the lone holdout, and already the priciest Kindle
The Colorsoft is the clearest loser
At $289.99, the entry-level color Kindle now costs exactly what the Boox Go Color 7 does — a device with a stylus, a microSD slot, a speaker, and four times the storage — and about $30 more than the Kobo Libra Colour, our number-two pick, which shares the same 7-inch Kaleido color screen and adds page-turn buttons and stylus support. Amazon still hasn't made a 6-inch color Kindle, so the cheapest way into Amazon's color reading is pushing $300. The Kindle Colorsoft still has the best-looking color panel we've seen, but that's a thin reason to pay the most in the category.
What to actually buy now
If you want the best value, look at Kobo, whose prices held while Amazon's climbed. The Kobo Clara BW is a waterproof, warm-light 6-inch reader for around $130 with no lock-screen ads and true EPUB sideloading — the value pick that just got more obvious. For color, the Kobo Clara Colour covers the 6-inch slot Amazon leaves empty, and the Libra Colour beats the Colorsoft on features and price.
If you're set on a Kindle, the Paperwhite is still the best all-around reader here — just don't pay the new $199 list. Amazon discounts Kindles constantly and will likely run another sale in October; build your shortlist from Best E-Readers, set a price alert, and let the price history, not the new sticker, tell you when to buy.
See all 10 products ranked by the community
Best E-Readers
See Full Rankings →242 community votes cast
Common Questions
On August 21, 2026, Amazon raised prices across the Kindle line by roughly $40 to $50 each, overnight. The basic Kindle went from $109.99 to $149.99 with ads. The 16GB Paperwhite went from $159 to $199, and the Paperwhite Signature Edition jumped $50 to $249. The color Kindle Colorsoft rose from $249 to $289.99, with its Signature Edition now $319.99. The only model left untouched was the Kindle Scribe, which was already the most expensive Kindle.
Amazon told Fortune it raised prices on Echo, Fire TV, Kindle, and eero hardware to offset 'significant increases' in memory costs. AI data centers have been buying up the world's DRAM and NAND flash, driving component prices to record highs — the same shortage that broke gaming handheld pricing this year. That said, e-readers use very little memory, so a $40 jump on the years-old basic Kindle struck many reviewers as more margin than cost. Either way, the shelf price is what you pay.
It's the hardest Kindle to justify now. At $289.99 the entry color Kindle costs the same as the Boox Go Color 7 — which adds a stylus, a microSD slot, and far more storage — and about $30 more than the Kobo Libra Colour, which has the same 7-inch color screen plus physical page-turn buttons. Amazon still hasn't released a smaller 6-inch color Kindle, so the cheapest way into Amazon's color reading is now close to $300. The screen is genuinely the best-looking color E Ink panel, but that's a narrow reason to pay the premium.
Kobo. Its readers did not take the same overnight increase, so the value gap widened in a week. The Kobo Clara BW is a waterproof, warm-light 6-inch reader for around $130 with no lock-screen ads. The Kobo Libra Colour, our number-two pick, undercuts the Colorsoft while adding page-turn buttons and stylus support. If you specifically want a Kindle, the Paperwhite is still an excellent reader — just wait for one of Amazon's frequent sales rather than paying the new $199 list.
Probably through sales rather than a reset of the list price. Amazon discounts Kindles often and will almost certainly run another big sale in October, so the effective price you pay may dip well below these new numbers. But the memory shortage behind the increase is expected to persist into 2027, so the era of a sub-$100 Kindle looks like it's on pause. Buying on a genuine sale, and checking price history first, beats paying the new sticker.
Products Mentioned
Jump to the full ranking and community verdict for each pick named above.