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Barnes & Noble NOOK GlowLight 3 vs Kindle Paperwhite

Product Comparison: Barnes & Noble NOOK GlowLight 3 vs Kindle Paperwhite

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Barnes & Noble NOOK GlowLight 3 6" eReader

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Kindle Paperwhite E-reader (Previous Generation - 7th)

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General Specifications

Brand

Barnes & Noble

Kindle

Model

GlowLight 3 (BNRV520)

Paperwhite

Origin

China

About the Product

More Features & Contents Our Highest Resolution Enjoy crisper text, enhanced contrast, and a glare-free, scratch-resistant screen. Featuring GlowLight Illumination It’s powerful enough to read in bed or in the bright light of the sun. NOOK’s most advanced Ambient (Always-On) GlowLight technology lets you enjoy an evenly dispersed light....

Kindle Paperwhite offers Bookerly, an exclusive font crafted from the ground up for reading on digital screens. Warm and contemporary, Bookerly is inspired by the artistry of the best fonts in modern print books, but is hand-crafted for great readability at any font size.

Key Specs

Screen Size

6 in.

Screen Resolution

300 ppi

Backlit Display

Yes

Barnes & Noble NOOK GlowLight 3

Kindle Paperwhite

Barnes & Noble NOOK GlowLight 3

Kindle Paperwhite

What customers say about "Key Specs"

Barnes & Noble NOOK GlowLight 3 6" eReader

High pixel density and I can see the difference from the first generation of the device
Drastically improved light bleeding from the top.
It's great, the screen is fantastic, battery life exceeded my expectations.
It's not my first nook, I love them. Great as expected, but could be a bit smaller.
The warm light makes reading so much better at night. The size is about right, light in weight, and easy to customize.

Kindle Paperwhite E-reader (Previous Generation - 7th)

The backlight looks great. It's a perfect size. And because it's one page at a time, you overcome another annoyance of physical books.
First and foremost, it feels so good reading one hand with it. It is perfect for one hand use: perfect weight, perfect size, perfect grip. I like the feel of it so much I just can't put a case on it. I purchased a sleeve for it when it's not in use.
The screen is beautiful. Being able to read either in complete darkness or in direct sunlight is a thing of beauty - especially coming from an iPhone.
I wish the screen had a bit more contrast. It seems like the Voyage might excel here but for the price difference I'm still satisfied.
Lighting issues - obviously, not all Kindles are made with the same tone of lights
There is no way to make a black background while having lit text. This makes reading before bed very frustrating since I don't want such a bright light shining in my face. Because this is when I do my most reading, it loses two stars for not including this basic feature.

Size & Weight

Height

6.9 in.

6.7 in.

Width

5 in.

4.6 in.

Depth

0.34 in.

0.36 in.

Weight

6.9 oz.

7.2 oz.

Barnes & Noble NOOK GlowLight 3

Kindle Paperwhite

Barnes & Noble NOOK GlowLight 3

Kindle Paperwhite

Barnes & Noble NOOK GlowLight 3

Kindle Paperwhite

Barnes & Noble NOOK GlowLight 3

Kindle Paperwhite

Features

Color

Black

Control Type

Touchscreen

Adjustable Brightness

Yes

Adjustable Font Size

Yes

Supported Media Formats

ePub, PDF, Adobe DRM ePub and PDF, JPG, GIF, PNG, BMP

Kindle Format 8 (AZW3), Kindle (AZW), TXT, PDF, Unprotected MOBI, PRC natively, HTML, DOC, DOCX, JPEG, GIF, PNG, BMP through conversion

Interface(s)

Micro USB

Battery Type

Lithium-ion

Lithium polymer

Extras

GlowLight Illumination, Night Mode, Comfortable Design, Free Lifetime In-store Support2, Now with B&N Readouts

VoiceView screen reader, Amazon's largest high-resolution display, Ideal for one-handed reading, Free cloud storage for all Amazon content

What customers say about "Features"

Barnes & Noble NOOK GlowLight 3 6" eReader

The dictionary search function is now better. Pressing and holding a word gives you the definition straight away. Before, you had to press and hold, and select the option to get the word definition which was a very unnecessary extra click.
So, for all the software short falls, this absolutely wins for ergonomics and hardware. I get why the bezel is so large now as well: If you make it any smaller you can't hold the device one handed.
The sideloading books, though, disappear from the shelves after each reboot or loading of new books. A little annoying at the beginning but I have learned to live with it. As an e-reader, it has its own tiny flaws but nothing takes away the satisfaction from reading using the Glowlight 3.
Do not buy if you want to use it to get books from your library. It does not work. And Barnes & Noble has terrible customer service. I have spent 4 months trying to resolve this issue and they are only good at giving me the runaround.
Only remark I have (my fault for not researching enough) is the lack of an SD card.

Kindle Paperwhite E-reader (Previous Generation - 7th)

The battery lasts forever. I've had it for almost a week now, and haven't had to charge it yet. The battery is still quite full.
You can plug it into your laptop and load other books (but sometimes it won't even with some common formats)
Easier access to configuration settings, i.e. better user interface
Also appreciate the ease of changing dictionaries once the definition comes up.
The battery life has dropped from 8 weeks at ½ hour of reading per day to 6 weeks at ½ hour of reading per day (Roughly 28 hours to 21 hours). That is due to the additional energy required for the higher resolution screen and the power to render the higher resolution of text.
Swiping the screen to unlock. I have plenty of tablets that require me to swipe them to start using them. It's not something I ever wanted in a reader.

Warranty / Certifications

Manufacturer Warranty

1 year(s)

Certifications

FCC, CE

Other Information

Manufacturer

Link

MSRP

119.99 $

Manual

Link