BOOX Palma, 6GB, 128GB, Black

A phone-sized E Ink tablet that's brilliant for reading and terrible for everything else. Buy it if your eyes are begging for mercy, skip it if you just want a cheap e-reader.

For an E Ink device, the Palma absolutely rips. The octa-core CPU lands in the 70th percentile, which doesn't sound wild until you remember this thing has no video to push. BOOX's Super Refresh Technology actually works, ghosting is minimal, and flipping through apps feels closer to a budget phone than a sluggish e-reader. The 6GB of RAM is middle of the pack, but Android apps don't need much headroom when you're mostly reading and scrolling. The 16MP rear camera is a head-scratcher, but hey, you can scan documents and pretend you're not carrying a second phone.

The Palma doesn't really compete with the iPad Pro M5 or Surface Pro 11, those are full-blown tablets with LCD screens and completely different use cases. The more honest comparison is against a Kindle Paperwhite or Kobo Clara. The Palma beats both on flexibility, you get the entire Play Store instead of one bookstore, and the phone-sized form factor is genuinely more portable. But the Kindle and Kobo crush it on battery life and price. If you want a dedicated reading device that lasts weeks on a charge, get a Kindle. If you want a pocket computer with an E Ink screen, the Palma is the only game in town.

At CAD 630, the Palma is a tough sell if you just want to read books. A Kindle costs a fraction of that. But you're not buying a Kindle, you're buying a pocketable Android E Ink device that runs whatever reading app you want. The affordability percentile sits at 36th, so it's not cheap, but it's also not pretending to be a budget e-reader. If you're deep in the Kindle, Kobo, Libby, and Pocket ecosystem and want one device for all of it, the price starts making sense.

The BOOX Palma is a weird little device that makes total sense once you hold it. It's a phone-sized E Ink tablet that slips into your pocket and does one thing brilliantly: reading without frying your eyeballs. The 300 PPI Carta 1200 screen is crisp, the octa-core CPU keeps things snappy, and the eye comfort score sits in the 97th percentile, which is basically the whole point of this thing. If you've ever squinted at a phone screen at 2 AM and thought 'there has to be a better way,' this is it.

If you're looking for a cheap, simple e-reader with weeks of battery life, this isn't it. Go get a Kindle Paperwhite and call it a day. If you want a tablet for video, games, or drawing, the Palma's E Ink screen will drive you insane. This is a reading-first device for people who live in multiple reading apps and want one pocketable gadget to rule them all.

The BOOX Palma is a niche device that nails its niche. It's not for everyone, but for the right person, it's the best thing on the market. If you read on your phone constantly and hate what it does to your eyes, this is the fix. If you just want to read books and nothing else, save your money and get a Kindle.