That’s fair enough in a budget tablet, but I digress.Īs it turns out, the octa-core 2GHz MT8183 chip that runs the show here is a pleasant surprise. Historically, MediaTek chips have not exactly provided stellar performance and you tend to see them in lower-cost phones and tablets.

If you follow technology closely you may well have sighed a little when you saw the processor in the Fire HD 10 is a MediaTek chip, rather than a Qualcomm equivalent. Amazon Fire HD 10 (2019) review: Performance That means it may struggle in the brightest sunshine but if you’re only planning on using the tablet indoors, you won’t face any problems. Indeed, it’s actually slightly lower than the 2017 Fire HD 10 and the 2018 Fire HD 8 which both reached 455cd/m2. The only slight downer is that, at a max screen brightness of 398cd/m2, it’s far from the brightest panel we’ve tested. No, it’s not the kind of high-quality panel you get on the 10.2in iPad but it does the job and is more than you have any right to expect for the price. Contrast is a decent 890:1, meaning that the onscreen image looks nice and lively and streaming TV is very watchable. Our colourimeter measured an sRGB coverage of 86.7% from a volume of 87.1%. It’s an IPS panel and it’s actually rather a good one for the price. The “ten” in the Fire HD 10’s name is shorthand for the size of the screen – 10.1in to be exact. Having to resort to an APK of a program designed to keep all your passwords safe felt too risky to try, which meant a fun time manually entering gratuitously long passwords for everything. While Amazon’s own app store has most of the popular bases covered there are some key omissions, most seriously for me: LastPass.

It’s basically fine but takes a little getting used to and you’ll have to sideload the Google Play store if you want access to the full range of Android’s apps: a process that’s not too daunting, but beyond the scope of most casual buyers all the same. This is a heavily skinned version of Android that has the main purpose of pushing Amazon products at every opportunity, whether it’s the store, Kindle books, Audible titles or Amazon Prime TV shows. It’s all good stuff and it feels nice enough in the hands, but there’s one thing that continues to divide opinion: Fire OS. So what gives? The price discrepancy can be explained by three unique features it offers over the regular version. I was sent both for this review and the hardware is identical, only the child-friendly version is £50 more. (No buying link here: trust me, I’m doing you a favour.) Amazon Fire HD 10 (2019) review: The Kids Editionīefore I get into the full review of the Fire HD 10, I should quickly highlight its sibling: the Kids Edition. Seriously, r eviewing the £90 Vankyo MatrixPad Z4 tablet should be classified as cruel and unusual punishment by the United Nations.

Good examples, like the 10.2in 2019 Apple iPad, are significantly pricier, starting at £350, while budget rivals tend to be dreadful. The 8in middle ground is £80 but again only comes with 16GB of storage and weaker specifications all round.Īll Amazon so far but rivals from other manufacturers are pretty hard to come by. By contrast, the 7in version will cost a third of the price at £50, although as well as the other drawbacks mentioned in the previous section, it also only includes 16GB of onboard storage.

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