Amazon is launching a new tablet line called Alexa Tablets, and the devices go on sale October 14th. The lineup bears little resemblance to the Fire tablets Amazon has sold for the last 15 years, and the company has dropped the Fire name entirely. Amazon says the tablets are built to put Alexa Plus at the center of computing life while also functioning as capable tablets in their own right. The move puts Amazon in more direct competition with Apple's iPad Mini and base iPad.
The most significant change is the software. The Alexa Tablets run full Android with Google Play support, meaning buyers get access to all Android apps rather than Amazon's prior app-limited environment. Amazon apps and shortcuts to Prime Video and shopping are still preloaded. Panos Panay, Amazon's SVP overseeing hardware and Alexa, said Google Play was a necessity, full stop. Panay said the hardware, not Android, was the top priority, and that he told his team to start from zero and avoid any components the company had used before. He said the Alexa Tablet was two and a half years in the making.
Three devices make up the lineup. The Tablet 8 has an 8.7-inch screen and starts at $229.99, positioned largely for reading. The Tablet 11 has an 11-inch screen and starts at $329.99, aimed more at watching video. The top model is the Alexa Tablet 12 Pro, which starts at $499. It measures 6.5mm thick, weighs 550 grams, and offers either 8 or 16 gigs of RAM with either 128 or 256 gigs of storage. It uses a MediaTek Dimensity 8400 processor.
Panay said the screen was the product's non-negotiable feature, describing a concept he calls the "one thing." The 12.5-inch display has a 2800 x 1840 resolution, a refresh rate up to 120Hz, and 500 nits of brightness. Its 3:2 aspect ratio is intended for running two Android apps side by side. The most expensive $549 model includes what Amazon calls a Nanomatte display, produced with Corning by etching a texture into the glass itself. Amazon says the result offers richer contrast and less glare than a typical display, with fewer tradeoffs in contrast and sharpness than competing approaches. The screen also adjusts to content, warming its color in the Kindle app and rendering comics with extra gloss.
Amazon also made a keyboard case and a stylus for the tablets, and Panay said he hopes buyers will use them as secondary or even primary computers. The company has spent the last few years developing the LLM-powered version of its assistant and positions Alexa Plus as more than a smart home tool. On these devices, users can ask Alexa about anything on the screen, and the chatbot will offer recommendations, find information, and attempt to sell products from Amazon.com. Alexa Plus appears nearly as pervasive on the tablets as Gemini or Siri is on competing devices.
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