Xteink X3 evaluate: the tiny eReader that also is smart — Gadget Flow

“Compact” is likely one of the most overused phrases in tech advertising and marketing. Most of the time, it simply means barely smaller than final 12 months’s mannequin. The Xteink X3 truly earns the phrase. It weighs 58 grams. It’s below 5mm thick. It’s nearer in dimension to a stack of index playing cards than to something you’d usually name an e-reader.

Here’s how this gadget stands out in its strategy and design.

Design and construct

Coming in at 3.7 inches and 58 grams, the X3 is sufficiently small to slot in your shirt pocket or a laptop computer sleeve’s card slot. And that too, with out including noticeable weight. There’s no bezel drama, no try and appear to be a shrunken pill. It reads as precisely what it’s: a slab of display with simply sufficient physique round it to carry.

The bodily page-turn buttons are the element I really feel must be known as out. Many small e-readers depend on contact or gesture controls to save lots of area. This would possibly sound environment friendly till you’re attempting to show a web page one-handed on a practice. However, the X3 doesn’t make that promise, and that’s what makes it one in every of a form.

The MagSafe attachment

The built-in magnetic ring, designed to snap onto the again of an iPhone, is straightforward to dismiss as a gimmick on paper. It isn’t one in apply. A number of “innovative” accent tips are options on the lookout for an issue. This one solves an actual one.

Most of the time, your cellphone is both in your hand or on the desk in entrance of you. Now, let’s come to the fundamentals: the entrance of it normally does what telephones do. These embody notifications, messages, and no matter app opens with out pondering. As quickly as you flip it over, the again turns into a studying floor as an alternative. No pop-ups, no feed, no infinite scroll ready to catch your thumb.

It’s a small mechanical trick, however the impact is actual. You’re not switching gadgets. You’re switching sides of the identical object, and that’s a lower-friction approach to construct a studying behavior than opening a separate app or reaching for a separate gadget throughout the room.

The display and the distraction-free pitch

“Distraction-free” will get slapped on so many merchandise now that the phrase barely means something by itself. Usually it’s a settings toggle sitting on high of a tool that’s nonetheless constructed to tug your consideration elsewhere.

The X3 doesn’t work like that. The five-tone reflective E Ink show can’t run social apps, autoplay video, or push notifications. There’s nothing to withstand as a result of there’s nothing pulling at you within the first place, which is a meaningfully completely different setup from a cellphone’s “focus mode,” which asks you to make use of willpower in opposition to a instrument crafted to undercut it.

The reflective display can be constructed to carry up in direct daylight, which is strictly the place many cellphone and pill screens quit.

Where it suits and the place it doesn’t

On a brief commute, pulling out a full pill for twenty minutes looks like overkill, however a card-sized reader suits the second precisely. Packed in a carry-on through which all grams get negotiated for, a 58-gram reader wins the argument in opposition to a 300-page paperback with out a lot of a struggle.

Now, let me additionally discuss what this isn’t. There’s no entrance mild right here, so studying at nighttime isn’t a part of the deal. If you ask me, I wouldn’t advocate that both. There’s no touchscreen and no help for third-party studying apps exterior Xteink’s personal ecosystem. If you desire a bigger show or a reader that doubles as a mini pill, this isn’t that gadget, and it isn’t attempting to be.

Who can buy this

The X3 is smart for commuters reclaiming transit time, college students who want one much less factor to hold between lectures, and vacationers who’ve made peace with packing mild. It additionally is smart for anybody who likes the concept of a cellphone that sometimes has a quieter facet to flip over to.

It doesn’t make sense if you would like one gadget to do every thing, or if entrance lighting is required for a way you learn.

The verdict

Plenty of merchandise chase the phrase “minimal” with out altering how they’re truly used. The X3 is likely one of the few latest devices the place the scale isn’t only a spec on a web page. It adjustments whether or not the gadget will get picked up in any respect. Sometimes essentially the most helpful improve isn’t extra options. It’s much less to consider earlier than you open a guide.

Madhurima Nag is the Head of Content at Gadget Flow. She side-hustles as a parenting and STEM influencer and likes to voice her opinion on product advertising and marketing, innovation and devices (in fact!) on the whole.