Amazon’s best-selling Kindle is an even better value than usual right now
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AmazonWhenever someone asks me which Kindle they should get, I immediately suggest the Kindle Paperwhite.
It's a step up from the standard Kindle in terms of functionality, but can be a tough sell since it's also more expensive.
If you're fine buying a certified refurbished product, though, you can pick up the Kindle Paperwhite for the price of the baseline Kindle.
Certified refurbished products from Amazon come with an — at minimum — 90-day warranty, so you'll get about three months to test it out.
Two big features separate the Kindle Paperwhite from the regular Kindle: a higher screen resolution, and integrated backlighting. With a screen resolution of 300 pixels per inch, the Kindle Paperwhite's screen is nearly twice as sharp as the screen on the regular Kindle. Screen sharpness matters a lot when you're staring at a screen for hours at a time, and that's especially true when you're reading text.
The Kindle Paperwhite's screen is so high resolution that your eyes probably won't be able to distinguish the Paperwhite's e-ink display from text in an actual book.
Having a Kindle with a backlit screen is very useful when reading at night. Instead of relying on an external light, you can switch on the backlights and continue reading. In many cases the external lights we use to read throw off far too much light to begin with, so your nighttime-reading experience should actually improve if you pick up a Paperwhite.
If you've been considering giving digital reading a try, this is an offer you don't want to miss out on. There are even more high-end Kindle models, but the Kindle Paperwhite sits in the sweet spot for most people. The price of the refurbished model makes it the only e-reader I'd feel comfortable recommending.
Certified Refurbished Kindle Paperwhite E-reader, $79.99, available at Amazon