Amazon Fire 7 tablet (newest model) 7” display, read and watch, under $60 with 10-hour battery life, 16 GB, Black

Bought this for a reason most people probably would not, but I purchased this to make it into a streamdeck for my Twitch account. Honestly, it works amazing. As the way it stands there are so many android apps (Free) that turn tablets into such great tools you cannot pass it up. It has multiple pages with multiple buttons that can do everything say an Elgato stream deck could do. It may not have the "physical" button feel, but this is much cheaper! It has worked through many streams and recordings. The buttons always work and you can even get into the "coding" side of making custom buttons for different things while streaming. All of this was just for streaming! Imagine the other uses it could be for the price! The screen size is big enough where the buttons are large enough to see and read. The screen is clear enough for me to see the buttons from even far away (other side of the room). The touch screen has not lost any responsiveness and the battery life is fantastic. If I do not crank the brightness to 100 this has lasted me multiple full-length streams. P.S I got a tablet stand for it. It's amazin.

Excellent product and price

I snagged this latest 12 th gen 7” fire tablet at one of amazons sales $39 in late 2023. The latest chip and 2 gigs RAM makes a real difference compared to a 7” fire I had a couple or so years ago. Last one was basically useless, slow, crashed, and the book reader could not even smoothly do page curl turns. BUT THIS ONE IS DIFFERENT. IF YOU ARE A BOOK READER I ASSURE YOU THERE’S A LOT TO LOVE HERE. (and see one more surprising positive below in my update). The kindle app is flawless and almost snappy on this device. Page turning page curls are smooth and totally free of stutter or lock up like the earlier generation. It has a LOT of nits of brightness - surprisingly VERY bright even for my somewhat older eyes. Making text a bit larger is great (if your vision can use that help) and the screen resolution is totally fine for reading text, no issues at all even though it seemed like it’s a bit lower resolution in its specs. I leave it full brightness and still the battery lasts forever. Given a choice of the e-ink kindle costing much more, and this tablet (I have both) this little 7” fire tablet is FAR SUPERIOR FOR BOOK READING THAN THE e-ink tablet: it is more responsive, agile in changing text size, and lots of nits of brightness for easy reading. If you buy it ONLY as a dedicated book reader, and especially if you get the $39 price - it’s a steal and an incredibly under recognized useful budget reading tablet. Scale of 1-10 as a book reader I give it a 10. No question. More pros: surprisingly solid feel, no bending or creaking- really feels solid in the hand. Not too heavy but it’s not like so paper light that it feels flimsy. I recommend you get a case however cheap, because it is a little slippery to hold. Current OS on it is reasonably responsive and has not once ever crashed. Ok now some practical comparisons. As a tablet it is maybe a 4 on that same scale of 1 to 10: it is not super fast opening apps, the selection of fire available apps is poor, and you should accept that this is not a high end android or apple tablet. Yet, several streaming apps work flawlessly and you can watch media on it but the screen is a little washed out on color and lower resolution when your eyes compare to a high end tablet, or iPhone or 4k TV. The silk browser does work, just not super fast. The USB C charging port (!) was a splendid surprise, and the files app built into the OS let’s you surf a USB flash drive you can plus into that USB port which is surprising and kind of really cool FOR A THIRTY NINE DOLLAR TABLET! I did find that USB 3.0 maybe 3.1 works plugged into the USB C port but not USB 3.2. Last note: it has a standard headphone jack. Streaming audio including Spotify through headphones gives very very good sound. Shockingly the OS is sophisticated enough that you can plug a USB C to 3.5 mm female headphone adapter and plug headphones into that and it DOES stream the sound that way to headphones too. Sound quality seems identical either way. Portable, fun, great book reader, quite competent on card game apps and streaming apps including Netflix, Amazon prime, HULU, Disney, other free streamers like Crackle and Pluto and more; long lasting battery life, quite solid, lots of fun and so budget priced that if these capabilities sound appealing just buy the thing you will love it. Great toy to add to the small electronics fun gadgets in our lives. Update 11 22 23: one more positive to note: surprising but absolutely true: just discovered that Facebook's Messenger app will handle video calling and the result is extremely good - even shockingly good; sharp image, no dropped frames, perfect clean sound quality. Years ago it would have been impossible to imagine an inexpensive tablet gadget that could do video calls like that; yet, here we are. Outstanding!

The Amazon Fire 7 tablet has good and bad points, but for the price, it’s hard to complain too much. The biggest downside is definitely the sluggish performance; apps take a while to open, and navigating the tablet can feel slow, especially if you’re used to faster devices. On top of that, I’ve noticed the user interface actually gets a little worse with each update, becoming less intuitive and more cluttered over time. That said, there are a lot of positives. It’s lightweight, easy to toss in a bag, and the battery life is impressive. I mainly use it for reading ebooks, listening to audiobooks, and watching downloaded videos, and it handles those basic tasks just fine. For more demanding apps or web browsing, it wouldn’t be my first choice, but if you’re looking for something affordable for reading and light media use, the Fire 7 is a solid option.