Kindle Oasis: For £270, Amazon's pricey e-reader is thinner and lighter but not waterproof

Amazon has finally unveiled its new eighth generation Kindle called the Oasis with a steep price tag of £270 ($381) in the UK, making it the priciest Kindle ever. The latest Kindle is almost 30% thinner and 20% lighter on an average than any other Kindle and starts shipping from 27 April. In the US, the device will cost much less— $290 — like most Kindles in the past.

The high price has taken most by surprise, given that a Kindle is an e-reader and not even a tablet and its other counterparts — Kindle (£59), Kindle Paperwhite (£109) and Kindle Voyage (£169) — are all considerably cheaper. But the company seems determined about the product and is looking to position it as a premium version of their flagship device Kindle, which is still the most popular e-reader in the market despite many new entrants.

On the Amazon UK website, the Kindle Oasis' features have been detailed as:

The highlight here is the battery and the battery charging case. It's a known fact that Kindle is preferred over other tablets due to its long lasting charge, which lasts up to days. The Oasis as per Kindle can run on a single charge for months. We don't know if this is without the case, as the case is itself a charger, or with frequent use of the case. Whatever it may be, a device lasting for a month on a single charge is definitely a thumbs up.

The rechargeable battery when plugged in with a cable and to the Oasis at the same time will charge both simultaneously. When unplugged, the cover's battery will be zapped first before the device switches to its internal one.

Amazon has also introduced a new hibernation mode when the cover is attached where the Oasis will only use the bare minimum amount of charge required to stay powered on after one hour of inactivity. This works like a doze or battery saver mode in mobile phones. The disappointment though is that Oasis is neither waterproof as many speculations were made nor is there substantial boost in processor speed.

With such a high price, we don't know how users will receive the product and whether there will be sufficient demand for it as Kindle content can be accessed from non-Kindle devices now, so paying such a high price may not be everyone's cup of tea. Nevertheless, e-readers like tablets generally have longer shelf lives than other mobile products due to which one may invest on a good solid product for it to last long enough.

To check out how the Oasis fares compared to previous Kindles, click here.