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My wife and I used the OBOOK6 for over a week to see if the budget Android E Ink e-reader is worth it. I’ll be upfront: it depends, but probably not. Read on for the OBOOK6 review for why and how we both came to this conclusion.
Specifications
The OBOOK6 we reviewed was the 32GB model, which only comes with 2GB of RAM. We were unable to review the 64GB model which comes with 4 GB of RAM.
| Display Size | 6 inches |
| Display Monochrome or Color? | Monochrome |
| E Ink Panel | The manufacturer does not publicly disclose the E Ink panel generation, which is unusual for established e-reader brands. |
| Resolution | 1072×1448; 300ppi |
| Processor | Cortex A55 Quad-Core 1.8 GHz |
| RAM | 2 GB |
| Storage | 32 GB |
| Battery Capacity | 1700mAh |
| Rated Battery Life | 2 weeks (manufacturer claimed; see real world results below) |
| Operating System | Android 11 |
| Google Play Certified? | No |
| Physical Page Buttons? | No |
| Stylus Support? | No |
| Water Resistance? | Unknown |
| Weight | 143 grams |
| Dimensions | 6″L x 4.21″W x 0.27″Thick |
| Speakers | None; Bluetooth headset/earbuds required |
| Headphone Jack | None; Bluetooth headset/earbuds required |
First Impressions
Packaging
The OBOOK6 came in a plain white box with a sleeve. Opening the box reveals minimal packaging. While I found the box bland, my wife found it the best looking of the three e-readers we are testing. Inside the box is the e-reader and a short USB-A to USB-C cable.
Build Quality
My wife and I found the device to have a premium look and feel, especially due to its thinness and tapered edges. It feels light in the hand and is easy to hold single-handed. Despite the screen being the same size as the Nook Glowlight 4, this e-reader is slightly smaller and thinner. Perhaps the most striking and noticeable aspect is the flush glass across the entire front of the device, reminiscent of the Kindle versus the recessed plastic screen of the Nook Glowlight 4.
Even off, the displayed image and text look good and comparable to other 300ppi e-reader screens such as the Nook Glowlight 4. The thin symmetrical bezels were pleasing to see.
There are no physical buttons aside from the power button located on the bottom side of the device, something we both prefer as we tend to accidently hit the page buttons on our Nook Glowlight 4.
The only surprise is we both noticed that fingerprints were far more visible on the screen compared to all the other e-readers in the series. If it wasn’t for the packaging and price, I would have immediately assumed this was a premium device.
Setup and Ease of Use
After powering on the device, we followed the setup steps on the screen. The speed of the device was a little sluggish, roughly what I experienced when setting up the Nook Glowlight 4. However, there were times when my touch did not register with the device, resulting in a second and even third press before the screen responded.
One glaring issue we discovered during the setup process was that our time zone (Mountain) is missing. It simply does not exist on the device. The default time zone is Chicago, but despite going through all 7 pages of options, Mountain time simply was not there.
Setup time would have been faster if we didn’t spend so much time going back and forth, both trying to see where our time zone was. Overall, set up took about 10 minutes when it should have been 5 or less.
Specifications in Real Life
Did the initial impressions of the device meet our expectations during use? For the most part, yes.
The monochrome display appears to live up to its 300ppi rating with text coming in crisp and there was minimal glare from our overhead lights.
The front light is evenly distributed with warm and cool options. There are 33 steps of brightness and, let me tell you, at the maximum brightness it might just be the brightest e-reader of the lot. I cannot understate just how bright this thing can get. Naturally, there are battery tradeoffs with having the light this bright. Unfortunately, there is no auto brightness option, so you’ll find yourself having to adjust the lighting strength manually.
Performance wise, the device feels sluggish. There is an option to switch the display from ‘normal refresh’ to ‘fast refresh’ that makes a remarkable difference in speed. However, quality drastically drops and ghosting dramatically increases as a result. Further frustration abounded with our touch not always registering, requiring us to touch the screen multiple times.
Powering on the device takes roughly 31 seconds before it is ready to use. Bringing it out of standby is instantaneous.
Under normal refresh, there were minimal ghosting or refresh issues. The screen stayed relatively ‘clean’ from ghosting as I went from page to page, app to app, screen to screen.
The OBOOK6 does have Bluetooth and is even advertised to be able to connect to Bluetooth speakers or headsets. I had no trouble connecting my AirPods Pro 2 to the device. I later test Audio books via Audible and streaming music so keep reading for more details on how this went.
Software wise, the device runs a very simple layout with Android 11. Options in Settings are straightforward, though a bit limited. I wish the battery icon could be configured to show the battery percentage, but we could not find a setting for that. The device comes preloaded with 6 public domain books such as Sherlock Holmes and The Count of Monte Cristo to get you started. There are only two apps preloaded on the device: the Google Play Store and a Book Transfer app (which we did not test).
The Google Play Store, while it would launch and present a sign in page, would freeze and not progress. It took closing the app, clearing the cache, and launching it three times before it would take me to a login screen. From there, it was simple to login and install the apps I wanted.
But then here comes a giant caveat – the Google Play Store is uncertified, meaning that there are no guarantees that apps will work with this device. While in our testing we were able to use the Kindle, Nook, and Libby apps, there is no guarantee of continued compatibility or ability to use these apps to read their DRM protected content. Further, long term updates by OBOOK are questionable, especially as they are a newer player in the Android E Ink e-reader arena.
The battery life is questionable as well. During setup and keeping the front light at roughly half-brightness, we drained the battery by roughly 50% over the course of about three hours. Adjusting the refresh rates in the settings will help but be aware that longer refresh rates equals more ghosting. After setup was done, we recharged the battery to 100% and used it for test reading. During reading with brightness at 20, the battery did do better, draining about 10% roughly (hard to exactly measure with no battery percent indicator) after about 2 hours of use. However, I must mention there is some battery instability.
One accidental test was leaving the device on standby for a full week from 100% charge. Upon waking it up, the battery showed roughly 50%. A few minutes later, the battery indicator dropped to zero and we got a warning that the battery was under 10%. After about 30 seconds or so, the indicator went up to about 25%, and the warning went away. Then 10 minutes later, the warning returned and the battery indicator again showed zero, but the device remained powered for at least another 10 minutes before we sat it down. Be aware that power could be an issue.
How does that stand by compare to the other devices? At the same (as best we can manage) settings across all devices (sleep after 30 minutes of inactivity): The Nook Glowlight 4 lost 19% battery life, waking at 81% remaining. The Kindle Colorsoft Signature Edition lost 7%, waking at 93% remaining. The Boox Go 7 and Boox Go Color 7 Gen 2 both auto powered off after a day of sleep (intentional) but powering them on only took about 20 seconds and they both had 99% battery health. Interestingly, the OBOOK6 was set to turn off entirely after two days of sleep, but this was not the case as the device was clearly in standby even after the full week of non-use.
Charging uses a USB-C cable and took roughly two hours or so from 25% to full. There is a red-light indicator on the power button to show that it’s charging if the device is powered off, and green-light if it is charging powered on. However, the indicator will not change color to show when it’s fully done.
One other note to mention: the WiFi turned off during stand-by mode and had to be manually turned on again after waking the device. This did not happen every time, but worth knowing.
The Multi-Store Reading Experience
Here is where things began to really fall apart. Setting up the device was simple: signing in, installing apps, all straightforward. Getting them to function reliably was another matter entirely. It is reasonable to consider the 2GB memory limitation as a factor and while I wish we could test the OBOOK6 with 64 GB of storage which has twice the RAM as well (4 GB), we simply could not. However, there is a chance that the experience would have remained the same.
Kindle App
After installing the Kindle App, I logged into my account and downloaded two books. After that every book would not download and kept giving an error. The fix? Restarting the device, which allowed us to download the same failed books moving forward.
As for the in-app experience itself, despite the sluggishness and having to restart, everything else functioned fine. My wife did have some issues tweaking the font size, seemingly related to our touch not always registering as mentioned earlier and due to how sluggish the device responded.
Nook App
After installing the Nook App, I logged into my account and… nothing, the library just would not sync. Closing the app and clearing the cache fixed this and the library proceeded to sync after relaunching the app. Once the library was synced, I downloaded one book. The book downloaded fine, but the app froze completely when opening the book, resulting in another necessary restart. Thankfully, the restart did fix the issue, but I suspect it could happen again, especially with our experience with the Kindle app also necessitating a restart to work properly. Changing the settings in the app, such as text size, was a chore for the same reasons mentioned above under the Kindle App.
Libby App
After installing the Libby App, it would not let me log in. It would launch and simply error out. Closing the app and clearing the cache did not fix this, ANOTHER restart resulted in us being able to launch the app fully and log into our library accounts. From there, we were able to access our holds and read the books in our account, mostly. We kept running into errors that would only resolve by restarting the device entirely, which was a very frustrating experience and an unfortunately common theme now.
Audible App
At this stage, I was hesitant to try loading the Audible app. However, I pressed forward and gave it a shot. It loaded fine, I was able to sign in easily enough and could browse my audiobook collection with relative ease. The sluggishness does hurt a little but if you are patient, it works fine. I downloaded an audiobook in seconds and listened to it. To my surprise, I had no issues and did not have to restart to fix anything.
Spotify App
As I listen to podcasts on occasion and like to listen to music while I read, I decided to load the Spotify App and give it a shot. One, does it work and two, can I listen to music while I read at the same time?
Yes, it works, but the sluggishness was present here. However, with a little patience I was listening to music. I did have to tell Spotify to play over my AirPods Pro 2 rather than through the device, which has no internal speakers.
While listening to Enigma, I opened Nook and was able to start reading. Again, the sluggishness was even more present, likely due to running Spotify and the Nook app at the same time, but it was not an issue overall.
Compared to Kindle Colorsoft Signature Edition
Comparing this $120 monochrome e-reader to the $280 Kindle Colorsoft Signature Edition is like comparing a plain color Smart Car to a Ferrari. There simply is no real comparison as each device caters to entirely different markets. However, there are some things to know.
The Kindle is noticeably snappier in performance and has a larger (7”) color display. Ghosting is not an issue with either device with the right settings.
The Kindle is much heavier, weighing 219 grams compared to the 143 grams of the OBOOK6. Both have a flush glass touch screen.
The Kindle has a better battery life measured in weeks.
The front light display, however, is much brighter on the OBOOK6, though the Kindle is still reasonably bright. The OBOOK6 does not have an option to enable auto brightness, whereas the Kindle does. The Kindle also has the option to automatically change light warmth (light color) whereas the OBOOK6 does not.
Both devices have the same amount of storage, though the Android OS and installable apps from the Google Play Store eat into that amount on the OBOOK6 by nearly 7.5 GB, leaving roughly 24.5 GB left for books and other apps. The Kindle on the other hand only has 23.75 GB available of its 32 GB.
Since the OBOOK6 can technically run other reading apps and is compatible with other eBook formats, it has the leg up here compared to the Kindle which can only show books you bought from Amazon Kindle Store or those sent to the device from Libby.
Both the Kindle and OBOOK6 could play audio books through Audible. The Kindle, however, cannot play other forms of music.
Compared to Barnes & Noble Nook Glowlight 4
The Barnes & Noble Nook Glowlight 4 is perhaps the closest one can get to an apples-to-apples comparison.
The Nook Glowlight 4 has around the same sluggish performance as the OBOOK6. Ghosting issues are minimal on both. The Nook Glowlight 4 is slightly thicker, bigger, and slightly heavier coming in at 170 grams compared to the 143 grams of the OBOOK6.
The Nook has a better battery life than the OBOOK6, measuring about a week with the front light on during an hour or so of reading each night. Neither the Nook nor OBOOK6 have auto adjusting brightness options, but the Nook does have an auto adjusting light warmth (light color) of cool to warm feature that changes over the course of the day (depending on the time of day). The OBOOK6 is also much brighter than the Nook.
Both devices have the same amount of storage, though as a pure e-reader the Nook has more available storage with 27.5 GB remaining after dozens of books have already been downloaded.
Since the OBOOK6 can technically run other reading apps and is compatible with other eBook formats, it has the leg up here compared to the Nook which can only show books you bought from the Nook store. The Nook is not compatible with Libby or Overdrive.
The Nook Glowlight 4 is not compatible with audiobooks, though its larger brother is. As such, the OBOOK6 has a leg up on the Nook here. The same is true for streaming music and theoretically, MP3s.
Wife’s Take
My wife is not very technical and is a bit impatient when it comes to just wanting things to work, and as such, is the perfect person to try this device out. If she has issues, then the average person will as well. So, what does she have to say?
“Can I throw this off a cliff?”
“I like the layout on this one the best; it’s very simple.”
“Setup was pretty easy, but what’s the deal with the time zone?”
I LOVE its weight. My iPad Mini is heavier. But the delay is hard for me to get used to since when I tell my iPad Mini to do something, it’s instantaneous in fulfilling my command. Libby is INORDINATELY slow and not worth pursuing on this device. The Nook is passable, but still too slow and boasts too many errors for any human to be even REMOTELY comfortable using it. The device was, overall, so frustrating that I gave up testing it.
Who is This Device For?
The OBOOK6 is best suited for patient, budget-conscious readers who need relief from tablet eye strain and want access to multiple ecosystems, but who don’t mind occasional restarts and some technical troubleshooting. It is not for casual readers expecting things to just work. If you want a cheap e-reader capable of playing music and audio books, this may work for you.
Final Verdict
We tested this device for a full week and have come away disappointed in almost every area. The time zone is an annoyance, the questionable software update support, the lack of certification for the Google Play Store, and the unreliable experience with other reader apps makes this an easy verdict: do not buy. The price, $120 as of this writing, may be tempting as a low-cost Android E Ink e-reader that gives access to all the different ecosystems, but there are better options to consider.
If price is critical and you don’t mind the risk and the constant restarts, then go for it. Alternatively, if audiobooks or listening to Spotify while reading is something you really want at this price point, it will work. I’ve included an affiliate link below. I don’t recommend this device for most readers, but if you want to research it further or make your own decision, you can purchase it through this link.
If you want to take a risk and get the next model up (OBOOK6 64 GB with 4 GB of RAM) it is only $150 as of the time of this writing. The additional 2 GB of RAM may solve the issues we experienced, but I cannot make any promises.
One option to consider and one I’d rather recommend over the OBOOK6 is to buy a second-hand, used Kindle, Nook, and/or Kobo. While Kobo runs on Linux and is not compatible with Kindle or Nook apps, it is compatible with Libby and Overdrive. Kindle allows Libby books to be sent to it (assuming you have access to Libby from a phone). Nook would be by itself, so you’d want to pair it with either a used Kindle or Kobo.
Another option is to save your money a little longer and buy a more expensive established brand, such as a Boox e-reader (stay tuned for that article in the coming weeks). I’ll give you a hint; it’s a better experience despite being more than twice the price.
A final option? Just use your phone if you can stand it.
Perhaps OBOOK will fix some of these issues with either a software update or model refresh down the road, but for now, pass unless you really want it.
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