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Amazon is the latest tech giant to increase prices across its lineup of smart home devices — and this also includes popular Kindle models.
In addition to devices such as the newer Echo Dot Max, Echo Show 21, and some Fire TV sticks, Amazon’s basic Kindle and mid-range Kindle Paperwhite e-readers have shot up by up to 60%. The only Kindle model that hasn’t seen a price hike is the premium Kindle Scribe.
Amazon’s price increases quietly landed over the weekend without an official statement from the retailer, but luckily the online outlet Fortune spotted the new price tags when conducting a review — who also shared that Ring doorbells are the only Amazon devices that haven’t been hit with a price adjustment.
The outlet also provided a full breakdown of the devices affected by the price hike, which you can view below:
Though Amazon didn’t issue any form of official explanation for this, a spokesperson released a statement to Fortune to offer more insight, sharing that consumer tech is “facing significant increases in memory and storage component costs. After absorbing these increases for as long as we could, we recently adjusted pricing across our product lines”.
2026 really has been the year of the price hike for the tech world, and it’s not just Amazon that’s been affected. Apple raised its Mac, iPad, and HomePod prices in June, while services like Spotify hiked subscription plans earlier this year and the same goes for YouTube Premium.
Price hikes are regular as clockwork at this rate, however some users don’t seem to mind as much if the product in question is of value and has a lot to offer. But take devices such as the standard Echo Dot and basic Kindle for example, two entry-level models in their respective areas, a $30-$40 increase seems a little unfair.
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Though the Echo Dot is a basic speaker that gets the job done, its audio output and smart features aren’t worth over $50 in my opinion. The same goes for the basic Kindle, an e-reader with basic functions, which you also have to pay more for if you want an ad-free experience.
As you can imagine, Amazon’s latest price increase hasn’t settled well with Kindle users, especially since Amazon’s e-readers are one of the company’s best sellers. Redditors have been posting non-stop about this, one user replied to a post saying ‘I hope nobody buys these and prices go down’ — however, bookworms are sharing ways to score these devices for cheaper in the wake of the price hike.
Now, users are reverting to third-party discount sites to get their hands on Kindle e-readers for a fraction of the new prices. Many users replied under the same Reddit post recommending Unclaimed Baggage, a site that sells on devices found in lost luggage from airlines.
For example, Amazon’s premium Kindle Scribe Colorsoft e-reader is the best part of $680, while Unclaimed Baggage has offers for half of that. This isn’t the only third-party retailer however, Redditors have also recommended Woot, an online deals site run by Amazon where you can access hundreds of deals across electronics.
One of the better sides to these third-party options is that they’re not limited to Kindles, they also have a number of listings for other devices in Amazon’s latest price increase. That said, Redditors aren’t ruling out Facebook Marketplace for finding offers on gadgets — you never know what the person around the corner from you wants to get rid of.
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