Amazon Fire HD 8
An affordable and welldesigned entertainment device, especially if you subscribe to Amazon Prime
SCORE PRICE £67 (£80 inc VAT) from pcpro.link/290fire8
Where the Kindle Fire 7 is a no-frills entertainment device that’s affordable enough to dish out to the whole family, the Fire HD 8 offers a slightly more grown-up alternative – but not too grown-up.
The Fire HD 8 looks much the same as the Fire 7 and is offered in the same fun and vibrant colours. We looked at the “Canary Yellow” version, which we liked far more than we expected to, but there’s also “Marine Blue”, “Punch Red” and boring old black. The button and camera placements are also the same as on the Fire 7, though the larger frame of the Fire HD 8 allows space for stereo speakers, which lack punch, but offer respectable volume.
The obvious and most important upgrade over the Fire 7 is the screen, and the 1,280 x 800 8in IPS panel is a distinct improvement. Text and icons look sharper, thanks to the 189ppi pixel density, but there is still a slight fuzziness around the edges of text, which isn’t apparent on the more expensive Android competitors with their higher-density screens. Still, it’s enough to allow Amazon Prime video content to stream in HD, something that many of the far more expensive devices fail to achieve due to inadequate DRM certifications.
The processor gets a bump too, though the MediaTek MT8163 is still far from a powerhouse, placing the Fire HD 8 third from bottom in the
Geekbench 4 tests. That said, the single-core score of 644 and multicore score of 1,854 are dramatically faster than the Fire 7. It also managed to complete the GFXBench Manhattan test, albeit with an uninspiring score of 9fps, but this does at least mean that modest 3D gaming is possible. The 1.5GB of RAM helps when switching between apps, though there are still limits to what you can do.
With a bigger 4,750mAh battery capacity, the Fire HD 8 looped our test video for 13hrs 4mins, which is the best out of all the Android devices, bar the Samsung Galaxy Tab S4.
All Amazon tablets work best when partnered with a subscription to Amazon Prime, and the Fire OS interface makes it simple to reach all of your Prime content. It’s a smooth experience and far more intuitive than having to open individual apps. Alexa is integrated too, so you can control your smart home devices and voice control your video and music choices.
Affordability is one of the strongest features of the Kindle Fire tablets, and at £80 for the 16GB model and £100 for the 32GB version, both of which are often discounted by £20, the Fire HD 8 is superb value for money. If you simply want a solid entertainment device, and have a Prime subscription, it’s a great choice.