The Amazon Kindle Year in Review

The Amazon Kindle E-Reader continues to be the most well known brand in the world and in 2019 they had a great year for sales for hardware, as well as ebooks. The original goal of the Kindle in 2007, was to think of a book and be reading it within 60 seconds. They are the only company to offer free monthly cellular access to the bookstore, as long as you pay extra for the device.

Kindle device sales continue to show year-over-year growth, and the company stated that they had the most successful Black Friday ever for Kindle devices. “Our long term goal is to create a device that allows you to lose yourself in the author’s story. And since the first Kindle launch, we’ve used our customers’ feedback and technological innovations to get us closer to that goal of paper reading, including adding features that go beyond paper. In the last 14 months we’ve had our largest Kindle portfolio refresh ever, including a complete update to our existing Kindle e-reader line up and the addition of a brand new offering just for kids.” Here are a few of the new features:

• In late 2018, we refreshed our most popular and best-selling e-reader, Kindle Paperwhite, by making it waterproof, so now readers can enjoy their favourite books wherever they may be, including in the bath, by the pool or at the beach.
• Earlier this year, we took our entry-level Kindle and made it better by adding for the first time an adjustable front-light for comfortable reading in even more places, all while keeping the price the same.
• With the all-new Kindle Oasis introduced this summer, we added for the first time an adjustable warm light. Now, you can customise the colour tone from white to amber to easily transition from daytime to a comfortable nighttime reading experience. You can even schedule the screen warmth to adjust automatically with sunrise and sunset.
• This autumn, we introduced Kindle Kids Edition, the first dedicated reading experience built just for kids, which includes the latest Kindle, access to over a thousand curated e-books with Amazon Fire for Kids Unlimited, a kid-friendly case, and a two-year worry-free guarantee.

Amazon stated that Kindle book sales grew again in 2019, in thanks to independent publishing, Kindle Unlimited subscriptions and Amazon Publishing. This is due to the sheer amount of new content published on the various platforms from indie authors.

Amazon expanded Kindle Unlimited, with more than a million titles now in the service, including even more of the best-loved authors and books. Along with all seven books from the original Harry Potter series, books by David Walliams, Agatha Christie, Bernard Cornwell, and many more. They added full magazine subscriptions within Kindle Unlimited including BBC Good Food, BBC Top Gear, National Geographic, Marie Claire, Time, and more.

What is next for the Amazon Kindle in 2020? Check out some of our predictions HERE.

Michael Kozlowski is the Editor in Chief of Good e-Reader. He has been writing about audiobooks and e-readers for the past ten years. His articles have been picked up by major and local news sources and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times.