- FIRE HD 8 VS FIRE HD 8 PLUS ANDROID
- FIRE HD 8 VS FIRE HD 8 PLUS SOFTWARE
- FIRE HD 8 VS FIRE HD 8 PLUS TRIAL
- FIRE HD 8 VS FIRE HD 8 PLUS PLUS
The screen is another area where compromises have been made, and it's not as sharp or as bright as you would get from something at the premium end of the market. Loading up your movies, or websites, or ebooks all works well, as long as you don't try and overdo it. In use, we found the tablet perfectly fine, if a little on the slow side – it's noticeable but it's not a major issue. Having a gadget that works as an Echo Show is almost worth the price of admission alone, and then you've got all the added extras of using it as a tablet too.
FIRE HD 8 VS FIRE HD 8 PLUS PLUS
In fact, Alexa is one of the most impressive parts of the whole Fire HD 8 Plus experience, quite apart from the physical device itself (just as it is with the Echo speakers). You can ask Alexa for the weather forecast, start playing something from Prime Video, control your smart home, start up some music, and so on. Alexa is baked right into the operating system, and the Amazon Fire HD 8 Plus works a lot like an Echo Show at times, especially if you buy the optional charging dock (Amazon even calls it Show Mode). Of course if all you want to use are Amazon apps then you're well covered.
FIRE HD 8 VS FIRE HD 8 PLUS SOFTWARE
Some of the gaps (such as YouTube and Airbnb) you can fill in by using the mobile websites instead, but it's worth bearing in mind before you buy an Amazon tablet – besides the hardware, you need to know what limitations the software has as well. There's no Slack, no Airbnb, no Uber, no WhatsApp. Most video streaming apps are here, including Disney Plus, Hulu, Netflix and Plex, but some of the others are missing. That's going to put off some potential buyers, but won't bother others at all – it really depends what you're planning to do with your tablet.
FIRE HD 8 VS FIRE HD 8 PLUS ANDROID
If you're new to Amazon's tablets, they run an adapted version of Android known as Fire OS, though it's nothing really to do with Google – a lot of key apps are here however (including Spotify, Netflix and Instagram), but there are no Google apps at all, so you'll have to do without Gmail, Google Maps, YouTube and Chrome. After that, Amazon's video and audio services, as well as Alexa, are kept front and center while you're using the tablet.
FIRE HD 8 VS FIRE HD 8 PLUS TRIAL
You'll certainly be left in no doubt that what you've got is an Amazon device You'll go past two or three special trial offers for the likes of Audible before you've even reached the home screen.
It's all as you would expect if you've used an Amazon FIre tablet before. We do like the new colors introduced this year – the slate, plum, white, black, and twilight blue options are much better than the gaudier options that came with the previous model (we're testing the standard black model here).Īn iPad this is definitely not, with its chunky bezels and its lower resolution screen, but it's also much cheaper than Apple's line of tablets – a trade-off that a lot of people are likely to be willing to make. You get an 8-inch, 1,280 x 800 pixel LCD screen, a matte back finish that's pleasing to the touch, and stereo speakers that will do the job for movies and shows (a headphone jack is also included). It's not a massive upgrade, but wireless charging is convenient, and that extra RAM is always handy for keeping apps and games responsive. The Plus model should also charge a little bit faster. The 2020 Plus model adds wireless charging capabilities and more RAM – 3 GB instead of 2 GB – over the 2020 Fire HD 8.
The storage options are now 32 GB and 64 GB (up from 16 GB or 32 GB), battery life increases from 10 hours to 12 hours, and a USB-C port replaces the old microUSB one. Neither the new Fire HD 8 or the Plus model we're reviewing offer a huge leap forward from the previous Amazon Fire HD 8 that launched in 2018 (Amazon tends to stick to the same naming all the time, so it's really only by the year of release that you can tell them apart). It continues the long run of solid, cheap, reliable devices, and we've been testing one out for the past few days. The Amazon Fire series has been offering budget tablets to the masses for almost a decade now, and the Amazon Fire HD 8 Plus is the newest in the range (alongside an updated Fire HD 8).