Amazon Fire HD 8 (2022) review: Spot the difference?

Amazon’s Fireplace HD 8 pill has, for an extended whereas, been our choose of the vary. It sits within the center between the smaller Fireplace 7 and larger Fireplace HD 10.

This new 2022 mannequin is nearly indistinguishable from the 2020 mannequin, however is now dearer. All the pieces is dearer, sure, but it surely grates to pay extra for a brand new system with little in the way in which of actual upgrades.

We referred to as the Fireplace HD 8 a “sensible combo of perform & worth” in 2018, a “finances pill no brainer” in 2019 and mentioned it was “nonetheless positive worth” in 2020.

However now, in 2022 with basically the identical limitations, identical poor cameras, identical display screen, gradual charging and no perceivable enhance in efficiency, it’s a lot tougher to suggest it.

Options & design

• Plastic construct
• Headphone jack
• Usual design

Amazon calls the 2022 Fireplace HD 8 “All-new”. However put it facet by facet with the earlier technology and also you’ll want a spot-the-difference competitors to establish any exterior adjustments.

The buttons and USB-C port have been rearranged barely, however aside from that, this is similar pill with a chunky bezel across the display screen and a cheap-feeling plastic body and again.

There’s a useful headphone jack, splendid for when children need entertaining on lengthy journeys, and two audio system within the high edge for if you don’t wish to use headphones.

They might help Dolby Atmos, however that doesn’t imply they sound good. You received’t wish to hearken to music on them and so they’re solely satisfactory for watching movies on Netflix and Amazon Prime Video.

Jim Martin / Foundry

If there’s a spotlight it’s that the Fireplace HD 8 has one of the best battery lifetime of the Fireplace pill vary at “as much as” 13 hours. That’s yet another than the Fireplace HD 10 and three greater than the Fireplace 7.

How lengthy you truly get between costs depends upon what you employ the Fireplace HD 8 for. Watching downloaded movies is pretty energy environment friendly so ought to get near the declare, however enjoying Roblox or different video games will critically shorten the battery life.

And the unhealthy information is that it takes 5 entire hours to cost from empty.

As earlier than, Amazon presents a Plus model of the Fireplace HD 8 which prices $20 / £20 extra, however costs in three hours, has extra RAM and provides wi-fi charging too.

Each variations can be found with both 32GB or 64GB of storage, and you may nonetheless add a microSD card to broaden that by as much as 1TB further.

Display

• 1280×800 pixels, 189ppi
• IPS LCD

One of many causes we’ve historically really helpful the HD 8 over the Fireplace 7 is as a result of it has a bigger, greater decision display screen. Most telephones lately have screens nearly as massive because the Fireplace 7, however with a lot greater resolutions.

Even now in 2022, the HD 8 nonetheless has the identical display screen it’s all the time had, with no upgrades. This implies a decision of 1280×800 pixels which equates to 189 pixels per inch.

To place that in context, even finances telephones have screens with round 400ppi. But Amazon has caught resolutely to the identical decision yearly. I wouldn’t name it ‘blocky’ but it surely’s not as sharp as you would possibly anticipate from a model new system, and that’s noticeable if you’re studying pages of textual content.

Jim Martin / Foundry

I didn’t have the 2020 mannequin handy for direct comparability, however the display screen on the brand new model seems to be decrease high quality.

It isn’t notably vibrant, the backlight isn’t very even throughout the display screen and brightness and hues change as you progress the pill in your arms and take a look at the display screen at an angle.

Colors are positive and, total, it’s acceptable for a finances pill, but it surely’s disappointing that there’s no enchancment, and presumably even a slight decline in high quality.

Software program

• Locks display screen adverts
• No Google apps or providers
• Designed for Amazon providers

A very powerful factor to know about Fireplace tablets is that they aren’t Android tablets. They do run Android beneath Amazon’s extremely customised Fireplace OS interface and so they do run Android apps.

The important thing distinction is that there are not any Google apps or providers. No Gmail, YouTube, Maps, Photographs, Drive or the rest. And that features the Google Play retailer.

To put in apps, there’s Amazon’s personal Appstore. This has a wide selection of in style apps and video games, however a much smaller total selection than the Play retailer.

Jim Martin / Foundry

So long as you don’t have to do on-line banking or use particular sensible house units from a Fireplace pill, you’ll be okay.

Leisure is nicely coated with apps for many of the big-name streaming providers within the Appstore.

You may management many sensible house devices with Alexa on the Fireplace HD 8, however solely if in case you have one other system resembling an Android telephone or iPhone on which to put in the app and join it to Alexa.

You received’t discover apps for Google House, Nest, Philips Hue, TP-Hyperlink Tapo, WiZ or Samsung SmartThings within the Appstore.

It’s attainable to make use of Amazon’s Silk net browser to observe YouTube and use Gmail and Google Maps, however the expertise – in comparison with having devoted apps – isn’t practically pretty much as good.

Fireplace OS is as an alternative designed to make it easy to entry Amazon’s providers resembling Prime Video, Kindle, Amazon Music and – after all – to purchase bodily merchandise from Amazon.

Except you pay further if you purchase a Fireplace HD 8, you’ll see adverts for such services on the lock display screen, and so they change each time you activate the pill. If these will trouble you, then it’s $10 /£10 further to not see them.

Fireplace OS itself is pretty intuitive, with a House display screen containing apps, lately used apps and a Uncover part that largely promotes Amazon’s personal content material.

There’s a For You display screen that additionally has a listing of lately used apps together with “Watch subsequent” for Prime Video and solutions for different apps and video games you would possibly wish to obtain.

Jim Martin / Foundry

Swipe down from the highest and also you’ll discover a brightness management, varied shortcuts to settings resembling Wi-Fi and Bluetooth, plus a toggle change for Present Mode.

Enabling it turns the Fireplace HD 8 into an Echo Present, displaying rotating house screens with information, climate, recipes and different issues.

Efficiency

With earlier Fireplace tablets, I haven’t run our typical Geekbench and GFXbench exams. There are two causes for this. First, it was awkward to put in these apps as a result of they weren’t on the Appstore. Second, the outcomes would have been meaningless to most individuals trying to purchase an inexpensive pill.

Each apps at the moment are on the Appstore, however neither would work correctly or give any outcomes. Geekbench 5 crashed on the finish of every take a look at and didn’t file a rating, whereas GFXbench refused to connect with the back-end servers to obtain the benchmarks.

This implies I can’t say for certain if the additional two processor cores make the HD 8 30% quicker as Amazon claims.

What I can say is that this pill nonetheless feels underpowered. Even swiping across the house screens and the notification shade can depart you ready for the display screen to catch up, and apps take longer to load that you simply’d anticipate.

The Silk browser floor to a halt each time I  tied to go to any complicated net pages, resembling Google Photographs. It crashed a very good few instances and stop again to the house display screen, too. A lower than splendid expertise when you’re attempting to make use of Google providers.

Jim Martin / Foundry

Present Mode works okay, though it isn’t as responsive as an actual Echo Present. When you have different Echo units, you’ll in all probability discover they reply first earlier than the Fireplace HD 8 has received its act collectively.

Cameras are the identical 2Mp ones discovered within the Fireplace 7 and plenty of Fireplace tablets over the previous few years. It’s onerous to overstate how unhealthy they’re. The rear one captures smeary pictures and jerky video, whereas the entrance one is enough for video calls, however not selfies.

The underside line is that that is nonetheless an inexpensive pill and has accordingly entry-level efficiency.

Value & availability

• Begins at $99.99/£99.99
• Advert-free mannequin is $10/£10 extra
• 64GB of storage provides $30/£30
• Fireplace HD 8 Plus is $20/£20 greater than equal non-Plus mannequin
• Youngsters Editions value $149.99/£149.99

The place the Fireplace HD 8 used to value $89.99/£89.99, it’s now on the cusp of $100/£100. And also you’ll pay $10/£10 extra for the ad-free mannequin.

Should you assume 32GB isn’t going to be sufficient storage for apps, video games and downloading movies to observe, the 64GB mannequin is an additional $30/£30.

Go for the Fireplace HD 8 Plus and also you get an additional 1GB of RAM (which makes nearly no distinction) and wi-fi charging. That’s $20/£20 further.

You should buy the Fireplace HD 8 from Amazon, naturally, however quickly you’ll additionally be capable to purchase it from different retailers. On the time of this assessment, on the pill’s launch date, it was solely obtainable from Amazon.

There’s a selection of black, denim (blue) and rose (pink).

Amazon additionally sells the Fireplace HD 8 in two completely different children variations. One is named the Youngsters and is aimed toward ages 3-7, and the opposite is the Youngsters Professional aimed toward 6-12s.

Each value $149.99/£149.99 and comes with a protecting case. The Youngsters mannequin has a chunky bumper case that’s simple to carry and presents glorious safety.

For older children, the Professional has a slimmer case in a collection of extra grown up designs, and a extra grown-up interface too.

Each embrace a 12 months’s subscription to Amazon Youngsters+ which incorporates a wide range of age-appropriate content material together with video games, e-books, audible books, movies and extra, all of that are ad-free.

Within the UK, the youngsters tablets have 32GB of storage within the UK, however within the US you’ll be able to go for 64GB when you’re keen to pay an additional $30.

As ever, they arrive with a two-year guarantee that covers unintentional harm. The common Fireplace HD 8 (and Plus) has a single 12 months of guarantee that doesn’t cowl harm.

It’s value noting that the common fashions embrace the Amazon Youngsters app, which lets you lock down the pill at sure instances, select what content material your children can use and prevents them utilizing the unfiltered web.

You received’t discover an important finances pill for a lot underneath $200/£200, however you’ll discover some suggestions in our roundup of one of the best finances tablets.

Verdict

Fireplace tablets could also be low cost, however the brand new HD 8 – particularly when you go for the additional storage and select the ad-free mannequin – is getting fairly costly.

You is likely to be completely happy to just accept the constraints of the Appstore and never having any Google providers, but it surely’s value realizing you should purchase a similar-spec Android pill for nearly the identical cash. Samsung’s Galaxy Tab A7 Lite is accessible from Amazon.com for simply $109, and within the UK for underneath £120 from varied retailers together with Argos.

It presents related efficiency and construct high quality, however will at the very least have all the same old Google apps, together with the Play retailer.

There are a great deal of un-branded (or no-name) Android tablets to be discovered on Amazon for even lower than this, too.

I’m certain market forces have dictated Amazon can not promote Fireplace tablets as cheaply because it as soon as did, however with nearly no enhancements to be seen over the previous few years (until you depend the USB-C port) this 2022 Fireplace HD 8 doesn’t characterize the good worth it as soon as did.

Amazon Fireplace HD 8 (twelfth gen): Specs

• Fireplace OS (primarily based on Android 11)
• 8in 1280×800 HD IPS touchscreen, 189ppi
• 2.0GHz hexa-core processor
• 2GB RAM
• 32/64GB storage (microSD as much as 1TB)
• 2Mp essential digicam, help for 720p HD recording
• 2Mp front-facing digicam
• 802.11ac dual-band Wi-Fi
• Bluetooth 5
• 202 x 137 x 9.7mm (7.94” x 5.40” x 0.37”)
• 335g / 1.88oz