The Kindle Oasis wasn’t the first ereader to have an offset design with page buttons on one side of the screen, but it was the device that popularized that type of design, along with the 7″ screen size.
Now just about every ereader company sells their own Oasis clone with a similar asymmetrical design and a 7″ E Ink screen, and most have started selling color versions with color E Ink screens now too. In fact, at least 4 different Oasis clones with 7″ color E Ink screens will hit the market this year.
Kobo has the new Libra Colour, and it seems to be off to a good start, as they’re having trouble keeping it in stock. It’s the least expensive 7″ color ereader at $219, which is $30 less than the base Kindle Oasis sold for before it was discontinued earlier this year.
PocketBook recently released the PocketBook Era Color for $259. It might have the nicest design of all the Oasis clones, and it’s the 5th color model that PocketBook has released so they should know what they’re doing by now.
On the Android side of things, there’s the Bigme B751C (pictured above) that was released a few months ago. It’s a more expensive option at $299, but the open Android operating system gives it some added versatility with being able to install apps.
There’s a rumor that Onyx is about to release a Boox Page C with a 7″ color E Ink screen in June, and considering they just slashed $30 off the price of the regular Page model that rumor is most likely true—I’d bet good money on that.
With all these new 7″ Oasis clones with color E Ink screens coming out this year, you can’t help but wonder if Amazon has any plans to release a 7″ color model as well.
Will they bring the Oasis back with a color option? That seems unlikely at this point with the Oasis being discontinued, but you never know with Amazon. After 5+ years of ignoring the 10″ eNote market they finally released the Kindle Scribe. At some point a color Kindle is going to happen; they can’t ignore that segment of the ereader market forever. With E Ink mass producing these 7″ color screens now, a Kindle Oasis Color seems like the most likely option.
