Amazon has unveiled its next-generation Fire HD 8 tablet, an update of the 8-inch tablet last refreshed in May 2017. It is priced still at USD 79.99/EUR 89.99 and available for pre-order. The tablet will come in a choice of Black, Marine Blue, Punch Red or Canary Yellow and will ship on 4 October.
Amazon also announced the new Fire HD 8 Kids Edition tablet for USD 129.99/EUR 124.99, also now available for pre-order and shipping from 4 October. The tablet is available in blue, pink and yellow. As a special introductory offer, the tablet can be had in a multi-pack option. For example, two tablets will be priced at USD 194.98, saving USD 65. The tablet comes with a kid-proof case and a two-year guarantee. Amazon notes: “if they break it, return it and we’ll replace it. No questions asked.”
The Fire HD 8 tablet sports an 8-inch HD display, a 1.3 GHz quad-core processor and 1.5 GB of RAM, 16 or 32 GB internal storage with support for 400 GB more, and ten hours of mixed use battery life. It has front and rear facing cameras and there is also Show Mode, with full screen visuals that complement voice responses from Alexa. The device is tough, with Amazon saying it's twice as durable as the iPad mini 4.
It also features Dolby Digital Plus and Dolby Atmos, dual-band Wi-Fi support, and other Amazon-exclusive features like ASAP, For You, X-Ray, Second Screen, Amazon FreeTime, Family Library, Blue Shade, On Deck or Prime Video downloads. The tablet gives access to movies, TV shows, songs, books, magazines, apps and games, with free, unlimited cloud storage for all Amazon content. There is also Screen Sharing, where an Amazon expert can help guide a user remotely through any feature on the screen, available free 24x7.
The new tablet can be paired with the Show Mode Charging Dock, priced at USD 39.99. Bundled together, the tablet and the dock carry an introductory discount, together priced from USD 94.99.
The Fire HD 8 Kids Edition also has an 8-inch HD display, 32 GB of storage with up to 400 GB of expandable storage via a microSD card slot, and up to 10 hours of battery life. The tablets, which Amazon said were developed to look real and not like a toy, support up to two adult profiles (accessible with a PIN) and four child profiles.
The tablet comes with a year’s worth of Amazon FreeTime Unlimited. The service delivers over 20,000 premium books, videos, audible books and as a new feature, more than 1,000 titles of Spanish-language content. The educational apps and games have been curated for age-appropriateness, and the service provides access to tens of thousands of hand-selected websites and web videos as well as parental controls.
