Introducing the Kobo Libra Colour, the most inspiring eReader yet. This innovative device brings a spectrum of gentle hues to your reading experience, enriching every page with colour.
Rakuten Kobo's CEO, Michael Tamblyn, stated, “We are pleased to be the first global eBook platform to offer affordable colour eReaders, bringing both your books and our bookstore to life with a beautiful spectrum of gentle hues. It’s everything you love about print, with all the benefits of eReading. For Kobo, colour is a way of deepening and enriching the reading experience, while keeping the daylight readability and battery longevity that E Ink screens deliver so well.”
The Kobo Libra Colour was released in April 2024.
The Kobo Libra Colour continues the trend of offering really good value.
Key Features and Benefits
- Colour E Ink Display: Book covers, illustrations, and note-taking come to life with vibrant colours.
- Kobo Stylus 2 Compatibility: Mark up and highlight your eBooks in colour, adding depth and personality to your pages.
- Ergonomic Design: A curved form fits perfectly in your hand, with page-turn buttons and customizable screen rotation.
- ComfortLight PRO: Reduces blue light throughout the day for restful reading at night.
- Waterproof: Meets IPX8 rating, ensuring protection for up to 60 minutes in up to 2 metres of water.
- Sustainable Design: Thoughtfully made with recycled and ocean-bound plastic, and designed to be repairable.
- Ample Storage: 32 GB of storage can store up to 24,000 eBooks or 150 audiobooks.
- Long Battery Life: A single charge lasts up to 40 days based on 30 minutes of reading per day.
- OverDrive Integration: Easily borrow library books.
Pricing and Availability in Australia
The Kobo Libra Colour retails for $359.95 AUD at select retailers. Pre-orders were available from April 10.
Read also: Libra 2 E-Reader Review
Australian book retailer Booktopia is offering a discount on the pre-order price of the Libra Colour. By using the code SENIORSSA10 at checkout, customers can save an additional 8.9%, bringing the price down to just AU$291.60.
The Kobo Stylus 2 is currently available and retails for $119.95 AUD.
Availability to purchase off shelves from April 30, 2024
Design and Display
At first glance, the Kobo Libra Colour looks almost identical to the Libra and Libra 2.
The Kobo Libra Colour looks identical to the Libra 2, which I think is great - why fix something that isn’t broken?
Read also: Color E-Readers Compared: Kobo Libra Colour and Kindle Colorsoft
The page-turn buttons and the slightly curved thicker bezel make the ereader really comfortable to hold and use in one hand.
The right side bears the same two navigational buttons, which are primarily used to flick back and forth between pages without having to swipe across the screen itself.
Around the back, you’ll find a nice textured finish and the power button in the top right-hand corner, which can be used to put the tablet to sleep or turn it off altogether.
The 7-inch E Ink Kaleido 3 plastic display supports up to 4,096 hues (or colours) and is pretty much as good as it can get in an e-reader at this point in time.
The Libra Colour puts out 150ppi (Pixels Per Inch) in colour and 300ppi in black and white.
Read also: Used Kobo Libra 2: A Review
The ComfortLight Pro, standard in previous Kobo models, also helps automatically adjust brightness in various situations and times of day, so that it never feels like a strain on the eyes.
The entire thing is still encased in plastic, which is made from 80% recycled materials, including ocean-bound plastics.
It’s quite impressive that Kobo has managed to keep the weight of the device down despite using a larger capacity battery in the Libra Colour. It weighs just 199.5g without a case, which is lighter than the Libra 2 that tips the scales at 215g.
Kobo has ensured the stylus stays magnetically secure on the edge of the slim bezel.
Kobo Stylus 2
With Kobo Stylus 2 compatibility, you can dive deeper into your favourite stories by marking up meaningful moments and highlighting powerful passages in the eBooks you love.
In addition, for every reader who is also a journaler, in-the-margins note-taker, or page-decorating BookTok’er, Kobo Libra Colour is also Kobo’s most affordable stylus-enabled ereader with the addition of a Kobo Stylus 2 (sold separately), with colour handwriting, highlighting, and notebooks.
We’ve obviously touched on the new Kobo Stylus 2 as it adds to the e-reader in so many ways, but I must stress here that while fantastic, adds to that initial A$359.95 purchase by tacking on another A$119.
It now allows for USB-C charging as well, making it lighter than the original pen, which required a single AAA battery.
You can choose the ink and highlight colors, plus the type of pen, the thickness of the nib and more.
Writing on the Libra Colour is different to how it feels like on the Kobo Sage or the Elipsa 2E - it’s a lot smoother, not at all like writing on actual paper.
It feels like you’re writing over a sheet of very smooth plastic, with no friction at all and I can't say I'm a fan.
Software Experience
The overall software experience feels as familiar as you would expect.
Users can even sign into their Dropbox and Google Drive storage facilities to transfer books over.
It even works both ways, as the Kobo app on your phone can even transfer these back and forth, should you want them then and there.
OverDrive is still available to all users who wish to borrow books with a valid library card instead.
Should you lean into the Kobo Stylus 2, you can also access Kobo’s Advanced Notebooks, which can help you add diagrams and graphs to your notes, and even translate handwriting to text.
I’ve always been a fan of Kobo’s user interface - it’s streamlined, very easy to navigate and wrap your head around.
There is now the My Notebooks tab smack bang in the center of the bottom navigation bar.
This gives you the full suite of Kobo’s writing features, including the Advanced Notebooks that I said made the Kobo Elipsa 2E a better note-taker than the Amazon Kindle Scribe.
Every time you select a tab from the bottom navigation bar, it changes color from black to brown.
Everything else about the Libra Colour is quintessential Kobo - good file format support, including EPUBs that Amazon requires you to jump through hoops to read on a Kindle.
There are a total of 10 document file types that Kobo supports by default, and this includes text and comic formats.
There are also four image files supported.
As I’ve mentioned earlier in this review, you can sign into either Dropbox or Google Drive to help transfer books.
The partnership with Google is relatively new, so Kobo has a single-page instruction sheet (in PDF) already in the device’s library.
It’s very seamless to use either cloud service, and that also holds true for transferring any notes or notebooks.
The latter can also be accessed via the Kobo app on your phone if you need any of them in a pinch.
True to form, it only inverts the text colors, not any book covers or notes.
If you don't want to use the dark mode, there are amber LEDs that allow you to change the white light hue to warmer tones to help you reduce the blue light emitted by the screen.
Technical Specifications
Here’s a quick look at the Kobo Libra Colour’s key specifications:
- Display Type: E Ink Kaleido 3
- Screen Size: 7 inches
- Resolution: 300ppi for B&W; 150ppi for colour
- Processor: 2GHz
- Frontlight: ComfortLight Pro (warm and cold)
- Storage: 32GB (non-expandable)
- Battery: 2,050mAh
- Water Protection: IPX8
- Software: Linux based
- Connectivity: Wi-Fi, Bluetooth, USB-C
- File Support: 10 document, 5 image, 1 audio
- Dimensions: 144.6 x 161 x 8.3 mm
- Weight: 199.5g
Eco-Conscious Design
Given Kobo’s continued commitment to more eco-conscious practices, Kobo Libra Colour will join the new lineup of eReaders made with recycled and ocean-bound plastics.
This diverts CDs and DVDs from landfills and plastic bottles from the planet’s oceans.
The packaging for the devices is also made with 100% FSC certified recycled paper and are printed with soy ink.
All three new devices are repairable so that customers can extend the life of their eReader and replace components.
Additional SleepCovers
Additional SleepCovers for Kobo Libra Colour are designed with magnets inside the case to snap it into place effortlessly and a 2-way stand to keep eReaders upright for hands-free reading in both landscape and portrait orientations.
The SleepCovers are made with recycled materials and available in three shades, Black, Dusk Blue and Butter Yellow, and retails for $49.99 CAD/$39.99 USD.