Latest Update: New ebook readers arrived! Our pick is the Kindle Fire, and here you can find a good Kindle Fire review. For the sole purpose of reading, choose either the best price all-new Kindle (the simplest eReader), or the Kindle Touch (for easy control with touch screen).
Before talking about choosing between the Kindle and the Nook, let’s talk about two other popuplar reading devices in the market. First of all, if you are looking for wide and cheap option of books, do not buy the Sony Reader, it does not have such a good choice of books and the books that are available are also costlier than the other ebook readers.
For the iPad, it does not offer a comfortable readability option as it is more like reading on a computer screen.
You can have a look at the below which is the comparison of the Nook with the Kindle from the official B&N page:
From the above page you can get to know the advantages of Nook over the Kindle, but the below are the benefits of the Kindle 3 over the Nook which is not mentioned in the Nook page:
- Though both the Kindle and the Nook has both a Wifi + 3G and a Wifi only version and both contains a basic internet browser, the internet browser of the Nook comes with a limitation. You can only use the Wifi and not the 3G wireless to browse the internet in Nook, whereas you can use either the Wifi or the 3G to browse internet in the Kindle.
- You can use the wireless in the Nook only for the purpose of buying books and that too only inside the U.S. In the case of Amazon Kindle, it provides free international 3G wireless which can be used in about 100 countries which means you can browse and download the books without any charge even from countries outside the United States.
- The Kindle now has a faster, and an improved browser which is more easy to control and also incorporates a new ‘article mode’ which shows only the main text of web pages.
- The Amazon Kindle is available in almost 176 countries outside the U.S while the Nook is on sale only inside the United States. And in case you are able to buy a Nook outside the U.S, you would still find problems in buying books for the Nook as they are sold only inside the U.S.
- The ‘text-to-speech’ is a special function that is not available in the Nook but is present in the Amazon Kindle. This function helps treat an ebook like an audio book.
- The Nook offers a battery life of 10 days while the Amazon Kindle can last for more than a month with the wireless switched off.
- The Nook is equipped with the microSD memory expansion slot, while the Kindle has a 4GB built-in memory that is almost double that of the Nook. The expansion slot of the Nook is good for flexibility, though with the 4GB memory the Amazon Kindle can hold on to about 3500 books which should be enough for an average user.
- You get a wider option of copyrighted ebooks in Kindle as compared to the options available in the Nook, maybe because of the effort Amazon has put in its development for the last 2 years. The Nook also talks about millions of books that are available for reading, but many of those are actually non-copyrighted books available in public domains which are free on other websites also. You can refer the below link to check millions of free books that work on the Amazon Kindle.
Full list for millions of free books available for the Kindle
- The ‘LendMe’ function in the Nook is one good feature provided by it, but there are limitations to it that only 30% of the books can be lent while in other books this functionality is blocked by the provider. There is a further constraint that these books can be lent only once and for just a maximum of 14 days. The Kindle also has a similar feature where you can share all your purchased books to about 5-6 Kindle devices which are registered on a single Amazon account. The most important aspect of the feature is that you have the flexibility of registering and deregistering your Kindle to many different accounts as many times you require.
- The Nook supports epub format while the Kindle supports mobi format. Refer the link below to know more about the calibre software which helps convert from one format to another.
- The feature of one hour free reading of books in the Barnes and Noble store is one another selling point of the Nook. But this might not be a platinum feature as to the fact that even paperbacks are available for free reading when you are in the Barnes & Noble store.
- The Nook has options on different colors of back cover, while the Kindle also has a good number of color choices on covers. Check out here for options available for the Kindle.
- When you take a look at the Nook, it is but natural to assume that the Nook ebooks can be read through a color touch screen. The truth is that the color touch is a small screen that is below the greyscale eInk screen which can only browse the ebook cover in Nook. Books can only be read with the greyscale eInk screen on the Nook.
To sum it up, I would say that the Kindle 3 is superior to the Barnes & Noble Nook though I would have agreed for a draw if it would have been the Kindle 2 and the Nook. In case you are a frequent traveller and you enjoy the reading experience during travel, then you should try out the Kindle 3.
You can find out the latest price of the ebook readers in their corresponding homepage, where changes to prices are reflected immediately.