The estimated reading time for this post is 8 minutes
If you’re looking to get a high quality tablet without spending a lot, check out the Amazon Fire HD 8 tablet. This latest version of Amazon’s Fire line of tablets offers a lot of features for a low price.
Design
The Fire HD 8 has an 8″ screen that’s long and narrow. The screen seems well designed for reading books and watching movies. The narrow design means you can fit the tablet in the pocket of your jeans (though I don’t recommend you do that).
The screen is crisp and clear. Images and videos are bright and sharp. While the display isn’t the best of any tablet, the quality of the screen is impressive, especially for the price.
This tablet is thin and light, weighing in at 11.0 oz (311 g) and measuring 8.4″ x 5.0″ x 0.3″ (214 x 128 x 7.7 mm).
The tablet is encased in a smooth, shiny plastic and comes in black, blue, magenta and tangerine. Amazon sent me a magenta one for review and the color is a pretty pink with purple tones. The colored plastic makes the tablet seem as if it’s more designed for fun than business. My daughters thought the color was great.
If you don’t like the plastic back you can get a cover, which is probably a good idea with any tablet to protect it from scratches, falls, etc. If you don’t like the fun colors you can opt for black.
At the top of the tablet reside the power button, charge port, headphone jack and volume buttons. If you’re charging your device and listening with headphones while you read, you could be competing with cords to view the screen. An easy fix is to just flip the screen 180° so the display rotates and top of the tablet becomes the bottom.
Two Dolby stereo speakers are on the side of the tablet. The sound was excellent for a tablet, and you can connect the Fire HD 8 to Bluetooth speakers if you want better sound.
You can choose from 8 GB or 16 GB of storage for an extra $20. The storage is expandable up to an extra 128 GB with a micro SD card. Amazon gives you unlimited storage in the Cloud for the Kindle books, videos and music you get from Amazon.
While the Fire HD 8 processor isn’t the fastest in the market, the tablet performed well, opening and switching between apps quickly. Even with music playing in the background, apps opened quickly, books downloaded swiftly and videos played seamlessly, without lagging or stuttering.
Navigation
The Fire HD 8 shows you a quick tutorial when you first turn on the tablet to help guide you through using it. You can rewatch the tutorial at any time by swiping down from the top of the screen, tapping Help, then Tutorial.
The Navigation Bar appears at the bottom of the screen when you tap that area. A left-pointing arrow takes you back to the previous app. The circle icon takes you back to the Home page. The square button shows you all the apps you have open, stacked so you can close any you’re not using any more.
Swipe down from the top of the screen to reveal Quick Settings. From there you can adjust settings such as brightness, auto-rotate, airplane mode and more.
Battery Life
The Fire HD claims 8 hour battery life and I found that to be accurate during heavy use. Turning off the power seems to preserve the battery without depleting it. I had the power turned off for a week and the battery was at 100% when I turned it back on.
Camera
If you’re looking for a top-of-the-line camera you should probably get one on your phone. When was the last time you took a photo with your tablet or saw someone taking a photo with a tablet?
The Fire HD 8 comes with front and rear-facing cameras so you can take photos and selfies. You can also use the front camera with the Skype app for the Fire for video chats.
The rear-facing 5 MP camera can take photos but probably won’t be the reason you consider the Fire tablet.
Apps
Amazon has 300,000 apps in the Amazon Appstore but be sure that your must-have apps are there. You won’t find Instagram or Periscope but you will find Facebook, Facebook Messenger, Evernote, Pocket, Twitter, Netflix, Dropbox and more.
Amazon Underground offers thousands of apps for free, including upgrades, that cost money in other app stores. Go to Apps => Store => Underground to see the apps available through Amazon Underground.
Check out Amazon Underground for more information on getting free apps.
Features
Word Runner
The Fire HD 8 comes with Word Runner, a feature that helps you read Kindle books faster. You’re shown one word at a time on the screen and you can increase or decrease the speed of your reading. Adjust your speed from 100 to 900 words per minute to see how fast you can go while still understanding what you’re reading.
To learn more about Word Runner, check out Word Runner – A New Way to Read Kindle Books.
ASAP
ASAP stands for Advanced Streaming and Prediction. The Fire (and other Amazon products that have this feature) figures out what Amazon Prime shows you like to watch and pre-loads these shows so they stream instantly.
You can also download videos from Amazon Prime onto your Fire HD 8 so you can watch them even when you’re not connected to the Internet.
See, Amazon Prime Now Has Free Downloads for Movies and TV Shows!
This feature can be handy when you want to watch shows during a car ride or plane trip and you’re not connected to the Internet.
=> Learn more at Streaming vs. Downloading Videos — What’s the Difference?.
Blue Shade
When you’re using the Fire HD 8 at night, you can turn on Blue Shade, a filter that helps tone down the brightness of the screen. Blue Shade adds a filter over the screen, as if you were looking through a film that softens the brightness.
You can adjust the brightness and color of Blue Shade in Settings => Display =>. Your color choices range from red candlelight to yellow moonlight. That’s right, Blue Shade isn’t blue, it’s supposed to filter blue light.
If you’re someone who likes to use your tablet before you sleep at night, this feature may help you get better rest. According to Amazon, “Blue Shade is like sunglasses for your screen; it blocks blue light, which may make it easier for you to fall asleep after nighttime reading.”
FreeTime
Fire Tablets offer parents a lot of control and supervision with a feature called FreeTime. Parents can monitor and restrict how their children use apps and the Internet on Fire tablets, while letting your children have unlimited time for reading.
You can set a separate profile for each child to control how long they use apps and see how much they are reading. FreeTime is free.
Mayday
Using Mayday, Amazon’s 24/7 live support, is a bit different on this version of the Fire. Go to Settings => Help => Phone & Email to have a customer service representative call you. You’ll have the option of letting the representative see your screen and draw on it so you can see how a feature works.
See, Mayday on the New Kindle Fire – A Game Changer in Tech (Support) for more information about Mayday.
Sponsored Ads
The Fire HD 8 shows you sponsored ads on your lock screen unless you pay $15 to remove them. Or you could think of it as Amazon is willing to pay you $15 to see ads.
If this sounds familiar, that’s because Amazon has offered similar deals on its Kindle ereaders for a while. But on the Kindle the ads seem less intrusive and are mostly books you might be interested in reading.
On the Fire, the ads show as soon as you turn on the power and are bright and in full-color. They seem more obvious than the Kindle ads and may not be what you want to see when you turn on your Fire.
Unlike the Kindle, you can’t change your mind and remove the ads later for the blue, magenta and tangerine tablets, only for the black model. I’m not sure why, but as of this writing that’s the case.
You may want to get the black HD 8 to reserve the ability to remove ads later should they seem intrusive to you.
Pros and Cons
Pros
- Price
- Screen
- Word Runner
- ASAP
- Blue Shade
- Expandable storage
- Amazon Prime content
Cons
- App selection is limited
- Sponsored Ads can only be removed on black tablet
Who This Tablet Is Best For
If you’re looking for a high quality tablet at a low price, consider the Fire HD 8. Amazon Prime members can get a lot of content for free, displayed on a sharp screen with a fast processor.
You can get two of these tablets for the price of an iPad Mini and get features unavailable on other types of tablets.
Consider what you would do most with the tablet. If you use a lot of apps, make sure they’re available in the Amazon Appstore and read the reviews. If you mostly watch videos, surf the Internet and read books, then the Fire HD 8 may be a good fit for you.
Availability
The Fire HD8 is available from Amazon with Sponsored Ads for $129.99 for 8 GB and $149.99 for 16 GB of storage. You can remove the Sponsored Ads for $15 on the black model.
Your Thoughts
Which features of the Fire HD 8 are most important to you? Would you like to try Word Runner, Blue Shade, FreeTime or other features of the Fire? Which features would you like to see on the Fire HD 8?
Share your thoughts in the Comments section below!
Wow, a lot has changed since the first Kindle Fire which I bought several years ago. I swapped it out for a Galaxy Tab last year, which granted costs much more, but feel it was worth the money. My Fire kept dropping the internet; same thing happened to a friend of mine. That drove me crazy. It would lose the signal right in the middle of a video. I can’t watch Amazon prime on the Galaxy Tab though; that is one bummer.
I just got the Amazon Echo which is a fun toy, so if I bought another Fire it would be nice to have the same verbal abilities that Echo has built in. Maybe that is asking too much for such a low price.
Hi Carolyn,
Amazon Fire HD8 really sounds good. I’ve a 7-inch tablet at home that my daughters use but reading your review makes me think that I should go for an upgrade. 🙂
The colors seem perfect for my teenagers. The cloud storage is really helpful and the battery is what causes most frustration if it runs out too soon. So, it’s good that this is not the case here. And, you’re right about leaving the job of photos and selfies to the smartphones.
I like the concept of blue shade to save the eyes from injury. Now, the Word Runner feature makes me think if we should have it on blogs too? What are your thoughts?
Thanks for this wonderful review. Have a nice rest of the week, and we meet Next Year now 🙂
Hi Harleena, Yes, when my girls saw this magenta Fire tablet they wanted to upgrade their Fire tablets right away. But the one I tested needs to be sent back as it was only sent to me for review.
Word Runner is very cool, especially if you want to increase your reading speed. You focus on one word at a time, which helps with concentration. Great idea, I hope Amazon does expand Word Runner to blogs.
Blue Shade is helpful for those who read before they go to sleep. If your girls do that then this tablet might be a good fit for them.
Happy New Year, Harleena!
Amazon fire HD 8 seems like a next big thing. $149 it seems like a best deal
Hello Carolyn, It seems great! I really want to buy the best kindle for e-books, but was always confused. After reading your blog my confusion got totally cleared and now I can buy the best one. Thank you for sharing this article.
Hi Ken, Yes, buying an ereader can be a tough decision, but the Fire is really a tablet not an ereader. If you’re looking for a dedicated ereader with an eInk screen, you should consider a Kindle. If you’re looking for a tablet that can run apps and search the Internet, then you should consider the Fire.